Comparison

Headspace vs Card Decks

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

Head to head
About

Headspace

This app offers a unique 3D approach to organizing thoughts and creating hierarchical outlines. Visualize your information in a floating space, navigate with intuitive gestures, and connect related ideas with visual links. It's designed for a dynamic and engaging way to manage lists and mind maps.

Highlights
  • Build hierarchical outlines in 3D space
  • Navigate and zoom with familiar finger gestures
  • Connect related items with link lines
  • Change item color and opacity
  • Universal app for iPhone and iPad
  • Sync files with Dropbox
  • PDF export with active note links
Features
Read full description

*** PLEASE NOTE: This NOT the meditation app! *** (There is another app called "Headspace: Guided Meditation and Mindfulness" and this is NOT that app!) This is the *original* Headspace! HEADSPACE is iOS's coolest 3D outliner and mind-mapping app! Do your list-making and mind-mapping in 3D space with the *original* Headspace. "Five stars on iPhone, completely off the scale on iPad" "This is the app I've most wanted to run on the iPad since the day it was announced, and the app that anyone looking over your shoulder will immediately want to buy an iPad just to run. " "Love the program. Favorite app. Useful and looks great. " "The implementation is beautiful! In my opinion, Headspace is becoming one of the best apps in the store." "I bought Headspace last night on a whim - been fooling around with mindmapping apps lately. This is a little piece of brilliance, you know that, right? " "This app could not just be a mindmapping program, It has the capability to become a new kind of U.I. That in my opinion that improved over apples U.I." Headspace allows you to create items and groups of items on a floating plane in three-dimensional space. The hierarchy of items and their various sub-items make for a beautiful display of information as they recede into the distance. Simple and familiar finger gestures allow you to move around the space. Use the menu button to travel between various groups. Easily create links and travel between them. The beautiful animated interface is like something from a sci-fi movie, but it isn't just eye-candy. You can go from an "eagle-eye" view of your entire map to focusing on a single item with a simple pinch of your fingers. There's just something about being able to manipulate the scale and space that goes perfectly with the idea of outlining. Here's a rundown on all its cool features: ● build hierarchical outlines in 3D space ● use familiar finger gestures to navigate and zoom ● connect related items with link lines - even between files! ● change item color and opacity ● change text color ● 'Flick' up or down to travel to top or bottom of lists ● special characters and foreign-language support ● universal app -- runs on both iphone and ipad ● easy travel between groups and files ● cut-and-paste items ● search in spaces, notes, and files ● item notes for supplemental information (text/photo/url) ● optional accelerometer rotate ● customizable color palette ● "to-do" style item checkboxes ● 2D orthogonal mode ● sync files between your iphone and iPad with Dropbox ● file support for Freemind, the free multi-platform desktop mind-mapping program ● stunning PDF export w/ active note links Get some perspective on your thoughts. Try Headspace today! Let us know what else you'd like to see added, email headspace@flatblackfilms.com!

About

Card Decks

Create and share custom card decks for various uses, from team meetings and planning to personal expression and task management. Configure individual cards with display times for timers or reminders, and easily share decks via email or messages.

Highlights
  • Configurable colored text cards
  • Group cards into decks
  • Create custom card sets
  • Timer and countdown functionality
  • Share decks via email/messages
  • Open source
Features
Read full description

Card Decks is a small utility application for your iPhone and iPad which brings you simple, configurable, colored, multi-line text cards that are grouped into card decks. A card deck can be used to show your vote or estimation on a certain topic in a meeting, e.g. in a planning meeting used in agile software development methods like Scrum or Extreme Programming. If the pre-configured cards don't fit your needs, just extend the existing cards or build your own set of cards, e.g. including special estimation numbers like "Pi" or "?". Or, if you are the chair of a session on a conference, you can use a card deck to remind a speaker of the remaining time for the presentation. Or, as a speaker, use a timer card deck to track the remaining minutes. Or, just use your cards to show your opinion, argument, or mood, in a simple, non-verbal way. Or, use the shuffle feature to randomly select a task from a card deck with tasks, or randomly assign tasks to students, team members, etc. Card Decks contains some pre-configured card decks with voting cards, simple colored cards, cards with numbers, colored cards which show remaining minutes, and some timers. Individual card decks can be created with the built-in editor. Each card in a card deck can be configured with a display time. This way, you can build your own countdown timer with individual numbers, texts, reminders, etc. Example timers for 15 and 60 minutes are pre-configured. Additionally, Card Decks supports sending and receiving card decks via e-mail, messages, etc. for sharing your card decks with your friends or colleagues. Either as an URL, or via a JSON-based document. Found a bug? Missing a feature? Drop a line to carddecks@0xc0.de, or open an issue in the project on GitHub. Card Decks is open source and licensed under the terms of the MIT license. Its source code is hosted on GitHub.

