Comparison

Ahead vs Anticipāt

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

Head to head
About

Ahead

Easily track important life events with this user-friendly calendar countdown application. View upcoming events as home screen widgets, receive timely notifications, and share your countdowns with others. Sync events across devices and enjoy a dark mode option.

Highlights
  • Home screen widgets
  • Event notifications
  • Cross-device sync
  • Event sharing
  • Dark mode
Features
Read full description

Count down to the days that matter. Ahead keeps your trips, birthdays, holidays and big days in one calm list, sorted soonest first, and puts them on your Lock Screen, Home Screen and wrist. MAKE EACH PLAN YOUR OWN • Give any plan a photo background: pick a preset, use one of your own photos, or create one with Image Playground on iOS 27 • Count in days, weeks or months, or let Smart pick • Pin the plans you care about most to the top • Count up from the moments worth remembering, like a move or a birth ON YOUR LOCK SCREEN AND HOME SCREEN • Live Activities on the Lock Screen and in the Dynamic Island • Lock Screen widgets, including a ring that fills as the day gets closer • Home Screen widgets for your next plan or the next four • An extra-large widget for iPad PLAN IT TOGETHER • Share plans with family and friends • Keep notes with checklists and formatting • Attach photos, tickets and documents • Publish your plans to Apple Calendar • Reminders when a plan is close EVERY DEVICE • iPhone, iPad, Mac and Apple Watch, always in sync • A sidebar and detail layout on iPad, Mac and iPhone Duo • Watch complications that show the plan you choose • Back up and restore your plans from Settings AHEAD FREE Notes, sharing, reminders, widgets, Mac and Apple Watch, with up to 5 active plans. No ads. AHEAD PLUS Unlimited active plans, photos and files, premium backgrounds, every countdown format and all app themes. Billed yearly, or once for life. Questions or ideas? Tap Suggest a new feature in Settings. We read every one. Terms of Use: https://www.apple.com/legal/internet-services/itunes/dev/stdeula/

About

Anticipāt

This app helps you visualize and count down to important upcoming events. Personalize each countdown with photos, colors, and fonts, and receive timely reminders. It also offers a home screen widget for quick access and saves past events for reflection.

Highlights
  • Home screen widget
  • Customizable event cards
  • Flexible time formats
  • Calendar import
  • Event reminders
  • Past event archive
  • Offline functionality
Features
Read full description

Anticipāt counts down to the days you're looking forward to. Add a trip, a concert, a birthday, or anything else worth the wait, and watch the days fall away on your Home Screen, your Lock Screen, and in the Dynamic Island as the moment gets close. It's free. There are no ads, no subscription, and no account to create. NEW IN THIS VERSION Anticipāt has been redrawn. Your photo now gets the whole frame, with the countdown set below it on paper instead of printed on top of someone's holiday picture. Events sit in a ruled register you can scan at a glance, and there are five themes to print it all on, from cream paper to true black. WHAT YOU CAN DO • Count down to trips, concerts, birthdays, holidays, or anything you like. • Put a countdown on your Home Screen and Lock Screen with widgets that update on their own. • See your next event on your Apple Watch with a watch-face complication. • Watch the final hours tick down by the minute, with a Live Activity and Dynamic Island countdown on iPhones that support it. • Pick from five themes, and set a font and a colour on any single event. • Add a photo from your library or search free photos from Unsplash, then frame it exactly how you want it. • Get a reminder 30 days, 7 days and 1 day before, plus the day itself, and turn them off per event. • Share a countdown as a card for your group chat or your story, or copy a link a friend can open to add the same event. • Ask Siri how many days until something, or to add a countdown. • Keep birthdays and holidays recurring year after year, add notes, and import dates from your calendar. • Look back at your year with a shareable recap every December. YOUR EVENTS STAY YOURS Anticipāt works fully offline and stores nothing on our servers. Your events ride your device's normal iCloud backup, and you can export a file at any time. Turn on iCloud Sync and they keep in step across your own iPhone and iPad through your own iCloud, with no account to create. Photo search and calendar import use the network when it's there and step aside quietly when it isn't. Part of the Āpex Suite by HYTimes App Studio. Pay once, own forever. No subscriptions.

Screenshots

Ahead4 screens
Anticipāt4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is in-app purchases: Anticipāt at none against Ahead's 2. Anticipāt also leads on ads (none vs shown) and update cadence (every 2 weeks vs every 5 weeks). On price, rating, review sentiment and ratings volume 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. Ahead sells 2 in-app purchases, starting at $3.99 per year. Anticipāt asks for nothing beyond the download.

ReceptionRating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings

On the App Store both sit at effectively the same score — 5.0 for Ahead against 5.0 for Anticipāt. Both are backed by a comparable volume of ratings — 2 and 5 respectively. Written reviews split almost evenly too, at 100% and 100% positive.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

Ahead ships an update every 5 weeks, Anticipāt every 2 weeks. The most recent releases landed on November 7, 2026 and October 31, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard5 real differences · 5 level
Ahead versus Anticipāt: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterAheadAnticipāt
PriceFreeFree
Rating5.0 (2 ratings)5.0 (5 ratings)
Positive reviews100.0% of reviews100.0% of reviews
Number of ratings25 — better
Update frequencyEvery 5 weeksEvery 2 weeks — better
AdsYesNo — better
In-app purchasesYesNo — better
MonetizationFree with in-app purchasesFree — better
DevicesiPhone, iPad, Mac, Apple Watch — betteriPhone, iPad, Apple Watch
Requires iOS18.616.0 — better
Further details — not scored
Size83 MB37 MB
Age rating4+4+
DeveloperAlex MalekDennis Hodgson

Customer experience

Ahead

All ratings2 ratings
Positive100.0%
Neutral0.0%
Negative0.0%
Written reviews2 reviews
Positive100.0%
Neutral0.0%
Negative0.0%

Anticipāt

All ratings5 ratings
Positive100.0%
Neutral0.0%
Negative0.0%
Written reviews4 reviews
Positive100.0%
Neutral0.0%
Negative0.0%

In-app purchases

2 purchases

Ahead

Subscriptions1
  • Annual Subscription$3.991 Year
One-time1
  • Lifetime Unlock$12.99
None

Anticipāt

No in-app purchases

Questions

Is Ahead free?
Ahead is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Is Anticipāt free?
Anticipāt is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Which has better reviews, Ahead or Anticipāt?
Ahead and Anticipāt are both rated 5.0 out of 5 on the App Store, from 2 and 5 ratings respectively.
Do Ahead or Anticipāt have ads?
Ahead shows ads; Anticipāt does not.
Which is updated more often, Ahead or Anticipāt?
Ahead ships an update every 5 weeks, and Anticipāt every 2 weeks. Most recently, Ahead was updated on November 7, 2026 and Anticipāt on October 31, 2026.

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