BuyNothing vs Ruff Hour
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
BuyNothing
Connect with your local community to give, receive, share, lend, and borrow items. This app fosters a gift economy, building connections through sharing, inspired by the BuyNothing® Project.
- Give and receive items locally
- Lend and borrow goods
- Hyper-local community sharing
- Gift economy model
- Build community connections
- Express gratitude
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We offer people a way to give, receive, share, lend, borrow and express gratitude through a hyper-local gift economy model in which people can share wherever they are and true wealth is measured by the web of connections formed between people through sharing. From the founders of the BuyNothing® Project. Terms of Use: https://buynothingproject.org/terms
Ruff Hour
Connect with nearby dog walkers in real-time to share walk routes and safety alerts. Log important moments during your walk and replay your journey with detailed insights. Share private replays of your adventures.
- Live dog walker visibility
- Log pee, poop, photos, and sniffs
- Nearby hazard alerts (foxtails, glass)
- Report hazards for others
- Lock Screen and Dynamic Island actions
- Offline recording
- 3D route replay
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Ruff Hour is live traffic for dog walks. See nearby dogs whose walkers choose to be visible, start a walk with one tap, and keep your dog's comfort preferences clear before anyone says hello. While you walk: • Log pee, poop, photos, and sniffs where they happen. • Get nearby heads-ups for foxtails, broken glass, and unpicked poop. • Report hazards for other walkers. • Use Lock Screen and Dynamic Island actions without reopening the app. • Keep recording when the network drops. After the walk: • Replay the route in an animated 3D trail view or a flat map. • See each moment appear where it happened. • Share a private, expiring replay with photos removed and route endpoints trimmed. Ruff Hour is offline-first and does not require an account. Your exact routes and walk moments stay private unless you deliberately create a trimmed replay link.
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is review sentiment: Ruff Hour at 100% against BuyNothing's 27%. Ruff Hour also leads on in-app purchases (none vs 8). BuyNothing's advantage is ratings volume (2.1K vs 1) and rating (4.3 vs 4.0). On price, ads, device support and iOS requirement 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. BuyNothing sells 8 in-app purchases, starting at $3.99 per month. Ruff Hour asks for nothing beyond the download.
BuyNothing holds the better App Store score, 4.3 against 4.0. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: BuyNothing has 2.1K ratings behind it against 1, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews complicate that: 27% of BuyNothing's written reviews are positive against 100% of Ruff Hour's, so the app with the better star average is not the one people write more warmly about.
| Parameter | BuyNothing | Ruff Hour |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free |
| Rating | 4.3 (2.1K ratings) — better | 4.0 (1 ratings) |
| Positive reviews | 26.9% of reviews | 100.0% of reviews — better |
| Number of ratings | 2.1K — better | 1 |
| Update frequency | Every 2 weeks | — |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | Yes | No — better |
| Monetization | Free with in-app purchases | Free — better |
| Best chart rank | #209 — better | — |
| Devices | iPhone, iPad — better | iPhone |
| Requires iOS | 16.0 — better | 17.0 |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 76 MB | 4 MB |
| Age rating | 12+ | 4+ |
| Developer | Buy Nothing Project, Inc. | Suhas Deshpande |
Customer experience
BuyNothing
Ruff Hour
Bugs and requests
BuyNothing
Reported bugs
5 issues- Frequent app crashes and freezes
- Login issues and inability to reset passwords
- Inconsistent location settings and radius
- Unreliable notifications and messaging
- Inability to edit or update posts
Requested features
5 requests- Search function to find specific posts
- Ability to edit and update posts
- Improved organization and sorting of posts
- Syncing across multiple devices
- More robust moderation and community tools
Ruff Hour
Not enough reviews yet to summarise bugs or requests.
In-app purchases
BuyNothing
- Buy Nothing Subscription$3.991 Month
- Buy Nothing Pro$3.991 Month
- Sustaining Member$5.491 Month
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- Sustaining Member$6.991 Month
- Buy Nothing Pro$38.491 Year
- Buy Nothing Subscription$38.491 Year
- Sustaining Member$54.991 Year
- Sustaining Member$69.991 Year
Ruff Hour
No in-app purchases
