Comparison

FreeCBT vs Safety Plan

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

Head to head
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

About

Safety Plan

This app guides users through creating a personalized safety plan to manage suicidal thoughts and self-harm urges. It offers tools for crisis moments, mood tracking, and access to support resources for individuals and their loved ones.

Highlights
  • Step-by-step safety plan creation
  • Shareable safety plans
  • Crisis intervention tools
  • Mood tracking
  • Access to crisis support
  • Informational resources
Features
Read full description

Safety Plan is here to help you make a plan for dealing with thoughts of suicide and self-harm. The app will walk you through filling out the 6 steps of a safety plan, share your safety plan with your loved ones, and use your safety plan in a moment of crisis. The app also includes audio and interactive tools to help you calm down, information for you and your loved ones about safety plans and suicide, mood tracking, and ready access to crisis support. Safety Plan is a U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs app, developed by the National Center for PTSD Dissemination and Training Division and the Office of Mental Health and Suicide Prevention.

Screenshots

FreeCBT3 screens
Safety Plan4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is rating: Safety Plan at 5.0 against FreeCBT's 4.7. Safety Plan also leads on iOS requirement (13.0 vs 15.1). FreeCBT's advantage is update cadence (every 9 months vs every 22 months) and ratings volume (170 vs 23). On price, review sentiment, 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

Safety Plan holds the better App Store score, 5.0 against 4.7. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: FreeCBT has 170 ratings behind it against 23, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews point the same way: 96% of FreeCBT's written reviews are positive against 100% of Safety Plan's.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

FreeCBT ships an update every 9 months, Safety Plan every 22 months. Both last shipped on November 3, 2026.

Scorecard4 real differences · 6 level
FreeCBT versus Safety Plan: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterFreeCBTSafety Plan
PriceFreeFree
Rating4.7 (170 ratings)5.0 (23 ratings) — better
Positive reviews96.2% of reviews100.0% of reviews — better
Number of ratings170 — better23
Update frequencyEvery 9 months — betterEvery 22 months
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesNoNo
MonetizationFreeFree
DevicesiPhone, iPad, iPodiPhone, iPad, iPod
Requires iOS15.113.0 — better
Further details — not scored
Size35 MB90 MB
Age rating12+4+
DeveloperEvan RossonUS Department of Veterans Affairs (VA)

Customer experience

FreeCBT

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

Safety Plan

All ratings23 ratings
Positive100.0%
Neutral0.0%
Negative0.0%
Written reviews6 reviews
Positive100.0%
Neutral0.0%
Negative0.0%

Bugs and 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

Safety Plan

Not enough reviews yet to summarise bugs or requests.

In-app purchases

None

FreeCBT

No in-app purchases

None

Safety Plan

No in-app purchases

Questions

Is FreeCBT free?
FreeCBT is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Is Safety Plan free?
Safety Plan is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Which has better reviews, FreeCBT or Safety Plan?
Safety Plan is rated higher. FreeCBT averages 4.7 out of 5 from 170 ratings, while Safety Plan averages 5.0 from 23 ratings.
Do FreeCBT or Safety Plan have ads?
Neither FreeCBT nor Safety Plan shows ads.
Which is updated more often, FreeCBT or Safety Plan?
FreeCBT ships an update every 9 months, and Safety Plan every 22 months. Most recently, FreeCBT was updated on November 3, 2026 and Safety Plan on November 3, 2026.

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