Comparison

Hourly vs Boople

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

Head to head
About

Hourly

This app provides customizable hourly chimes and notifications, functioning like a personal wristwatch that alerts you at specific intervals. You can select unique sounds, display custom messages, and choose which times to be notified.

Highlights
  • Customizable hourly chimes
  • Selectable notification sounds
  • Display custom messages
  • Flexible notification scheduling
  • No ads or tracking
Features
Read full description

Hourly helps you keep track of time. It's just like having a wristwatch that beeps on the hour, except it's much more personal! You can choose: * The sound to play (from a simple wristwatch beep, to the legendary Greenwich Pips, to a spoken voice, or the chime of an old clock) * A message to display on the screen * Which hours, half hours, or any other times to notify you about We think it's the best hourly chime app on the App Store, and we're always listening for your feedback if you think we can do better! No ads, no tracking, no In-App Purchases. Ever.

About

Boople

Features
Read full description

This is for me, but you can use it too. Boople is a reminder app with one job: boop you on a schedule you set. Drink water every 30 minutes. Stand up every hour. Check your posture every 45 minutes. Stretch every 2 hours. Set it once and stop thinking about it. HOW IT WORKS You build a boop like a sentence: "Gimme a boop every 30 min from 09:00 AM to 05:00 PM on weekdays playing bird." - Interval: every 15 minutes, up to every 2 hours - Window: a start and end time, so nothing fires while you sleep - Days: any combination of weekdays - Sound: glass, wave, scream, bird, cricket, fart, bubble, boing. Tap one and hear it before you commit. - Pause: flip a boop off without deleting it, flip it back on whenever Make as many boops as you want. Tap any card to change it, toggle it off for the weekend, or delete it. WHAT IT DOESN'T DO No account. No sign up. No cloud, no sync, no ads, no feed. No streaks to keep and no badges to earn. Your boops live on your phone and nowhere else, and the app never talks to a server. ONE HONEST LIMIT iOS only lets an app keep 64 pending notifications at a time. Boople shows you the live count right on the home screen, so a dense schedule never quietly stops working without you knowing. Add a Boop, and it'll boop you.

Screenshots

Hourly3 screens
Boople3 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is price: Boople at Free against Hourly's $0.99. Boople also leads on update cadence (every 2 months vs every 6 months) and iOS requirement (15.1 vs 17.0). On ads, in-app purchases and device support 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

Boople is free to download; Hourly costs $0.99 up front. Neither carries in-app purchases, so what you see is what you pay.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

Hourly ships an update every 6 months, Boople every 2 months. The most recent releases landed on September 21, 2026 and September 7, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard3 real differences · 7 level
Hourly versus Boople: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterHourlyBoople
Price$0.99Free — better
Rating4.0 (127 ratings) — better—
Positive reviews72.4% of reviews—
Number of ratings127 — better—
Update frequencyEvery 6 monthsEvery 2 months — better
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesNoNo
MonetizationFree—
DevicesiPhone, iPad, Apple Watch — betteriPhone, iPod
Requires iOS17.015.1 — better
Further details — not scored
Size94 MB26 MB
Age rating4+4+
DeveloperChris JonesAdiv Maimon

Bugs and requests

Hourly

Reported bugs

13 issues
  • Notifications don't work when phone is locked or in sleep mode
  • Notifications stop working after phone is silenced
  • App stops working after iOS updates
  • Settings fail to sync between iPhone and multiple Apple Watches
  • Duplicate notifications firing within 2-3 seconds
Show 8 more
  • Day-of-week selection not functioning correctly
  • Apple Watch notifications don't display the time, only logo
  • App doesn't work reliably in background
  • Chimes during phone calls and are audible to other party
  • 11 PM checkbox gets stuck on some devices
  • Notifications appear twice on Apple Watch
  • App stops notifying around midnight and restarts at 9 AM
  • Text display issues on Apple Watch with large text settings

Requested features

16 requests
  • More diverse sound options (cuckoo chime, gong, church bells, grandfather clock)
  • Ability to use system sounds and custom ringtones
  • Female voice option and multiple voice varieties (British, Australian accents)
  • Volume control for individual notifications
  • 24-hour continuous operation option
Show 11 more
  • iCloud sync with Apple Watch
  • Apple Watch standalone functionality without iPhone dependency
  • Ability to set different schedules for weekdays vs weekends
  • Customizable notification messages beyond 'it is X o'clock'
  • Quarter-hour chime intervals
  • Different sounds for hour vs half-hour vs quarter-hour
  • Haptic feedback option
  • Ability to select which device receives notifications
  • Profile/preset saving and restoration
  • Spoken time on Apple Watch notifications
  • Disable notifications without clearing history

Boople

Not enough reviews yet to summarise bugs or requests.

In-app purchases

None

Hourly

No in-app purchases

None

Boople

No in-app purchases

Questions

Is Hourly free?
Hourly costs $0.99, with no in-app purchases.
Is Boople free?
Boople is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Do Hourly or Boople have ads?
Neither Hourly nor Boople shows ads.
Which is updated more often, Hourly or Boople?
Hourly ships an update every 6 months, and Boople every 2 months. Most recently, Hourly was updated on September 21, 2026 and Boople on September 7, 2026.

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