Comparison

Tacho vs Runner's Shadow

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

Head to head
About

Tacho

Track your cycling workouts with this app, which functions as a bike computer on your Apple Watch and iPhone. It records key metrics like speed, heart rate, and elevation, syncing data to Apple Health.

Highlights
  • Bike computer functionality
  • Track speed, heart rate, elevation
  • Syncs with Apple Health
  • Auto-pause feature
  • Barometric altimeter for accuracy
  • Real-time weather data
Features
Read full description

Tacho is a bike computer for the Apple Watch and iPhone. With the Tacho Watch app, you can track your bike workouts and save them to the Apple Health app on your iPhone. You can use the Tacho Watch app with or without an iPhone. Start your tracking on the Apple Watch. With the Tacho iPhone app, you can then see key metrics like speed, heart rate, elevation, incline, wind speed and direction, and air temperature. On the Apple Watch, you'll also see average and maximum speed, pulse, and ascent and descent. With the auto-pause function, only the time and distance you are actually moving is counted. The barometric altimeter ensures accurate altitude measurement. It automatically calibrates itself based on the GPS signal as you move. Weather data is updated every 5 to 15 minutes depending on your speed and location. The following data is stored in the Apple Health app on your iPhone: - ride time - distance - route - altitude (ascent/descent) - speed - pulse - calories burned - air temperature - air humidity - weather condition - events (pause start/end, movement start/end) In the Settings app on your iPhone, you can configure the Tacho app to your liking. You can choose between altimetry via GPS or barometer, configure units of measurement, customize the appearance and disable the auto-pause functionality. Terms of Use: https://www.apple.com/legal/internet-services/itunes/dev/stdeula/

About

Runner's Shadow

This app serves as a comprehensive companion for outdoor runners, allowing them to track, log, and analyze their runs from various sources. It provides detailed run history, course tracking, personal records, lap analysis, and shoe mileage management, all integrated with Apple Health and Activity.

Highlights
  • Run history tracking
  • Course and personal record management
  • Lap analysis
  • Journaling and labeling
  • Shoe mileage tracking
  • Apple Watch app integration
  • Data import from Apple Health
Read full description

Follow your runs like your shadow follows you. What Is Runner's Shadow? A runner's companion. A fantastic app for all outdoor runners to augment their kit. Runner's Shadow is an iOS Activity and Health-based app for the purpose of augmenting, tracking, logging, and understanding your outdoor runs, regardless of source; regardless of when the run took place. And it includes an Apple Watch app to get out and run with. Why Try Runner's Shadow? Run History A history of all of your runs, from any supported App. The run history is all your runs, grouped by week, month, year, and all-time. It has graphs, logs, journals, and more (like courses). Courses Which routes you've run. Do you tend to run the same routes repeatedly? Why not keep track of those as courses? This app keeps track of all of your courses; and your personal records for each course. Personal Records What's my personal best? Accurate and complete PRs. What is the best I've done so far at this distance? This course? This week? This month?. Runner's Shadow PR keeps my goals in perspective and my motivation on-point. This app finds and keeps your bests. Laps Keep and Recall interval laps. With a tap of a button in the Shadow Runner's watch app (included), you can set your laps. In the iPhone app, you can see how you did for them. What was the lap distance? Pace? Gain? It's all there. Journaling What are my thoughts after a run? How was the run? What do I find interesting about this course? Who did I run with? What did we laugh about? The journals are for these and/or anything else you want to write there. Labeling Tag runs for later retrieval. Label the people you ran with. Or label which runs were races. Or label which runs were your favorites. Tag runs with labels any way you'd like. Shoe Tracking Keep track of your running shoes. You may have heard that running shoes should be replaced between 300-500 miles or in 3-6 months. But how do you keep track of that? Simply add your shoes to the app, then tap on which ones were worn after a run. We'll keep track of how many run, miles, and days you've put on the pair. Photos Find photos taken near the time of your run. Want to find those shots you get before and after a run a year and a half later? Well, you just go to that run and click the 'camera' button, and there they all are. Graphs? Yes. Numbers? Of course. Maps? You bet. Running app for your Apple Watch? Yeah, that too. Watch Laps? Uh huh. Open to suggestions? We listen. What you'd expect? We try to be more than that. You can run with this or any other app that supports Apple Activity; we'll take it from there. ---- The data comes from Apple Health/Activity. That means that any outdoor running app that works with Apple Health/Activity will work with this one. The data goes nowhere. We don't take it. We don't keep it. We don't track it. We don't track you. We're not interested in all of that. We're just runners who want to enhance all of our running experiences. Contact us: support@alumra.ltd

Screenshots

Tacho4 screens
Runner's Shadow4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is price: Runner's Shadow at Free against Tacho's $4.99. Runner's Shadow also leads on rating (5.0 vs 3.7). Tacho's advantage is ratings volume (3 vs 1). On update cadence, ads, in-app purchases and device support 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

Runner's Shadow is free to download; Tacho costs $4.99 up front. Neither carries in-app purchases, so what you see is what you pay.

ReceptionRating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings

Runner's Shadow holds the better App Store score, 5.0 against 3.7. Both are backed by a comparable volume of ratings — 3 and 1 respectively.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

Both ship on a similar rhythm, roughly every 6 weeks. The most recent releases landed on September 14, 2026 and June 3, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard4 real differences · 6 level
Tacho versus Runner's Shadow: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterTachoRunner's Shadow
Price$4.99Free — better
Rating3.7 (3 ratings)5.0 (1 ratings) — better
Positive reviews73.7% of reviews—
Number of ratings3 — better1
Update frequencyEvery 6 weeksEvery 6 weeks
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesNoNo
MonetizationPaidFree — better
DevicesiPhone, iPad, iPod, Apple Watch — betteriPhone, iPod, Apple Watch
Requires iOS15.515.0 — better
Further details — not scored
Size7 MB26 MB
Age rating4+4+
DeveloperFriedemann BartelsAlumra, Ltd

Customer experience

Tacho

All ratings3 ratings
Positive66.7%
Neutral0.0%
Negative33.3%
Written reviews19 reviews
Positive73.7%
Neutral15.8%
Negative10.5%

Runner's Shadow

All ratings1 ratings
Positive100.0%
Neutral0.0%
Negative0.0%

In-app purchases

None

Tacho

No in-app purchases

None

Runner's Shadow

No in-app purchases

Questions

Is Tacho free?
Tacho costs $4.99, with no in-app purchases.
Is Runner's Shadow free?
Runner's Shadow is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Which has better reviews, Tacho or Runner's Shadow?
Runner's Shadow is rated higher. Tacho averages 3.7 out of 5 from 3 ratings, while Runner's Shadow averages 5.0 from 1 ratings.
Do Tacho or Runner's Shadow have ads?
Neither Tacho nor Runner's Shadow shows ads.
Which is updated more often, Tacho or Runner's Shadow?
Tacho ships an update every 6 weeks, and Runner's Shadow every 6 weeks. Most recently, Tacho was updated on September 14, 2026 and Runner's Shadow on June 3, 2026.

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