Comparison

Orthodox Rule vs Orthodox Hours

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

Head to head
About

Orthodox Rule

Features
Read full description

A private, offline Orthodox app for women — grounded in the prayers, calendar, and rhythm of the Church. One download. One purchase. Yours for life.​

About

Orthodox Hours

This app provides a comprehensive prayer book for the Eastern Orthodox Byzantine tradition. It includes the daily cycle of prayer, the Church's calendar, and the full Psalter, accessible offline. Features include daily readings, saint commemorations, and customizable prayer reminders.

Highlights
  • Daily prayer cycle (Horologion)
  • Orthodox Church calendar
  • Full Psalter with multiple numbering systems
  • Daily scripture readings and saint lives
  • Customizable prayer reminders
  • Offline access
  • Themed app colors based on Church calendar
Features
Read full description

Hours is a prayer book for the Eastern Orthodox Byzantine tradition: the daily cycle of prayer, the calendar of the Church, and the whole Psalter, in one place and always to hand, with or without a signal. THE HOURS The Horologion, the cycle that sanctifies the day. Orthros at dawn, the First, Third, Sixth and Ninth Hours, Vespers at sunset, and Compline before sleep. The hour you are presently in is marked when you open the app, so you always know where the day stands. The Little Hours are given in full, and change with the Church's calendar: the hymns of the Resurrection in the week's tone, the hymns of each weekday, the Great Feasts, the Lenten Hours and the Paschal Hours of Bright Week. TODAY The Orthodox calendar for the day: - The commemorations and feasts, and the rank of the celebration - The tone of the week - The fasting rule, and what is abstained from - The scripture readings, in full - The lives of the saints commemorated Follow the New Calendar or the Old in Slavic usage, as kept by the OCA, ROCOR and the Russian and Serbian Churches, or the usage of the Antiochian and Greek Archdioceses. On the memorial Saturdays and through Great Lent, Today points to the prayers the day calls for. THE PSALTER All 150 Psalms, in both Masoretic and Septuagint numbering, so the psalm you are looking for is the psalm you find. And the twenty Kathismata, stasis by stasis, with those appointed for the day at Matins, at Vespers, and at the Hours of Lent. THE LITANY Write in the names of those you pray for, the living and the departed, and they are read into the commemorations of the Prayer Book. Pin each name's saint, and keep your own patrons, your family's and your parish's; Today remembers them on their day. Check names off as you pray. The names never leave your phone. THE PRAYER BOOK Prayers for adoration, confession, thanksgiving, supplication, intercession, lamentation and consecration, and the prayers before Holy Communion. PRAYERS FOR A NEED Sickness, grief, a sick child, the departed, fear, repentance, travel, marriage, peace and more: for each, the psalms and the prayers of the Church. SEARCH Find a saint and the day they are kept, a verse of the Psalms or the readings, a life, or a prayer. REMINDERS Set any of the seven hours to call you to prayer. Each repeats daily and carries a line from that hour's own prayers rather than a generic alert. Orthros begins at four in the morning, so it is left off until you ask for it. CHANT Orthodox chant that keeps playing while you pray, with the screen locked or another app open, and with controls on the lock screen. VESTED IN THE DAY The app takes the colour of the day as the Church keeps it: gold through ordinary days, purple through Great Lent, red for the feasts of martyrs and of the Cross, dark on Great and Holy Friday, Paschal red through Bright Week. The cycle follows the moving date of Pascha by itself, year after year, on either calendar. A widget brings the day to your home and lock screens. EASY TO READ Text set for reading on a screen, that follows your iPhone's Text Size, in light or dark. WITHOUT A SIGNAL Everything is in the app itself: the prayers, the Psalter, the chant, and the calendar with its readings and lives through 2050. Hours never needs a connection, which matters most where prayer is wanted and there is no signal. PRIVACY Hours collects nothing. There is no account, no analytics, no advertising and no tracking of any kind, and the app makes no network requests. The calendar is compiled from orthocal.info; the lives of the saints are from Abbamoses.com, by permission.

Screenshots

Orthodox Rule4 screens
Orthodox Hours4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is in-app purchases: Orthodox Hours at none against Orthodox Rule's 1. Orthodox Hours also leads on update cadence (every 2 days vs fortnightly). Orthodox Rule's advantage is iOS requirement (15.1 vs 17.0). On price, ads 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

Both are free to download. Orthodox Rule sells 1 one-off in-app purchase. Orthodox Hours asks for nothing beyond the download.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

Orthodox Rule ships an update fortnightly, Orthodox Hours every 2 days. The most recent releases landed on October 28, 2026 and October 26, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard3 real differences · 6 level
Orthodox Rule versus Orthodox Hours: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterOrthodox RuleOrthodox Hours
PriceFreeFree
Rating—5.0 (2 ratings) — better
Number of ratings—2 — better
Update frequencyFortnightlyEvery 2 days — better
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesYesNo — better
Monetization—Free
DevicesiPhone, iPodiPhone, iPad
Requires iOS15.1 — better17.0
Further details — not scored
Size38 MB11 MB
Age rating4+4+
DeveloperSarah HowellBruce Willke

In-app purchases

1 purchases

Orthodox Rule

One-time1
  • Orthodox Rule$14.99
None

Orthodox Hours

No in-app purchases

Questions

Is Orthodox Rule free?
Orthodox Rule is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Is Orthodox Hours free?
Orthodox Hours is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Do Orthodox Rule or Orthodox Hours have ads?
Neither Orthodox Rule nor Orthodox Hours shows ads.
Which is updated more often, Orthodox Rule or Orthodox Hours?
Orthodox Rule ships an update fortnightly, and Orthodox Hours every 2 days. Most recently, Orthodox Rule was updated on October 28, 2026 and Orthodox Hours on October 26, 2026.

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