Meditation Timer | Samsara vs Mindful Timer
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
Meditation Timer | Samsara
This minimalist app provides a customizable timer for various meditation and mindfulness practices. It features calming chimes, detailed statistics, and iCloud support for seamless data syncing across devices. Designed for simplicity, it helps users focus on their practice without distractions.
- Customizable meditation timer
- Support for various practices (mantra, mindfulness, zazen, yoga, reiki)
- Collection of calming chimes (Tibetan bells, singing bowls)
- Detailed practice statistics and progress tracking
- iCloud support for data syncing across devices
- Profile management for easy switching between practices
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For the past twelve years, Samsara has been the meditation timer of tens of thousands of people around the world. This meditation timer is designed for iPad and iPhone, and caters to a wide range of practices, including mantra meditation, transcendental meditation, tm for short, mindfulness, zazen, yoga, reiki, shiatsu, and more. This elegant mindfulness app brings a unique approach to incorporating mindfulness into your everyday life. It's a perfect choice for practitioners of various flavors of meditation and mindfulness. Samsara's clean and minimalist design keeps your focus steady. The app's interface is thoughtfully crafted with simplicity at its core, ensuring your yoga, meditation, or mindfulness session isn't interrupted by complex features or visually overwhelming elements. Profiles make it easy to switch between practices. Switching between profiles takes a second. Whether you are moving between a yoga session and a mindfulness timer, or shifting between personal and group sessions, your settings can be adjusted with just a few simple taps. This meditation timer includes a collection of calming chimes, such as Tibetan bells, singing bowls, and meditation bells. They allow you to personalize your sessions and create the ideal atmosphere for your practice. The bells and chimes are gentle reminders, guiding your yoga or meditation journey and helping you build a deeper connection with your practice. The app provides detailed, insightful statistics for those who want it. Stay motivated by tracking your progress and patterns over time. Monitor the duration, frequency, and type of your practices to get a deeper understanding of your journey and gain insights into your personal growth. Samsara optionally integrates with Apple's HealthKit. This meditation timer comes with iCloud support, one of the most requested features. Your profiles and sessions are stored in iCloud on Apple's servers. Communication with iCloud is encrypted end-to-end, which means it is safe and secure. What does that mean for you? You don't run the risk of losing your data when you lose your device. Switching to a new device is also a breeze. Another benefit is that you can use Samsara on multiple devices, sharing profiles and sessions. It works like magic. Download Samsara for free and let it be your meditation timer during your practice. Privacy Policy: https://www.adropofzen.com/privacy-policy/ Terms of Use: https://www.apple.com/legal/internet-services/itunes/dev/stdeula/
Mindful Timer
This app provides a simple, unguided interval timer for self-guided meditation, breathwork, and yoga practices. It features customizable timers, gentle bells, and a distraction-free interface. Save your favorite routines and track your weekly sessions without any ads or subscriptions.
