Comparison

Home vs Step Learning

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

Head to head
About

Home

Control all your home lights with a single tap. Organize lights by room, adjust brightness and color, and customize icons for quick access. Syncs preferences across devices and supports multiple homes.

Highlights
  • One-tap light control
  • Organize lights by room
  • Adjust brightness and color
  • Customizable light icons
  • Control grouped lights individually
  • Syncs preferences via iCloud
  • Supports multiple homes
Read full description

Home Lights gives you fast, one-tap control of every light in your home through a clean, compact interface. Each room is organized into a collapsible section with a grid of buttons that show every light's power state, brightness, and color at a glance. Tap a button icon to toggle a light, or tap the body of the button to open a detail panel with sliders for brightness, hue, color temperature, and saturation. Pick from 16 icons to make each button instantly recognizable, and long-press a room's badge to toggle every light in that room at once. Personalize every home. Set a unique background photo for each of your homes, with adjustable blur and separate dim levels for light and dark mode — so each home feels distinct the moment you open it. Arrange your space. Enter edit mode to drag and drop rooms into the order that matches how you actually move through your home, and rearrange lights within each room the same way. Your layout, your way. Run HomeKit scenes. Trigger any of your existing scenes — Movie Night, Good Morning, Dinner — straight from the top of the home view, with no extra setup. Talk to your lights. Use the built-in assistant, powered by on-device Apple Intelligence, to control your home in plain language: "dim the living room", "turn everything off", "make the kitchen warm white", or "run movie night". Nothing leaves your device. Grouped lights, no compromises. For grouped accessories, adjust all services together or fine-tune each one individually — without ungrouping anything in HomeKit. Switch between multiple homes from a single tap, and pull to refresh light states anytime. Your room order, light order, icon choices, and per-home backgrounds sync seamlessly across your devices via iCloud. Supports light and dark mode. Available on iPhone, iPad, Mac, Apple Watch, and Apple Vision Pro.

About

Step Learning

This focus timer helps you manage your time effectively with countdown and count-up modes. Track your focus sessions, analyze trends, and sync with your calendar for better productivity. Enjoy a distraction-free experience with no ads.

Highlights
  • Countdown and count-up timer modes
  • Focus statistics and trend analysis
  • Calendar sync for session tracking
  • Dynamic Island and Live Activities support
  • Customizable multi-scene tags
  • iCloud multi-device synchronization
Features
Read full description

Step Learning — Make Every Minute Count A focus timer that supports both count-up and count-down modes. Whether you're studying, exercising, or coding, let the little panda keep you focused. Core Features • Countdown Mode: Set a focus duration and concentrate until completion • Count-Up Mode: Open-ended timing for tasks with no fixed duration • Dynamic Island shows focus progress in real time (iPhone 14 Pro+) • Live Activities on Lock Screen — check timer without unlocking Multi-Scene Tags • Preset tags: Study, Exercise, Coding, Work, Pomodoro • Custom tags for personalized tracking Focus Statistics • Focus streak tracking to build consistent habits • Weekly trend charts for time allocation insights • Tag distribution analysis of your focus patterns Calendar Sync • Automatically sync completed sessions to iOS Calendar • Easy daily review and reflection iCloud Sync • Automatic iCloud data synchronization • Seamless multi-device experience Why Step Learning? • Lightweight and distraction-free • No ads — a pure focus experience • 15 languages supported • Count-up mode — a unique feature most Pomodoro apps lack Perfect for students, professionals, freelancers — anytime you need to focus.

Screenshots

Home4 screens
Step Learning4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is review sentiment: Step Learning at 100% against Home's 0%. Step Learning also leads on update cadence (fortnightly vs every 3 months) and iOS requirement (17.0 vs 26.0). Home's advantage is price (Free vs $1.99) and device support (5 vs 2). On 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

Home is free to download; Step Learning costs $1.99 up front. Neither carries in-app purchases, so what you see is what you pay.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

Home ships an update every 3 months, Step Learning fortnightly. The most recent releases landed on June 21, 2026 and September 12, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard6 real differences · 4 level
Home versus Step Learning: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterHomeStep Learning
PriceFree — better$1.99
Rating3.0 (2 ratings) — better—
Positive reviews0.0% of reviews100.0% of reviews — better
Number of ratings2 — better—
Update frequencyEvery 3 monthsFortnightly — better
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesNoNo
MonetizationFree — betterPaid
DevicesiPhone, iPad, Mac, Apple Watch, Vision Pro — betteriPhone, Mac
Requires iOS26.017.0 — better
Further details — not scored
Size5 MB16 MB
Age rating4+4+
DeveloperFabio Policarpo小祯 汪

Customer experience

Home

All ratings1 ratings
Positive100.0%
Neutral0.0%
Negative0.0%
Written reviews1 reviews
Positive0.0%
Neutral0.0%
Negative100.0%

Step Learning

Written reviews1 reviews
Positive100.0%
Neutral0.0%
Negative0.0%

In-app purchases

None

Home

No in-app purchases

None

Step Learning

No in-app purchases

Questions

Is Home free?
Home is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Is Step Learning free?
Step Learning costs $1.99, with no in-app purchases.
Do Home or Step Learning have ads?
Neither Home nor Step Learning shows ads.
Which is updated more often, Home or Step Learning?
Home ships an update every 3 months, and Step Learning fortnightly. Most recently, Home was updated on June 21, 2026 and Step Learning on September 12, 2026.

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