Comparison

Now Meditation Timer vs Zen

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

Head to head
About

Now Meditation Timer

This app offers a simple, distraction-free meditation timer with customizable durations and calming visual themes. It helps build a daily practice without pressure, optionally syncing with Apple Health and featuring an Apple Watch companion app.

Highlights
  • Customizable meditation timer (8-60 minutes)
  • Daily habit tracking (week strip, month calendar)
  • Three distinct visual themes
  • Optional Apple Health integration
  • Apple Watch companion app
  • Focus-designed interface with accessibility features
Features
Read full description

Now is a minimal meditation timer. No accounts, no subscriptions, no tracking — just you and the present moment. Set a timer. Press Begin. Breathe. • A SIMPLE TIMER Choose any duration from 8 to 60 minutes, with one-tap presets at 8, 10, 15, 20, and 30. Adjust by single minutes with a familiar stepper. The timer fades into a calm, immersive screen with a soft breathing glow. • A DAILY HABIT, NOT A STREAK YOU'LL LOSE Set a daily goal — eight minutes is a good place to start. A week strip on the home screen and a month calendar in History show every day you practiced. Build the habit at your own pace. • THREE LOOKS, ONE APP Pick the theme that fits your mood: Clay (warm paper, terracotta), Deep (restful ink, glowing aqua — made for night practice), or Mist (cool, precise, near-monochrome). Switch any time in Settings → Appearance. • APPLE HEALTH, IF YOU WANT IT Sessions save as Mindful Minutes in Apple Health, and mindfulness logged in other apps counts toward your daily goal here. You can skip this entirely — the app works the same. • APPLE WATCH A companion app on your wrist starts, runs, and saves sessions, with a complication for one-tap access. • DESIGNED FOR FOCUS • Newsreader serif for the parts that matter • A breathing glow that respects Reduce Motion • Full Dynamic Type support • VoiceOver labels on every control • YOUR DATA STAYS YOURS Your sessions live on your device (and Apple Health if you opt in). No analytics. No advertising SDKs. No accounts to make. No subscription to remember to cancel. — Built with care by an indie developer. If something feels off, tell me, and I'll fix it.

About

Zen

Features
Read full description

Just Sit. Your Way. Nothing Else. A silent meditation timer with traditional bells. The sit is free. Optional short guided sits when just sitting is hard. Then silence. No ads, no streaks, no account. JUST SIT Sit on a cushion or chair. Eyes barely open, soft gaze. Feel your body, breath, and posture. No mantra, no goal. When thoughts come and go, just return to sitting. The benefits are real — a calm mind, more focus, more clarity, better sleep, less stress, more presence. They show up when you stop chasing them. YOUR WAY Just sit. Easier said than done. Just sitting can be brutal. Most people need a little guidance, and that detour is fine. Optional short guided sits — the Just Sit course, one idea at a time — then sit in silence. Or leave every optional feature off. Not a library of courses. Discover your way to just sit. NOTHING ELSE Everything you need to just sit is included, and stays free. A timer, bells, Watch, widgets. No ads, no streaks, no account to sit. The sit stays free. Always. Native on iPhone, iPad, and Apple Watch. Focus on what matters: just sit. HOW IT WORKS Open the app · pick a duration · sit. Beautiful bells, soundscapes, intervals, warmup and cooldown. If you want to look around: Welcome on first launch, then short guided sits for ordinary life. Nothing required. Explore at your own pace. WHY THIS EXISTS Hi, I'm Francis, a longtime Apple developer. I discovered regular meditation about 15 years ago. I suffer from PTSD, and meditation has helped me survive — more than once — when things fall apart. Meditation only clicked for me with a Zen just-sit practice. To get there I had to put in the time: other practices, sampling, trial and error, year after year of showing up to sit. I needed those 10,000 minutes on apps before I could stop searching and, in the end, just sit. Zen : Your Way is my way of giving back. A quiet timer. Optional guidance to nudge you toward just sitting. Nothing in the way of the sit itself. ON IPHONE AND IPAD • Apple Watch companion — start sits and complications on your wrist • Home Screen widgets and Live Activities

Screenshots

Now Meditation Timer4 screens
Zen4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is update cadence: Zen at every 2 days against Now Meditation Timer's every 2 months. Zen also leads on device support (6 vs 2). On price, ads, in-app purchases and iOS requirement 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. Neither carries in-app purchases, so what you see is what you pay.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

Now Meditation Timer ships an update every 2 months, Zen every 2 days. The most recent releases landed on October 22, 2026 and October 14, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard2 real differences · 8 level
Now Meditation Timer versus Zen: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterNow Meditation TimerZen
PriceFreeFree
Rating5.0 (1 ratings) — better—
Positive reviews100.0% of reviews—
Number of ratings1 — better—
Update frequencyEvery 2 monthsEvery 2 days — better
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesNoNo
MonetizationFree—
DevicesiPhone, iPadiPhone, iPad, Mac, Apple TV, Apple Watch, Vision Pro — better
Requires iOS17.017.0
Further details — not scored
Size2 MB25 MB
Age rating4+4+
DeveloperBrian KemlerFrancis Dierick

In-app purchases

None

Now Meditation Timer

No in-app purchases

None

Zen

No in-app purchases

Questions

Is Now Meditation Timer free?
Now Meditation Timer is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Is Zen free?
Zen is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Do Now Meditation Timer or Zen have ads?
Neither Now Meditation Timer nor Zen shows ads.
Which is updated more often, Now Meditation Timer or Zen?
Now Meditation Timer ships an update every 2 months, and Zen every 2 days. Most recently, Now Meditation Timer was updated on October 22, 2026 and Zen on October 14, 2026.

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