Screenshots

Headspace4 screens
Card Decks4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is price: Card Decks at Free against Headspace's $3.99. Headspace's advantage is update cadence (every 2 months vs every 5 months) and ratings volume (10 vs 2). On rating, review sentiment, 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

CostPrice · In-app purchases · Ads · Monetization

Card Decks is free to download; Headspace costs $3.99 up front. Neither carries in-app purchases, so what you see is what you pay.

ReceptionRating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings

On the App Store both sit at effectively the same score — 4.4 for Headspace against 4.5 for Card Decks. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: Headspace has 10 ratings behind it against 2, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews are what separate them: 71% of Headspace's written reviews are positive against 78% of Card Decks's.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

Headspace ships an update every 2 months, Card Decks every 5 months. The most recent releases landed on October 29, 2026 and October 23, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard5 real differences · 5 level
Headspace versus Card Decks: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterHeadspaceCard Decks
Price$3.99Free — better
Rating4.4 (10 ratings)4.5 (2 ratings) — better
Positive reviews71.4% of reviews77.8% of reviews — better
Number of ratings10 — better2
Update frequencyEvery 2 months — betterEvery 5 months
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesNoNo
MonetizationPaidFree — better
DevicesiPhone, iPad, iPodiPhone, iPad, iPod
Requires iOS9.0 — better18.0
Further details — not scored
Size19 MB1 MB
Age rating4+4+
DeveloperFlat Black FilmsArne Harren

Customer experience

Headspace

All ratings10 ratings
Positive90.0%
Neutral0.0%
Negative10.0%
Written reviews182 reviews
Positive71.4%
Neutral12.6%
Negative15.9%

Card Decks

All ratings2 ratings
Positive100.0%
Neutral0.0%
Negative0.0%
Written reviews9 reviews
Positive77.8%
Neutral0.0%
Negative22.2%

Bugs and requests

Headspace

Reported bugs

15 issues
  • App crashes on creating new groups
  • Crashes when entering text on iPad
  • Text color picker fails to change colors
  • Instant crash when closing text color picker
  • Crashes on Dropbox connection
Show 10 more
  • Data loss with file format updates
  • Existing links lost after updates
  • Screen flickers between files
  • Text display issues after multiple app launches
  • Color brightness settings lost
  • Keyboard popup without dialog box
  • Accelerometer causes erratic screen movement
  • Incompatibility with iOS/iPadOS updates
  • Performance lag with large maps
  • Syncing issues between devices

Requested features

24 requests
  • Desktop/Mac version for syncing
  • iCloud syncing between iOS devices
  • Google Drive and OneDrive support
  • Evernote integration
  • Ability to drag items between groups
Show 19 more
  • Undo functionality
  • Export to email directly
  • Different arrow/connector styles
  • OPML export format
  • Reminders and deadline notifications
  • Different text box shapes
  • Photo/image import and support
  • Web-based version
  • Ability to move items outside groups
  • Simpler gesture controls for text entry
  • List view option
  • Icons and visual indicators for content types
  • Advanced search functionality
  • Child count indicators on parent nodes
  • Customizable 3D graphics
  • Movie recording with preset paths
  • Structured data visualization capabilities
  • Automatic color selection for new groups
  • Bullet points for children items

Card Decks

Not enough reviews yet to summarise bugs or requests.

In-app purchases

None

Headspace

No in-app purchases

None

Card Decks

No in-app purchases

Questions

Is Headspace free?
Headspace costs $3.99, with no in-app purchases.
Is Card Decks free?
Card Decks is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Which has better reviews, Headspace or Card Decks?
Card Decks is rated higher. Headspace averages 4.4 out of 5 from 10 ratings, while Card Decks averages 4.5 from 2 ratings.
Do Headspace or Card Decks have ads?
Neither Headspace nor Card Decks shows ads.
Which is updated more often, Headspace or Card Decks?
Headspace ships an update every 2 months, and Card Decks every 5 months. Most recently, Headspace was updated on October 29, 2026 and Card Decks on October 23, 2026.

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