# Planetary Social — Community governed social

> Decentralized, peer-to-peer social media prioritizing user control and privacy. (iPhone/iPad app by Verse Communications Inc.)

- Source: https://appshunter.io/ios/app/planetary-social/id1481617318 (this page in markdown: same URL + `.md`)
- Developer: [Verse Communications Inc](https://appshunter.io/developer/1454907197)
- Category: Social Networking
- Price: Free
- Rating: 4.10/5 from 37 App Store ratings · 15 written reviews indexed
- Age rating: 12+
- Requires: iOS 16.0 · 53 MB
- Languages: American English, Catalan, German (Germany), Polish, European Spanish
- Released: 2021-01-13
- Data updated: 2026-08-16
- Monetization: free
- User reviews in markdown: https://appshunter.io/ios/app/planetary-social/id1481617318/reviews.md

## What is Planetary Social?

Peer to peer social media for humans, not algorithms.

Planetary passes data from friend to friend, creating a network that is personal, censorship resistant, and minimizes abuse and spam. Planetary gives you ownership over your relationships and content, and is compatible with any app using the Secure Scuttlebutt protocol.

In Planetary there are no advertisements or artificial intelligence algorithms trying to make you feel a certain way. Your content lives on your device and the devices of those around you, it isn't owned or controlled by a corporation. Experience social networking where you're the customer, not the product.

Unlike most social media, Planetary:

- Does not sell your data.
- Is naturally spam-resistant.
- Compatible with other apps including Manyverse, Patchwork, Patchfox, feedless, and more.
- Works off-grid and offline.
- Allows you to take your friends with you if you decide to move to another client.
- Is open source!

No one company should own the Internet’s public spaces, which is why we’re building on —and contributing back to— the open source Secure Scuttlebutt ecosystem. Their core technologies let us recreate a social network experience, but in a decentralized way that no one organization can dominate.

## Key features

- Peer-to-peer data sharing
- Censorship resistant network
- User ownership of content
- No advertisements or algorithms
- Offline and off-grid functionality
- Open source
- Compatible with Secure Scuttlebutt apps

## Recent user reviews (10 of 15)

All indexed reviews: https://appshunter.io/ios/app/planetary-social/id1481617318/reviews.md

### 1/5 — This app is dead

*2026-08-01*

Hasn't been updated in 2 years and I get server errors

### 1/5 — Dead

*2023-11-03*

Dead application. Doesn’t function at all anymore. Not sure why it is still on the store.

### 5/5 — The new 2.0 version works so fast

*2023-03-08, version 2.0.0*

The updated version is so snappy. 

Planetary is a secure scuttlebutt app which makes it easy to take control of your social media. No cloud services to control you, instead you can choose the algorithims yourself.

### 3/5 — Sounds interesting

*2022-10-31*

Hear a review/discussion about this from the TWIT network of podcasts, thought I’d take a look 😁

### 1/5 — Just… Just… Sigh…

*2022-10-28*

Installed on my iPhone. Set up a user name and avatar.

Installed on my iPad and… there’s no way to log in to my account? Are the accounts device dependent?

This “app” makes no sense.

### 2/5 — Buggy

*2022-10-27*

Tried to give it a chance. Signed up and attempted to learn how to use it. It crashed and froze a few times in the span of about 3hrs. Came back to it a little later and it froze up again. Force closed the app and then when I restarted it, it tried to onboard me again. During the signup it fails (probably because I already have an account) so now I can’t use it at all.

### 3/5 — Nice UI but not ready

*2022-07-28*

For an app that markets itself as being for humans, I was very disappointed to find that there is no way to see which of my real life friends might be using it. So I'm literally just seeing a bunch of crypto posts from strangers. I have no need for more internet junk content that has no relevance to my IRL world. Deleting the app for now, but I'll reinstall it if they add a feature to search for my contacts who are using the app or a way to easily share my posts with friends outside of the app.

### 2/5 — Can't follow anything!

*2021-11-03*

Trying to follow any communities or users just fails, having the button un-check itself a second after you click it. This app is rather worthless until that is fixed!

### 3/5 — Very polished but needs more

*2021-07-20*

Planetary feels very polished and slick but it’s still missing some of the essentials: no way to post a photo or any other media, no quick way to follow somebody when you’ve read their post. Coming along nicely though. Scuttlebutt is a strange place at the moment though, needs more pubs for people to get started - it’s just too empty and too slow to propagate. Great concept though.

### 4/5 — It keeps crashing

*2021-05-01*

Please fix this because I want to use it. Also can you get on other social media and promote your app on there? You don’t have Twitter, VERO, Display, Odysee or anything like that. I honestly think people would use it more if you did that one. One more thing, we need a logout feature because there’s nothing like that on Planetary and I don’t like to stay on apps

## Frequently asked questions about Planetary Social

### What makes Planetary different from other social media apps?

Planetary operates on a peer-to-peer network, meaning your data is shared directly between users and not controlled by a central corporation. It is designed to be censorship-resistant and free from advertisements and manipulative algorithms.

