Comparison

Hourglass vs Countdown

Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.

Head to head
About

Hourglass

A minimalistic countdown clock app designed for iPhone. It offers a clean interface with a visual progress indicator and supports multiple time units. Easily share countdowns and receive notifications when events conclude.

Highlights
  • Minimalistic design
  • Multiple time units
  • Visual progress indicator
  • Unlimited countdowns
  • Sharable content
  • Push notifications
  • Notification Center widget
  • Apple Watch compatibility
Features
Read full description

When time doesn't fly, countdown in style with Hourglass. Hourglass is a minimalistic countdown clock for iPhone. It's simplistic, easy to use, and has a beautiful design. Features: - Beautiful, Minimal Design: The flagship feature of Hourglass is its incredible design. The sleek, black background blends seamlessly with the device bezel. No complicated features or in-app purchases, just a clear design with easily readable text. - Multiple Time Units: Simply tap the time remaining to switch between seconds, minutes, hours, and days. - Visual Progress Indicator: The beautiful blue ring surrounding the time indicates the progress of the time remaining to an event. - Unlimited Countdowns: Countdown to as many events as your heart desires. Simply swipe left or right to switch countdowns, and get an overview of all your countdowns by going back to the Countdowns list - Sharable Content: Easily E-mail, Text, or Tweet the time left to an event by tapping the Share icon. - Push Notifications: Get notified when a countdown finally finishes. - Notification Center Widget: Instead of having to open Hourglass, just swipe down to view your Countdowns in the Notification Centre. - Compatible with Apple Watch: Now, you can easily view your countdowns quickly and easily, right on your wrist!

About

Countdown

Visually track important dates and goals with customizable widgets for your Home Screen and Lock Screen. Set up countdowns and count-ups for personal milestones, habits, or deadlines. Sync across devices and receive timely notifications.

Highlights
  • Home Screen and Lock Screen widgets
  • Count up and down timers
  • Recurrent event tracking
  • Calendar and Reminders synchronization
  • Customizable designs and templates
  • iCloud synchronization
  • Notifications for key dates
Features
Read full description

Track time with beautiful countdown widgets on your Home Screen and Lock Screen. Get the results you want by adding beautiful ALWAYS ON motivational countdowns to the device you use every day. On your wrist? On your Mac? Pretty Progress works there, too. Our objective is to support you achieve your goals. We beautifully track your goals so you don’t have to. What better place to remind yourself of the things that matter than the devices you use every day? Your life goals, your health routines, your personal habits, when your newborn arrives, the deadline of your PhD or your mother’s birthday… No matter what your goal is. Pretty Progress gives you beautiful countdowns with widgets to customize and track them all: - Count up & down towards a specific date or with a timer - Create recurrent events and count the days periodically - Synchronize and import Apple Calendar events and Reminders - Show the percentage of completion, how much time is left or how much time has past (time since). In years, months, weeks, days... or a combination of them - Beautiful and unique designs. 6 different templates to customize and add to your Home Screen, Lock Screen, Stand By (iOS 17), and Watch complications - Customize colors, icons, layout, fonts, size... and every little aspect of the countdown at any time. Create your own personal Home Screen and Watch Face - A dashboard to visualize all the timers and day counters created and understand your deadlines, goals, achievements, or recurrent tasks - Notifications: 1 week and 1 day before, and at the end of your countdown, and every day, week, month or year after your habit streak - A library to get inspired and create widgets easily - 3 different sizes for the Home Screen widgets: small, medium, and large - All Lock Screen widgets localizations available - All complication sizes for Watch Faces supported - Dark mode support - iCloud synchronization. Sync your countdowns on your iPhone, iPad, Apple Watch, and Mac (Silicon) automatically - Family sharing enabled for the PRO purchase WHAT CAN YOU TRACK? - Health routines - Personal habits progress - Countdown to Christmas - Days until your mother's birthday - Countdown to your next holidays - Days until your project release deadline - Days left until your next trip - Percentage of your gym routine complete - Days left until your wedding anniversary - Days until retirement - Days until your financial independence - Percentage of the year, month, week... - Days left until your kombucha is fermented - How many days you have left on your vacations - Countdown to tax submission - Days until your new child arrives - Countdown to that important exam - Days until your graduation - Percentage of the academic year left - Days until Superbowl - My love countdown - Streak of days of habits - Daily, weekly and monthly tasks - Time until your new job WE WOULD LOVE YOUR FEEDBACK: We love to improve, so any feedback is always welcome! For any question, issue, suggestion or anything you want to say, contact at: hi@prettyprogress.app ======================= The free version of Pretty Progress includes four custom countdown widgets with two designs, the default daily, weekly, monthly and yearly progress and some customization options. If you purchase Pretty Progress PRO, the payment will be charged to your iTunes account. If you purchase a monthly or yearly subscription, your account will automatically be charged for renewal within 24 hours prior to the end of the current subscription period unless you disable auto-renew. You can turn off auto-renewal at any time by going to your Account Settings on the App Store after purchase. ======================= Terms of Service: https://prettyprogress.app/terms-of-service Privacy Policy: https://prettyprogress.app/privacy-policy