- Multiple automatic timers
- Customizable interval bells
- Save preset routines
- Weekly session tracking
- Gentle bell sounds
- Distraction-free design
- Offline functionality
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A simple meditation timer for unguided practice. No ads. No subscriptions. No distractions. Just gentle bells to keep time while you practice. Set your session, put your phone down, and let the bells guide you. Mindful Timer is built for people who just want the space to meditate—no courses, no sleep sounds, no content library. Just timers, soothing sounds, and you. Perfect for meditation, yin and restorative yoga, breathwork, zazen, or any self-guided practice. NEW + 20+ curated sounds: singing bowls, bells, and simple voice cues + Choose how many times the bells ring —once, twice, or three times + Practice insights and heat maps to help you build consistency + Sync sessions to Apple Health as Mindful Minutes CORE FEATURES + Sequential timers that flow automatically from one to the next, so you never check the clock + Interval bells at your chosen frequency (e.g. every 5 minutes) + Fully custom timer durations + Save your routines as presets and start them in one tap + Track streaks, weekly and monthly sessions, and lifetime minutes + Play your own music (Spotify, Apple Music, etc.) + Runs in the background and while your phone is locked + Large countdown display. DESIGNED FOR CALM FROM DAY ONE + No ads, ever + No subscriptions, ever — one simple purchase, yours forever + No guided meditations, courses, or content to wade through + No social feeds or comparison + Dark mode so it's easy on the eyes + Works fully offline + Gentle sounds to guide you through transitions (unlike most interval timers) PERFECT FOR + Any self-guided or silent meditation + Zen, zazen, vipassana, and insight meditation + Yin yoga and restorative yoga + Breathwork and pranayama + Practicing at home before a vipassana or meditation retreat + Building a daily unguided meditation or yoga habit + Yoga teachers keeping time during class + Interval walking, Japanese interval walking, and Pomodoro focus blocks WHAT MAKES IT DIFFERENT + Incredibly simple and intuitive design. + Keeps time in the background, so you never pick up your phone mid-practice. + Carefully curated, soothing sounds. No jarring alarms. + No clutter, no distractions, nothing you don't need.
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is monetization model: Mindful Timer at free against Meditation Timer | Samsara's free with in-app purchases. Mindful Timer also leads on rating (5.0 vs 4.7) and review sentiment (100% vs 91%). Meditation Timer | Samsara's advantage is ratings volume (431 vs 10). 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. Meditation Timer | Samsara sells 6 in-app purchases, starting at $2.99 per month and Mindful Timer sells 2 one-off in-app purchases. Whichever you choose, the download price is not the number that matters.
Mindful Timer holds the better App Store score, 5.0 against 4.7. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: Meditation Timer | Samsara has 431 ratings behind it against 10, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews point the same way: 91% of Meditation Timer | Samsara's written reviews are positive against 100% of Mindful Timer's.
Meditation Timer | Samsara ships an update every 10 days, Mindful Timer weekly. The most recent releases landed on September 20, 2026 and September 13, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | Meditation Timer | Samsara | Mindful Timer |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free |
| Rating | 4.7 (431 ratings) | 5.0 (10 ratings) — better |
| Positive reviews | 90.5% of reviews | 100.0% of reviews — better |
| Number of ratings | 431 — better | 10 |
| Update frequency | Every 10 days | Weekly — better |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | Yes | Yes |
| Monetization | Free with in-app purchases | Free — better |
| Devices | iPhone, iPad | iPhone, iPad |
| Requires iOS | 17.6 — better | 18.6 |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 22 MB | 52 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 4+ |
| Developer | Bart Jacobs | Burnt Cinnamon Labs |
Customer experience
Meditation Timer | Samsara
Mindful Timer
Bugs and requests
Meditation Timer | Samsara
Reported bugs
2 issues- Crashing on launch for some users
- Chimes cutting off prematurely
Requested features
6 requests- Apple Watch support
- More color options for highlights
- Additional sound effects like other bells and instruments
- Ability to delete saved profiles
- Option to continue timer after initial duration
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- Ability to set multiple timers within a single session
Mindful Timer
Not enough reviews yet to summarise bugs or requests.
In-app purchases
Meditation Timer | Samsara
- Samsara Premium Monthly7 Days trial$2.991 Month
- Samsara Premium Weekly3 Days trial$3.997 Days
- Samsara Premium Yearly14 Days trial$9.991 Year
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- Samsara Premium Yearly14 Days trial$19.991 Year
- Samsara Premium Yearly$29.991 Year
- Samsara Premium Lifetime$59.99
Mindful Timer
- Premium Sounds$1.99
- Mindful Timer Pro$2.99
Questions
Is Meditation Timer | Samsara free?
Is Mindful Timer free?
Which has better reviews, Meditation Timer | Samsara or Mindful Timer?
Do Meditation Timer | Samsara or Mindful Timer have ads?
Which is updated more often, Meditation Timer | Samsara or Mindful Timer?
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