Quick Journal vs Softly
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
Quick Journal
This app offers a straightforward journaling experience with extensive customization options. Personalize themes, fonts, icons, and layouts to create your ideal digital notebook. Widgets and draft saving features enhance usability for daily reflection.
- Customizable themes and fonts
- App icon and layout personalization
- Home screen widgets
- Save entries as drafts
- Copy and share entries
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Quick Journal is the simplest way to keep a journal. You can customize your journal's theme, fonts, app icon, layout, and even where the composer button is placed. To help you write or keep track of your entries, the app features widgets you can put on your home screen. You can copy or share your entries. You can always come back to an entry later by saving it as a draft, just swipe down and the entry will be saved. Hope you enjoy! EULA https://www.apple.com/legal/internet-services/itunes/dev/stdeula/
Softly
A private journaling app focused on reflection and emotional well-being. It offers multiple writing styles, a visual emotional calendar, and word pattern analysis. All data is stored locally for complete privacy.
- Multiple writing styles
- Visual emotional calendar
- Word constellation analysis
- Time capsule feature
- On-device data storage
- Face ID protection
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Softly is a private journal for your days. No achievements. No streaks. No productivity metrics. Just you, a word when you want one, and a space that comes back every night to receive you the way you arrived. WRITE HOWEVER FEELS RIGHT Free diary, gratitude in three lines, a mood with a tap of a moon, or an affirmation when you need to hear it. Four ways to leave the day without losing it. YOUR MONTH IN WATERCOLOR Each day lights up with the color of how you felt. A hand-painted emotional calendar — not a bar chart. YOUR CONSTELLATION OF WORDS The words that return most to your writing appear as a constellation that shifts with you. You see patterns without anyone interpreting them for you. TIME CAPSULES Seal a piece of writing today (AES-GCM encrypted). Open it in a month, a year — whenever you're ready to listen to yourself again. TOTAL PRIVACY Everything lives on your device. On-device speech recognition. Face ID for your space. No tracking, no accounts, no server watching. WATERCOLORS THAT BREATHE Each time you return, a new variant of a sprig, flower, or lavender greets you. The notebook changes with you. Softly is for the days you want to write — and for the days you only wanted to open the app. Here, both count.
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is rating: Softly at 5.0 against Quick Journal's 4.7. Softly also leads on update cadence (every 3 days vs every 9 days) and review sentiment (100% vs 86%). Quick Journal's advantage is ratings volume (24 vs 3) and device support (3 vs 1). On price, ads, in-app purchases and monetization model 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.
Softly holds the better App Store score, 5.0 against 4.7. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: Quick Journal has 24 ratings behind it against 3, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews point the same way: 86% of Quick Journal's written reviews are positive against 100% of Softly's.
Quick Journal ships an update every 9 days, Softly every 3 days. The most recent releases landed on October 7, 2026 and September 28, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | Quick Journal | Softly |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free |
| Rating | 4.7 (24 ratings) | 5.0 (3 ratings) — better |
| Positive reviews | 86.4% of reviews | 100.0% of reviews — better |
| Number of ratings | 24 — better | 3 |
| Update frequency | Every 9 days | Every 3 days — better |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | No | No |
| Monetization | Free | Free |
| Devices | iPhone, iPad, Apple Watch — better | iPhone |
| Requires iOS | 17.4 | 17.0 — better |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 4 MB | 60 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 4+ |
| Developer | Charlie Deets | Jean Millan |
Customer experience
Quick Journal
Softly
In-app purchases
Quick Journal
No in-app purchases
Softly
No in-app purchases