### Can I use Planetary without an internet connection?

Yes, Planetary is designed to work off-grid and offline. Your content can be shared with devices around you, making it functional even without a traditional internet connection.

### Is Planetary compatible with other social apps?

Planetary is compatible with any app using the Secure Scuttlebutt protocol. This includes other popular clients like Manyverse, Patchwork, and Patchfox, allowing for interoperability within the decentralized social ecosystem.

### What is the age rating for Planetary?

Planetary has an age rating of 12+. This indicates it is suitable for users aged 12 and older, generally due to the nature of social interaction and content that may be present.

### How often is Planetary updated?

The latest version of Planetary is 2.1.2, and it was last updated on June 18, 2024. This suggests a relatively active development cycle, with updates occurring periodically to improve functionality and address issues.

### What devices can I use Planetary on?

Planetary is available for both iPhone and iPad devices. This means users with Apple mobile devices can download and use the application.

### What is the user sentiment for Planetary?

Planetary has a rating of 4.1 stars from 37 ratings. This indicates generally positive user sentiment, with most users finding the app to be effective and valuable.

### Does Planetary sell user data?

No, Planetary explicitly states that it does not sell your data. This is a core principle of the app, emphasizing user privacy and control over personal information.

## Version history (last 5 releases)

### 2.1.2 — 2024-06-18

- Remove topical pubs that are shutting down. See %1ao9SOiYKIOyPaqgWBJXXMngpiDyS/GJVIVkqg0Y1PU=.sha256

### 2.1.1 — 2024-06-15

- Add timestamps back to message cards
- Fix max width on top card in thread view

### 2.1.0 — 2023-04-10

Hello friends! Our goal from the beginning was to make Planetary the world's first mainstream iOS client for Secure Scuttlebutt (SSB), a truly distributed social network protocol that doesn't store your data in the cloud. These new v2.0 versions of the app include significant rewrites that apply all our years of peer-to-peer expertise in the SSB protocol, fixing many bugs and performance issues you've noticed for a long time. Your app experience is now faster, more stable, and more intuitive. And for developers, since all of our code is open source, other SSB apps can also benefit from this hard work now and in the future. Enjoy, and as always, let us know of any ideas or bugs via the side nav in the app. 

Improvements:
- Added multi-thread support, you will be able to create new threads by replying to a specific reply.- Added the ability to reply to a follow/unfollow/ignore message.
- Redesigned the screen that shows a specific message/post.

### 2.0.1 — 2023-03-28

- Improved message replication performance.
- Redesigned screen for composing posts with better support for previewing.
- Filter list of followers/follows by name, bio or identity.

### 2.0.0 — 2023-03-08

- Changed the underlying Secure Scuttlebutt implementation which should significantly improve app performance.
- Improved overall stability of the app.
- Added the option to join the Planetary room to the Manage Rooms screen.
- Added the option to reset the Forked Feed Protection when it is triggered. 
- Added block messages to the Home feed. 
- Added support for unicode in hashtags. 
- Added the option to unfollow a Pub you joined before.
- Added an alert if some error occurred while replying to a post.
- Added a button to delete the SQL database in the debug settings.
- Fixed an error alert being displayed when viewing an identity we have no information for.
- Fixed spacing and headings in the Thread screen.
- Fixed bug with calculating the number of new messages in Home screen.

## Apps similar to Planetary Social

| App | Rating | Price | Category |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| [distrikt social](https://appshunter.io/ios/app/distrikt-social/id1590176124) | 4.8 (42) | Free | Social Networking |
| [Bingg Bongg](https://appshunter.io/ios/app/bingg-bongg/id1616509409) | 5.0 (4) | Free | Social Networking |
| [Parallel Social](https://appshunter.io/ios/app/parallel-social/id6455427268) | 5.0 (5) | Free | Social Networking |
| [Flotilla Chat](https://appshunter.io/ios/app/flotilla-chat/id6741344107) | — | Free | Social Networking |
| [Freerse](https://appshunter.io/ios/app/freerse/id6450604093) | 5.0 (1) | Free | Social Networking |
| [Stickifax – nerd social](https://appshunter.io/ios/app/stickifax-nerd-social/id1502933044) | 5.0 (2) | Free | Social Networking |

## More apps by Verse Communications Inc

- [Nos Social](https://appshunter.io/ios/app/nos-social/id1670125746)
- [Divine Video](https://appshunter.io/ios/app/divine-video/id6747959501)

All apps by Verse Communications Inc: https://appshunter.io/developer/1454907197

---

*Data collected daily from the US App Store and indexed by [AppsHunter](https://appshunter.io/). User reviews are verbatim App Store reviews. Ratings, prices and chart positions refresh continuously; this snapshot is from 2026-08-16.*