Comparison

PE Coach 2 vs FreeCBT

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

Head to head
About

PE Coach 2

This app assists individuals undergoing Prolonged Exposure (PE) therapy for PTSD. It guides users through therapist-assigned exercises, tracks progress, and offers distress-reduction techniques like controlled breathing. Users can also record and review therapy sessions.

Highlights
  • Guided PE therapy exercises
  • Progress tracking and recording
  • Distress tolerance techniques
  • Controlled breathing exercises
  • Therapy session reminders
  • Audio recording of sessions
Features
Read full description

PE Coach is designed to be used during therapy for posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) with a health professional who is trained in Prolonged Exposure (PE) therapy. The app will guide you through the exercises assigned by your therapist and allows you to track and record your progress. In addition, the app provides techniques such as controlled breathing that will help you tolerate and decrease your distress. PE Coach will help you remember and track your upcoming therapy sessions. You will be able to audio record your sessions directly onto your phone so you can review them later as part of your treatment. By itself this app is not sufficient to treat PTSD. However, those who are receiving PE treatment can work together with their therapist to use the tools in this app. PE Coach was created by VA’s National Center for PTSD.

About

FreeCBT

This app provides a digital thought diary to practice Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT). It helps users identify and challenge negative automatic thoughts, retrain their brains, and ultimately improve mood and behavior. It's an open-source tool for self-help and as a companion to traditional therapy.

Highlights
  • Thought diary
  • Challenge automatic thoughts
  • Identify cognitive distortions
  • Train alternative thoughts
  • Open source
  • CBT self-help tool
Features
Read full description

FreeCBT is an open source thought diary for Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT). Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) is the "gold standard" of psychotherapy and is widely considered to be one of the most effective, evidence backed treatments for depression, anxiety, and panic. If you go into just about any therapist or psychiatrist, CBT will likely be one of the first treatments they try. FreeCBT is a companion and self-help app for one of the most common formats of CBT. You may have heard it called "the three column technique" or "catch it, check it, change it." Your brain is really good at making you feel exactly what you're thinking. Often, we find ourselves thinking "automatic negative thoughts" that lead us to fume on something that may not be true. That can cause us to feel depressed or anxious. CBT helps you record "automatic thoughts," challenge them with cognitive distortions and then train your brain with an alternative thought. If you do it enough, you can change your thoughts, your moods and your behavior. FreeCBT, a fork of Quirk, is open source under the GPL. You can find the code on Github at: https://github.com/erosson/freecbt

Screenshots

PE Coach 24 screens
FreeCBT3 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is review sentiment: FreeCBT at 96% against PE Coach 2's 20%. FreeCBT also leads on rating (4.7 vs 2.5) and ratings volume (170 vs 27). On price, update cadence, ads and in-app purchases 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. Neither carries in-app purchases, so what you see is what you pay.

ReceptionRating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings

FreeCBT holds the better App Store score, 4.7 against 2.5. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: FreeCBT has 170 ratings behind it against 27, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews point the same way: 20% of PE Coach 2's written reviews are positive against 96% of FreeCBT's.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

PE Coach 2 ships an update every 10 months, FreeCBT every 9 months. Both last shipped on November 3, 2026.

Scorecard3 real differences · 7 level
PE Coach 2 versus FreeCBT: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterPE Coach 2FreeCBT
PriceFreeFree
Rating2.5 (27 ratings)4.7 (170 ratings) — better
Positive reviews20.0% of reviews96.2% of reviews — better
Number of ratings27170 — better
Update frequencyEvery 10 monthsEvery 9 months — better
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesNoNo
MonetizationFreeFree
DevicesiPhone, iPad, iPodiPhone, iPad, iPod
Requires iOS14.0 — better15.1
Further details — not scored
Size29 MB35 MB
Age rating12+12+
DeveloperUS Department of Veterans Affairs (VA)Evan Rosson

Customer experience

PE Coach 2

All ratings27 ratings
Positive33.3%
Neutral11.1%
Negative55.6%
Written reviews15 reviews
Positive20.0%
Neutral13.3%
Negative66.7%

FreeCBT

All ratings134 ratings
Positive94.0%
Neutral2.2%
Negative3.7%
Written reviews79 reviews
Positive96.2%
Neutral2.5%
Negative1.3%

Bugs and requests

PE Coach 2

Not enough reviews yet to summarise bugs or requests.

FreeCBT

Reported bugs

5 issues
  • Swiping from distortion page selects/deselects distortions unintentionally
  • App update deleted all past user entries
  • Keyboard covers answer input area on some screens
  • Swipe navigation doesn't work properly on certain screens
  • Inconsistent touch response during navigation

Requested features

12 requests
  • Dark mode option
  • Analytics to track thoughts and patterns over time
  • Export feature to share entries with therapist or notes app
  • Cross-device synchronization
  • Bottom navigation bar
Show 7 more
  • Ability to tag or categorize thoughts by topic
  • Filter and view thoughts by category
  • Evidence section with for/against columns
  • Worst case scenario section with probability assessment
  • More detailed examples for alternative thought step
  • Additional cognitive distortion options (jumping to conclusions)
  • Better help documentation and explanations

In-app purchases

None

PE Coach 2

No in-app purchases

None

FreeCBT

No in-app purchases

Questions

Is PE Coach 2 free?
PE Coach 2 is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Is FreeCBT free?
FreeCBT is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Which has better reviews, PE Coach 2 or FreeCBT?
FreeCBT is rated higher. PE Coach 2 averages 2.5 out of 5 from 27 ratings, while FreeCBT averages 4.7 from 170 ratings.
Do PE Coach 2 or FreeCBT have ads?
Neither PE Coach 2 nor FreeCBT shows ads.
Which is updated more often, PE Coach 2 or FreeCBT?
PE Coach 2 ships an update every 10 months, and FreeCBT every 9 months. Most recently, PE Coach 2 was updated on November 3, 2026 and FreeCBT on November 3, 2026.

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