Going to Confession vs Shrive
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
Going to Confession
This app guides users through the examination of conscience and the steps of confession. It offers customizable examination options based on age and sin categories, and provides real-time assistance during confession, including tracking sins and confession history.
- Examination of conscience by commandments or categories
- Customizable examination based on age
- Real-time confession assistance
- Automatic tracking of confession history
- Custom sin creation
- Face ID protection for sensitive information
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Going to confession! This app is the perfect tool to assist you with your examination of conscience, and help you through the steps of going to confession. Experience peace of mind during your next Reconciliation, whether it's been years since your last confession or you're a frequent visitor to the sacrament. Designed for the whole family with helpful examinations for all ages. Prepare with Confidence: * Choose from specific examinations for Child's First Confession, Child, Teen, or Adult. * Group your examination by The Ten Commandments or by God, Others, and Self. * Simply by combining Commandments 6 & 9 and 7 & 10. * Track sins with counts, per day, per week, or per month. * Add additional sins for your examinations. Step-by-Step Guide: * Use the Confession Tab in the confessional for a guided walkthrough of every prayer and step. * The app automatically displays your sins and their counts. * Automated history tracking. Privacy & Control: * Keep your examination completely private with Face ID. * Quickly reset clear your examination data back to defaults.
Shrive
This app helps Catholics prepare for and engage in the sacrament of confession. It allows users to privately log sins, track the date of their last confession, and provides a comprehensive guide for the confession process. The goal is to facilitate a deeper spiritual connection.
- Log sins privately
- Track last confession date
- Comprehensive confession guide
- Spiritual preparation tool
- Widgets for confession tracking
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Shrive is the ULTIMATE confession App for Catholics providing a variety of features for preparation of the sacrament. LOG YOUR SINS: Safely and privately record all of your sins so you will easily be able to read them off to the priest. REFLECT: Easily reflect before confession or even when in the confession like to help you make the most honest confession SEE WHEN YOUR LAST CONFESSION WAS: Shrive will automatically keep track when you go to confession. Upon first launch, it will ask you approximately when you last went to confession. Shrive also has widgets that count up to when you were last at confession. COMPREHENSIVE GUIDE TO CONFESSION: Whether this is your first or you’ve been confessing for 20 years, we understand that you may get nervous. Shrive will show you exactly what you got to say to the priest in the “Confession Time” menu including the Act of Contrition, your sins, and when your last confession was. GET CLOSER TO GOD: Logging your sins the moment you realize them will make you more likely to get to Heaven. Note: Shrive is NOT a replacement for the sacrament of reconciliation, rather it's a resource that you can use in confession to help you get closer to God.
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is update cadence: Shrive at every 3 days against Going to Confession's every 4 months. Going to Confession's advantage is ratings volume (28 vs 4). On price, rating, review sentiment 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.
On the App Store both sit at effectively the same score — 4.9 for Going to Confession against 5.0 for Shrive. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: Going to Confession has 28 ratings behind it against 4, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews split almost evenly too, at 100% and 100% positive.
Going to Confession ships an update every 4 months, Shrive every 3 days. The most recent releases landed on August 31, 2026 and September 9, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | Going to Confession | Shrive |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free |
| Rating | 4.9 (28 ratings) | 5.0 (4 ratings) — better |
| Positive reviews | 100.0% of reviews | 100.0% of reviews |
| Number of ratings | 28 — better | 4 |
| Update frequency | Every 4 months | Every 3 days — better |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | No | No |
| Monetization | Free | Free |
| Devices | iPhone, iPad — better | iPhone |
| Requires iOS | 17.0 — better | 17.4 |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 3 MB | 7 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 4+ |
| Developer | Anthony Splaver | William Gallegos |
Customer experience
Going to Confession
Shrive
In-app purchases
Going to Confession
No in-app purchases
Shrive
No in-app purchases
