Orchid Journal vs Spool
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
Orchid Journal
Track your orchid collection with detailed logs, photos, and growth charts. This private app helps you monitor watering, weight, and blossoms, creating a visual history for each plant. Share your orchid's journey with a giftable history file.
- Private care tracking
- Daily log with photos
- Growth charts
- Collection view
- Shareable plant history
- Slideshow mode
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Orchid Journal is a beautiful, private care tracker for orchid enthusiasts. Log daily weight, bud counts, blossoms, watering amounts, tray readings, and personal notes for every plant in your collection. Watch your orchids thrive through growth charts that plot weight against flower count over time. KEY FEATURES • Full collection view with at-a-glance watering and weight status • Daily log with photos — build a visual timeline of every plant • Slideshow mode: flip through your orchid's full history as glowing photo cards • Growth charts showing weight and bloom count trends side by side • Glow Stats dashboard showing active plants and total blossoms at a glance • Gift an orchid: bundle its entire history — photos and all — into a shareable file so the new owner receives the complete story of the plant COMPLETELY PRIVATE Orchid Journal collects zero personal data. No account, no cloud sync, no analytics, no tracking of any kind. Everything lives only on your device. NO ADS — EVER This app is free with no advertising of any kind, now or in the future. Developed by skyberrys — skyberrys.com
Spool
This app helps knitters manage their projects with interactive patterns, row counters, and stash organization. It supports custom charts, size recommendations, and time tracking to streamline the creative process from start to finish.
- Interactive step-by-step patterns
- Built-in row counters
- Colorwork and cable chart support
- Knitworthy size recommendations
- Yarn and materials stash organizer
- Time tracking for projects
- Widgets and Live Activities
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Made to support the creative process from cast on to cast off. Spool was built by a knitter who was tired of scribbling row counts on PDFs, circling sizes in every step, and constantly losing track of progress within patterns. Upload your knitting pattern, create a project, and work through it step-by-step, section-by-section — just hit 'Next Row' and keep knitting. Anywhere there's a repeat, there's a built-in row counter integrated with the full project. Size-specific instructions, stitch counts, and repeat tracking are all handled. See all your WIPs in one place, track your knitting hours, and finally put that yarn stash to work. FEATURES Step-by-step interactive patterns — work through your project row by row, with built-in row counters & repeat tracking and your size pulled through to every step Colorwork & cable charts — your pattern charts directly in the app. Customize colorwork with your actual yarn colors, and track your place with automatic highlighting on your current row Knitworthy: add your measurements (and those of the people you knit for), all that data in one place — plus we'll recommend a size based on the project's recommended ease Standalone row counter — for quick projects and one-off needs Materials: Needles and Yarn Stash — catalog your yarn and materials so you can finally utilize that stash Yarn substitutions: want to use a different yarn than the recommended? We'll give you a starting point for your needle size, based on Ravelry data Time tracking — find out exactly how long your sweater actually took Ruler — measure your ribbing without hunting for a tape measure Widgets and Live Activities: work your project from your home screen or lock screen Glossary — definitions and tutorials linked directly to terms in your pattern SUBSCRIPTION: Free: one pattern upload per month, full interactive project experience, Knitworthy fit profiles, yarn stash tracker, knitting stats Maker: 3 pattern imports per month, Ravelry integration, Widgets & lock screen counter, yarn substitutions, plus everything in Free Founding Member (limited time, $8.99): 10 pattern imports that never expire, 60 days of full Maker access, founding member badge, then free tier — or subscribe to keep Maker at $3.99/month. Spool was created by a serial knitter and a software developer with 8 years of experience. We hope you love it! Download the app today and spool around with us. Terms of Use: https://spoolhq.co/terms
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is in-app purchases: Orchid Journal at none against Spool's 3. Orchid Journal also leads on rating (5.0 vs 4.7) and iOS requirement (13.0 vs 18.2). Spool's advantage is ratings volume (9 vs 1) and device support. On price 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. Spool sells 3 in-app purchases, starting at $3.99 per month. Orchid Journal asks for nothing beyond the download.
Orchid Journal holds the better App Store score, 5.0 against 4.7. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: Spool has 9 ratings behind it against 1, so its average is the more settled of the two.
| Parameter | Orchid Journal | Spool |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free |
| Rating | 5.0 (1 ratings) — better | 4.7 (9 ratings) |
| Positive reviews | — | 85.7% of reviews |
| Number of ratings | 1 | 9 — better |
| Update frequency | — | Every 2 days |
| Ads | — | No |
| In-app purchases | No — better | Yes |
| Monetization | Free — better | Freemium |
| Devices | — | iPhone, iPad — better |
| Requires iOS | 13.0 — better | 18.2 |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 25 MB | 22 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 4+ |
| Developer | Carrie Segal | Spool App LLC |
In-app purchases
Orchid Journal
No in-app purchases
Spool
- Spool Maker14 Days trial$3.991 Month
- Spool Maker14 Days trial$35.991 Year
- Founding Member$8.99









