Comparison

FreeCBT vs Feeling Great

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

Feeling Great

This app offers interactive courses and an AI chatbot to help users improve their emotional well-being. It aims to reduce negative feelings like anxiety and anger while boosting joy and self-esteem.

Highlights
  • AI chatbot for guidance
  • Interactive courses
  • Emotional well-being tools
  • Anxiety reduction
  • Mood enhancement
  • Self-esteem boost
Read full description

Discover the power of Feeling Great, an exhilarating app inspired by the groundbreaking work of world-renowned psychiatrist, Dr. David Burns. Dive into our dynamic app, where our friendly AI-chatbot and vibrant interactive courses await to guide you on an inspiring journey toward a more fulfilling life. Embrace a suite of innovative tools with Feeling Great to enhance growth, resilience, and joy every day. Most users report dramatic reductions in feelings of unhappiness, anxiety, guilt, shame, inadequacy, loneliness, hopelessness, and anger in just one day, along with a significant boost in feelings of joy and self-esteem. Feeling Great feels wonderful. You owe it to yourself to Feel Great!

Screenshots

FreeCBT3 screens
Feeling Great4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is in-app purchases: FreeCBT at none against Feeling Great's 2. FreeCBT also leads on review sentiment (96% vs 79%). Feeling Great's advantage is update cadence (fortnightly vs every 9 months). On price, rating, ratings volume 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. Feeling Great sells 2 in-app purchases, starting at $9.99 per month. FreeCBT asks for nothing beyond the download.

ReceptionRating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings

FreeCBT holds the better App Store score, 4.7 against 4.5. Both are backed by a comparable volume of ratings — 170 and 214 respectively. Written reviews point the same way: 96% of FreeCBT's written reviews are positive against 79% of Feeling Great's.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

FreeCBT ships an update every 9 months, Feeling Great fortnightly. Both last shipped on November 3, 2026.

Scorecard4 real differences · 6 level
FreeCBT versus Feeling Great: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterFreeCBTFeeling Great
PriceFreeFree
Rating4.7 (170 ratings) — better4.5 (214 ratings)
Positive reviews96.2% of reviews — better79.0% of reviews
Number of ratings170214 — better
Update frequencyEvery 9 monthsFortnightly — better
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesNo — betterYes
MonetizationFree — betterFree with in-app purchases
DevicesiPhone, iPad, iPod — betteriPhone, iPod
Requires iOS15.115.1
Further details — not scored
Size35 MB43 MB
Age rating12+17+
DeveloperEvan RossonFeeling Great Corporation

Customer experience

FreeCBT

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

Feeling Great

All ratings211 ratings
Positive86.7%
Neutral3.8%
Negative9.5%
Written reviews105 reviews
Positive79.0%
Neutral7.6%
Negative13.3%

User reviews

FreeCBT

From 170 App Store ratings

What we love

  • 👍 Simple and intuitive user interface
  • 💰 Completely free with no ads or subscriptions
  • 🎯 Effective CBT methodology in 3-column format
  • ⚡ Quick and easy to use in the moment
  • 🔒 Private and secure thought tracking

Room to improve

  • 🐛 Swipe navigation causes accidental distortion selection
  • 💾 Data loss issue after app updates
  • ⌨️ Keyboard covers input area while typing
  • 📱 Limited cross-device synchronization
  • 🎨 Missing dark mode option

Feeling Great

From 214 App Store ratings

What we love

  • 🚀 Effective and helpful
  • 👍 Powerful and insightful
  • 🤖 Impressive AI capabilities
  • 📚 Useful educational content
  • 🕰️ Always available support

Room to improve

  • 🐛 Occasional crashes or bugs
  • 🤖 Scripted AI responses
  • 💰 Expensive subscription cost
  • 🤔 Confusing or inconsistent guidance

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

Feeling Great

Reported bugs

3 issues
  • Inability to type responses on iPad
  • Loss of data when app crashes
  • Inconsistent behavior when skipping certain steps

Requested features

6 requests
  • Copy-paste functionality
  • Ability to edit previous responses
  • Rollback feature to revisit previous stages
  • Multiple session storage
  • Expanded emotion vocabulary
Show 1 more
  • More granular emotion rating system

In-app purchases

None

FreeCBT

No in-app purchases

2 purchases

Feeling Great

Subscriptions2
  • Monthly Subscription7 Days trial$9.991 Month
  • Annual Subscription Early Bird7 Days trial$99.991 Year

Questions

Is FreeCBT free?
FreeCBT is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Is Feeling Great free?
Feeling Great is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Which has better reviews, FreeCBT or Feeling Great?
FreeCBT is rated higher. FreeCBT averages 4.7 out of 5 from 170 ratings, while Feeling Great averages 4.5 from 214 ratings.
Do FreeCBT or Feeling Great have ads?
Neither FreeCBT nor Feeling Great shows ads.
Which is updated more often, FreeCBT or Feeling Great?
FreeCBT ships an update every 9 months, and Feeling Great fortnightly. Most recently, FreeCBT was updated on November 3, 2026 and Feeling Great on November 3, 2026.

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