Beachsafe vs JCU App
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
Beachsafe
Discover Australian beaches with real-time information on surf conditions, weather, hazards, and lifesaving services. Find patrolled beaches, learn about safety, and get expert advice on rip currents and marine life.
- Find nearby beaches with GPS
- View surf, weather, and tide forecasts
- Check patrol service information
- Identify beach hazards and warnings
- Access surf safety advice
- Save favorite beaches
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Taking a road trip up the coast? On holiday? Or just looking for the right beach for you? Find your nearest beaches in seconds. Brought to you by Surf Life Saving Australia, the Beachsafe app includes the location, weather, surf conditions and hazards plus the local facilities for all Australian beaches. Importantly, the current lifesaving service for each beach is listed to help you find the nearest patrolled beach. Beachsafe also provides expert advice about rip currents, flags and signs, waves, marine creatures, surf skills and more. SLSA recommends swimming at patrolled beaches, between the red and yellow flags. App Features Find a beach • Find beaches near you with your device’s GPS • Use the map view to quickly locate beaches near you • Search for a town, city, region or beach • Save your favourite beaches Patrol service information • Quickly and easily see if a beach is patrolled by surf lifesavers or lifeguards • Find out when a beach will be patrolled using the future search function Conditions • View detailed weather forecasts • See the tide information • Check the swell and wind forecast • Push notifications - Beach closures and major hazard alerts for Beaches that you follow Hazards • Review a beach’s hazard rating • Read detailed summaries of each beach written by coastal safety experts • See hazard information about a patrolled beach including rip currents, stingers and sharks when these have been entered by surf lifesavers or lifeguards Surf Safety • How to identify and escape rip currents • Lifeguard’s top tips • Read about flags and signs • Waves and weather • Surf skills • Marine creatures • Stingers • First aid advice • And more… The Beachsafe app was produced in conjunction with SLSA's beach safety website beachsafe.org.au. If you find this app useful and you wish to help support Surf Life Saving Australia and our 160,000 volunteers, please visit https://sls.com.au. Be safe at the beach, get Beachsafe.
JCU App
This app helps students manage their university life, offering features for enrolment, accessing study tools, finding campus information, and connecting with university support services. It provides quick access to essential resources like email, library search, and campus maps.
- Enrolment and subject registration
- Access to eStudent and LearnJCU
- Library search integration
- Campus maps and parking information
- Quick access to JCU security and email
- Links to university events and activities
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Features: - Enrolment: accept your offer, complete important details, enrol in subjects and register for classes - Study tools: access eStudent and LearnJCU without having to log in again, easily access the Library search - Study Support: find help with your study and life at uni - Security: quick access to the JCU security number for your course campus - Email: open your JCU email from the App - Need help?: access online help for your study and support for student life - Mobile Maps: find your way around campus with JCU campus maps - Uni life: links to events, sports and other activities on campus - Parking: find information on where to park and what it’ll cost - Got an idea? We are working hard to improve and build the features you want. Help us by sending your feedback using the in-app feedback or emailing jcuapp@jcu.edu.au - Want to get involved? Join our beta team to help design and test new features. Email jcuapp@jcu.edu.au if you want to be involved
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is rating: Beachsafe at 5.0 against JCU App's 3.0. JCU App's advantage is update cadence (every 6 weeks vs every 6 months). On price, review sentiment, ratings volume and ads 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.
Beachsafe holds the better App Store score, 5.0 against 3.0. Both are backed by a comparable volume of ratings — 3 and 2 respectively. Written reviews point the same way: 46% of Beachsafe's written reviews are positive against 40% of JCU App's.
Beachsafe ships an update every 6 months, JCU App every 6 weeks. The most recent releases landed on September 19, 2026 and September 3, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | Beachsafe | JCU App |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free |
| Rating | 5.0 (3 ratings) — better | 3.0 (2 ratings) |
| Positive reviews | 46.5% of reviews — better | 40.0% of reviews |
| Number of ratings | 3 — better | 2 |
| Update frequency | Every 6 months | Every 6 weeks — better |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | No | No |
| Monetization | Free | Free |
| Devices | iPhone, iPad, iPod | iPhone, iPad, iPod |
| Requires iOS | 13.0 | 13.0 |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 100 MB | 67 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 4+ |
| Developer | Surf Life Saving Australia Ltd. | James Cook University |
Customer experience
Beachsafe
JCU App
In-app purchases
Beachsafe
No in-app purchases
JCU App
No in-app purchases