Screenshots

Hourglass4 screens
Countdown4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is rating: Countdown at 4.7 against Hourglass's 4.0. Countdown also leads on ratings volume (3.1K vs 4). Hourglass's advantage is in-app purchases (none vs 18) and iOS requirement (8.2 vs 18.0). On price, review sentiment, update cadence and ads there is nothing between them.

Scored on Price · Rating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings · Update frequency · Ads · In-app purchases · Monetization · Best chart rank · Devices · Requires iOS

CostPrice · In-app purchases · Ads · Monetization

Both are free to download. Countdown sells 14 in-app purchases, starting at $1.99 per month. Hourglass asks for nothing beyond the download.

ReceptionRating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings

Countdown holds the better App Store score, 4.7 against 4.0. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: Countdown has 3.1K ratings behind it against 4, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews point the same way: 80% of Hourglass's written reviews are positive against 82% of Countdown's.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

Hourglass ships an update fortnightly, Countdown weekly. The most recent releases landed on June 10, 2026 and September 30, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard5 real differences · 5 level
Hourglass versus Countdown: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterHourglassCountdown
PriceFreeFree
Rating4.0 (4 ratings)4.7 (3.1K ratings) — better
Positive reviews80.0% of reviews81.6% of reviews — better
Number of ratings43.1K — better
Update frequencyFortnightlyWeekly — better
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesNo — betterYes
MonetizationFree — betterFree with in-app purchases
DevicesiPhone, iPodiPhone, iPad, Apple Watch — better
Requires iOS8.2 — better18.0
Further details — not scored
Size14 MB183 MB
Age rating4+4+
DeveloperMat Cartmillkeinois OU

Customer experience

Hourglass

All ratings4 ratings
Positive75.0%
Neutral0.0%
Negative25.0%
Written reviews5 reviews
Positive80.0%
Neutral20.0%
Negative0.0%

Countdown

All ratings3,053 ratings
Positive93.2%
Neutral2.5%
Negative4.3%
Written reviews604 reviews
Positive81.6%
Neutral5.6%
Negative12.7%

Bugs and requests

Hourglass

Not enough reviews yet to summarise bugs or requests.

Countdown

Reported bugs

3 issues
  • App crashes on launch for some users
  • Widgets not updating in real-time as expected
  • Countdown data resetting unexpectedly

Requested features

5 requests
  • More customization options for widgets
  • Ability to track non-time-based progress
  • Improved recurring event management
  • Notification/alarm feature when countdown ends
  • Wider range of color and font options

In-app purchases

None

Hourglass

No in-app purchases

14 purchases

Countdown

Subscriptions10
  • Unlimited access7 Days trial$1.991 Month
  • Unlimited access7 Days trial$2.991 Month
  • Pretty Progress PRO (Weekly)$4.997 Days
Show 7 more
  • Pretty Progress PRO (Weekly)3 Days trial$4.997 Days
  • Pretty Progress PRO (Monthly)7 Days trial2 variants$4.991 Month
  • Unlimited access7 Days trial$5.991 Year
  • Unlimited access7 Days trial$8.991 Year
  • Pretty Progress Pro (Annual)7 Days trial3 variants$14.991 Year
  • Pretty Progress Pro (Annual)1 Year trial$24.991 Year
  • Pretty Progress Pro (Annual)$24.991 Year
One-time4
  • Pretty Progress PRO (Lifetime)$29.99
  • Pretty Progress PRO (Lifetime)$34.99
  • Pretty Progress PRO (Lifetime)2 variants$49.99
Show 1 more
  • Pretty Progress PRO (Lifetime)$59.99

Questions

Is Hourglass free?
Hourglass is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Is Countdown free?
Countdown is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Which has better reviews, Hourglass or Countdown?
Countdown is rated higher. Hourglass averages 4.0 out of 5 from 4 ratings, while Countdown averages 4.7 from 3.1K ratings.
Do Hourglass or Countdown have ads?
Neither Hourglass nor Countdown shows ads.
Which is updated more often, Hourglass or Countdown?
Hourglass ships an update fortnightly, and Countdown weekly. Most recently, Hourglass was updated on June 10, 2026 and Countdown on September 30, 2026.

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