NorthStarVIP vs Crowded NYC
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
NorthStarVIP
This app provides comprehensive guides for new residents, covering city overviews, local news, weather, real estate markets, schools, and attractions. It aims to help people quickly settle into their new surroundings by offering essential local information.
- Area guides
- Local news and weather
- Real estate market info
- School information
- Things to do
- Restaurant listings
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NorthStarVIP app includes comprehensive area guides with an overview of the city, local news and weather, purchase and rental market info, info on local schools, things to do, restaurants and other important information to help relocating people to quickly settle into their new location.
Crowded NYC
Discover how busy popular New York City locations are in real-time before you go. See crowd levels, user-submitted vibes, and photos to make informed decisions about where to spend your time. Earn rewards for contributing accurate crowd reports.
- Real-time crowd level indicators (Empty, Moderate, Crowded)
- User-submitted vibe reports with descriptive phrases
- Live photos from venues
- Bounty system for requesting crowd information
- Typical crowd data for planning
- Gamified user contributions with 'Cred' and badges
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Is it packed right now? You're outside a bar deciding whether to bother. Eyeing a forty-minute line for froyo. Wondering if the museum is a mistake on a Saturday. Crowded tells you before you go. HOW IT WORKS Open the map and see how busy places are across New York — bars, restaurants, cafes, clubs, museums, gyms, parks, anywhere a line forms. Three levels, no guesswork: - Empty - Moderate - Crowded Every level comes from someone who was standing there minutes ago. VENUES CAN'T PAY TO LOOK BUSY This is the part that matters. A place cannot set its own crowd level. It cannot pay to look packed on a dead night, and it cannot pay to look quiet when there's a line down the block. The only thing that moves the number is a report from someone at the door — we check you're actually there before a report counts. WHAT'S THE VIBE Reports can carry vibes, picked from a vocabulary we wrote: - Walked right in - 20 min for a drink - DJ's cooking - Line out the door - Door's picky tonight - Outlets are gold dust - Quiet enough for a date - Skip it tonight One-click, real data, no bots. FEED See it, don't just read it. Photos from people standing in the room right now — a line down the block, a half-empty bar, a park in full swing. Camera only, never your photo library. Faces are blurred on your phone before a photo is ever sent, and every photo disappears on its own. BOUNTIES Wondering about somewhere nobody's checked? Put a bounty on it. Someone nearby can answer, and earns Cred for it. CRED Cred is earned, never bought. A point for every report you file from the spot, five for filling someone's bounty. There's nothing to buy and nothing to unlock — it's just proof you're one of the people keeping the city honest. Browsing is always free. TYPICAL CROWDS No live report yet? See what a place is usually like at this hour, on this day, so you're never staring at a blank. BADGES Report at dawn, close down a block, cover all five boroughs. Some are obvious. Some you'll find by accident. NEW YORK ONLY Crowded covers the five boroughs and nowhere else. It's built for one city, by two people who live here, and it works best when you're standing in it. WHAT WE DON'T DO No comment sections. No follower counts. No ads dressed up as recommendations. No venue paying for a better number. You look, you go, you get on with your night. Check Crowded!
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is rating: Crowded NYC at 5.0 against NorthStarVIP's 4.3. Crowded NYC also leads on update cadence (every 5 days vs monthly). NorthStarVIP's advantage is ratings volume (11 vs 1) and iOS requirement (15.0 vs 18.0). 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. Neither carries in-app purchases, so what you see is what you pay.
Crowded NYC holds the better App Store score, 5.0 against 4.3. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: NorthStarVIP has 11 ratings behind it against 1, so its average is the more settled of the two.
NorthStarVIP ships an update monthly, Crowded NYC every 5 days. The most recent releases landed on October 21, 2026 and October 10, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | NorthStarVIP | Crowded NYC |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free |
| Rating | 4.3 (11 ratings) | 5.0 (1 ratings) — better |
| Positive reviews | 80.0% of reviews | — |
| Number of ratings | 11 — better | 1 |
| Update frequency | Monthly | Every 5 days — better |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | No | No |
| Monetization | Free | Free |
| Devices | iPhone, iPod — better | iPhone |
| Requires iOS | 15.0 — better | 18.0 |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 50 MB | 77 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 12+ |
| Developer | John L Merriweather | ARKA VAHAN KHORCHIDIAN |
Customer experience
NorthStarVIP
Crowded NYC
In-app purchases
NorthStarVIP
No in-app purchases
Crowded NYC
No in-app purchases









