TomCom vs Arc Pathway
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
TomCom
This app serves as a central communication hub for parents and schools. It provides a secure inbox for important messages, a personalized school calendar, and a media feed showcasing educational highlights. Parents can also access photo galleries and news updates.
- Parent-school communication inbox
- Personalized school calendar
- Media feed of educational highlights
- News publications
- Pupil photo and video galleries
- Formal photo purchases
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TomCom is used by Thomas's for all communications with parents and consists of 5 areas. Need to know - This is the parents' own personal inbox with important need to know messages from the school. Calendar - A personalised school calendar for pupils. Parents can add events to their own calendars and also find more information like team sheets. Highlights - A media feed highlighting the diverse and progressive education Thomas's provides. News - A weekly news publication released every Friday during term time. Gallery - A photo and video gallery personalised for each pupil. Every day - A personal photo gallery for each pupil with free downloads for parents. Formal - Formal individual and class photos for parents to purchase as a download or print. Productions - All photos from the year group's production that each pupil takes part.
Arc Pathway
This app supports early years education by allowing school staff to profile children's development, create observations, and manage learning journals. Families can view shared content and add comments, fostering collaboration between home and school.
- Profile and assess child development
- Create and edit observations
- Manage learning journals
- Share progress with families
- Add comments to observations
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This companion app is for those school staff and families who are already using Arc Pathway early years software. To have access to this app, you will need an Arc Pathway account. With this app teachers can: • Profile/assess children’s development using six monthly milestones. • Use the prioritised next steps/create their own to support each child’s pattern of development. • Create, view, edit observations. • Access/share and edit each child’s learning journal with families. With this app families can: • View all shared items in their child/children’s learning journal and add comments to observations.
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is iOS requirement: Arc Pathway at 13.0 against TomCom's 15.1. On price, update cadence, 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
Both are free to download. Neither carries in-app purchases, so what you see is what you pay.
TomCom ships an update every 6 weeks, Arc Pathway monthly. Both last shipped on September 17, 2026.
| Parameter | TomCom | Arc Pathway |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free |
| Rating | 3.4 (7 ratings) — better | — |
| Positive reviews | — | 83.3% of reviews |
| Number of ratings | 7 — better | — |
| Update frequency | Every 6 weeks | Monthly — better |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | No | No |
| Monetization | Free | Free |
| Devices | iPhone, iPad, iPod | iPhone, iPad, iPod |
| Requires iOS | 15.1 | 13.0 — better |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 51 MB | 10 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 4+ |
| Developer | Thomas's London Day Schools | Arc Pathway |
Customer experience
TomCom
Arc Pathway
In-app purchases
TomCom
No in-app purchases
Arc Pathway
No in-app purchases
