HiCoffee vs Cup Buddy
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
HiCoffee
Track your daily caffeine intake with this app, which offers data for many beverages and a calculator for homemade drinks. It personalizes your daily limit based on sensitivity, helping you boost productivity and improve sleep. It also analyzes heart rate and sleep data to reveal caffeine's health impact.
- Log daily caffeine intake
- Caffeine Calculator for homemade drinks
- Personalized daily caffeine limits
- Analyze heart rate and sleep data
- Interactive widgets and Apple Watch app
- iCloud sync across devices
- Offline functionality
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HiCoffee is a powerful caffeine tracker that makes it easy to record your daily caffeine intake. It includes data for more than 2,500 branded coffee products, and its Caffeine Calculator can estimate the caffeine in homemade drinks such as espresso and pour-over coffee. HiCoffee can set a caffeine limit based on your sensitivity and give you personalized suggestions. It helps you enjoy coffee when you need focus, while reducing the chance that too much caffeine gets in the way of your sleep at night. HiCoffee can also look at your long-term resting heart rate and sleep duration, helping you understand how caffeine may be affecting your health. HiCoffee works beautifully across the Apple ecosystem, with rich widgets, excellent Apple Watch support, Shortcuts, Health data sync, and more. Reliable iCloud sync lets you use HiCoffee with confidence on multiple devices. HiCoffee also supports Dynamic Type, VoiceOver, and other accessibility features for a comfortable, smooth experience. --- ** Recognition ** - Featured by the App Store multiple times, including App of the Day, Fresh Apps, Interactive Widgets, and accessibility-focused collections. - Mentioned during Tim Cook's 2023 visit to China and covered by several media outlets. - Appeared in the WWDC 2023 and WWDC 2024 keynotes. - Featured by well-known coffee creator James Hoffmann on his channel. - Recommended multiple times by creator Nikias Molina. - Reviewed by German tech publication t3n. - Recommended by SSPAI as a dynamic caffeine monitoring tool worth watching. --- ** Premium Membership and Subscription ** HiCoffee's premium features can be unlocked in the app through a one-time purchase or a subscription. You can find the purchase options in the app's Settings page. If you choose to unlock premium features with a subscription, payment will be charged automatically to your App Store account within 24 hours before the end of the current subscription period. After subscribing, you can manage or cancel your subscription at any time in HiCoffee's Settings page or in your App Store account settings. To cancel, please do so at least 24 hours before the end of the current subscription period, otherwise the App Store will renew the subscription automatically. ** A Note from the Developer ** I'm Gong Zhang, the developer of HiCoffee. If you have any questions or suggestions, feel free to contact me from Settings > Contact and Support > Email in the app, or email me directly at hicoffee@gongzhang.zendesk.com. If you enjoy using HiCoffee, a rating or review on the App Store would help me improve it faster. Privacy Policy: https://gongzhang.io/app/hicoffee/en/privacy Terms of Use: https://gongzhang.io/app/hicoffee/en/terms
Cup Buddy
Track your daily caffeine intake to understand its effects on your body, mind, and sleep. Set personal limits, monitor progress, and receive metabolism forecasts to manage your energy levels and improve your overall well-being.
- Track caffeine intake from over 180 sources
- Set and adjust daily caffeine limits
- View caffeine metabolism forecasts
- Integrates with Apple Health
- Monthly subscription for full features
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Have you ever thought about how caffeine affects you? your body? your mind? your sleep? Probably yes, and you know - this effect is pretty dramatic. I realized my addiction to coffee and wanted to regain control of my caffeine intake. That is why I created CupBuddy. First of all, This app helped me properly understand how much caffeine I intake and then reduce it to an acceptable level. Now I feel much better. My sleep improved, like the overall quality of my life. I hope my app will help you too. Just give it a chance. CupBuddy lets you track every shot of your favorite drink and deeply understand how much caffeine comes to your system every day. Set your very own daily caffeine limit and check it every time you about to take one more cup of latte. Adjust your limit every month to see the progress and return to healthier living. Get caffeine metabolism forecast to plan your sleeping schedule, or taking one more cup. CupBuddy knows about more than 180 different caffeine sources from all over the world, and this number will rise with almost every update. If you want to tell CupBuddy about your favorite drink, tweet to @getCupBuddy or send a message to cupbuddy@stukalovtech.com, and CupBuddy will do his best to learn it with the next update. CupBuddy offers optional integration with Apple's Health App so you can exchange caffeine data with it. _______ MORE INFO ABOUT CUPBUDDY SUBSCRIPTION: CupBuddy requires an active subscription to let you record caffeine from all sources via the app, see metabolism forecast(also can get notifications), and edit limit Plans are monthly You'll be billed at the end of the free trial automatically unless you cancel Subscription will auto-renew unless you turn it off in your iTunes account Payment will be charged to iTunes Account at confirmation of purchase You can turn off auto-renew in iTunes You can cancel up to 24 hours before the next period Please review our Terms of Service here: https://istukalov965.wixsite.com/mysite/cupbuddy-tos Please review our Privacy Policy here: https://istukalov965.wixsite.com/mysite/cupbuddy-privacy
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is review sentiment: Cup Buddy at 100% against HiCoffee's 82%. Cup Buddy also leads on update cadence (every 4 days vs every 10 days) and iOS requirement (16.0 vs 18.0). HiCoffee's advantage is device support (5 vs 1). On price, ads, in-app purchases and monetization model 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
Both are free to download. HiCoffee sells 3 in-app purchases, starting at $0.99 per month and Cup Buddy sells 2 in-app purchases, starting at $5.99 per month. Whichever you choose, the download price is not the number that matters.
HiCoffee ships an update every 10 days, Cup Buddy every 4 days. The most recent releases landed on October 16, 2026 and September 20, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | HiCoffee | Cup Buddy |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free |
| Rating | 4.8 (839 ratings) — better | — |
| Positive reviews | 82.0% of reviews | 100.0% of reviews — better |
| Number of ratings | 839 — better | — |
| Update frequency | Every 10 days | Every 4 days — better |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | Yes | Yes |
| Monetization | Freemium | Free with in-app purchases |
| Devices | iPhone, iPad, Mac, Apple Watch, Vision Pro — better | iPhone |
| Requires iOS | 18.0 | 16.0 — better |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 141 MB | 9 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 4+ |
| Developer | 弓 张 | Ilia Stukalov |
Customer experience
HiCoffee
Cup Buddy
Bugs and requests
HiCoffee
Reported bugs
3 issues- Widgets not updating
- Watch app not syncing properly
- Caffeine data truncation when adding custom drinks
Requested features
7 requests- Add more beverage options (energy drinks, regional brands, etc.)
- Ability to track caffeine from non-beverage sources (pills, chocolate, etc.)
- More customization options for homemade coffee
- Easier way to add custom drinks
- Extend sleep time range beyond current limits
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- Add caffeine calculator for AeroPress method
- Include caffeine content for different coffee roast levels
Cup Buddy
Not enough reviews yet to summarise bugs or requests.
In-app purchases
HiCoffee
- Monthly Subscription$0.991 Month
- Annual Subscription$6.991 Year
- Permanent Unlock$8.99
Cup Buddy
- Unlimited access7 Days trial$5.991 Month
- Unlimited access for a Year7 Days trial$59.991 Year
Questions
Is HiCoffee free?
Is Cup Buddy free?
Do HiCoffee or Cup Buddy have ads?
Which is updated more often, HiCoffee or Cup Buddy?
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