Comparison

Pomodoro Focus Timer vs Relay Shortcut Trigger

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

Head to head
About

Pomodoro Focus Timer

Enhance productivity with a customizable Pomodoro timer, distraction blocking, and habit building. Track your focus sessions, gain insights into your work patterns, and improve concentration with ambient sounds. Plan your week and sync with your calendar for a structured approach to deep work.

Highlights
  • Customizable Pomodoro timer
  • Break habit builder
  • Distraction blocking (Focus Shield)
  • Ambient focus sounds
  • Productivity statistics and insights
  • Weekly planner
  • Apple Calendar sync
Features
Read full description

Stay focused, block distracting apps, and finish what you start with Deeply - a Pomodoro focus timer, app blocker, study planner, and body-doubling companion in one beautifully simple app. Whether you are studying for exams, doing deep work, building an ADHD-friendly routine, or trying to reduce screen time, Deeply helps you start faster, protect your attention, and build consistent focus habits. BLOCK DISTRACTING APPS Focus Shield helps you stay away from distracting apps while you work or study. Choose which apps to block during a focus session, or schedule Focus Shield for the hours when you need uninterrupted concentration. Need extra accountability? Commitment Mode adds deliberate friction when you try to end a session early, helping you follow through on the goal you set. A FLEXIBLE POMODORO FOCUS TIMER Choose the focus method that works for you: • Classic 25-minute Pomodoro sessions • Custom focus and break durations • Longer deep-work sessions • Open-ended stopwatch mode • Tasks, projects, and tags • Intentional break reminders Live Activities, Dynamic Island, StandBy, widgets, and Apple Watch support keep your timer visible without repeatedly reopening the app. LIVE FOCUS ROOMS AND BODY DOUBLING You do not have to focus alone. Join live Focus Rooms such as Cozy Café, Silent Library, and Coding Cave to work alongside others in real time. See who is currently focusing, send encouraging reactions, and use body doubling to create gentle accountability. Public Focus Rooms are free to join, while Deeply Pro lets you create custom rooms of your own. PLAN YOUR DEEP WORK Turn your intentions into a realistic focus plan: • Schedule focus sessions throughout the week • Organize work with projects and tags • Sync focus time with Apple Calendar • Launch planned sessions with less friction • Build healthy break habits such as hydrating, stretching, walking, or breathing TRACK YOUR FOCUS AND BUILD CONSISTENCY Understand where your time goes with clear productivity insights: • Daily, weekly, and monthly focus statistics • Focus streaks and achievements • Session history and activity reports • Time tracked by project or tag • Insights into your most productive hours CREATE YOUR PERFECT FOCUS ATMOSPHERE Set the mood with calming ambient sounds including rain, white noise, café ambience, fireplace sounds, and more. Connect Apple Music to automatically play your chosen focus playlist when a session begins. Personalize your timer with multiple themes and custom colors so your workspace feels like your own. MADE FOR THE APPLE ECOSYSTEM Deeply works across iPhone, iPad, Mac, and Apple Watch. iCloud keeps your focus history, habits, tags, and settings synchronized across your devices. DEEPLY IS GREAT FOR • Students preparing for exams or completing assignments • People building ADHD-friendly study and work routines • Professionals, remote workers, freelancers, and developers • Anyone who benefits from body doubling and accountability • People reducing social media distractions and screen time • Anyone working to overcome procrastination and build better habits DEEPLY PRO Upgrade to unlock advanced productivity insights, Commitment Mode, unlimited tags, custom Focus Rooms, premium themes, and future Pro features. A free trial is available with the yearly plan. Deeply is free to download, and no account is required to start your first focus session. Start focusing deeply today. Terms of Use: https://www.apple.com/legal/internet-services/itunes/dev/stdeula/

About

Relay Shortcut Trigger

Features
Read full description

Relay turns a spare iPhone or iPad into a hands-free Shortcuts trigger. Run any Shortcut on a repeating interval or at specific times of day, or fire it from another device on your Wi-Fi with a simple, token-protected local web request. No subscription. No account. No cloud. Everything runs on your device and your local network. WHY RELAY Some automations only work when a device actively opens an app or runs a Shortcut — showing a camera dashboard every few minutes, rotating a status display, kicking off a sync, opening a kiosk app on a timer. iOS only allows an app to launch Shortcuts while it is in the foreground, so Relay is built to be exactly that: a reliable foreground scheduler you leave running on a dedicated device. SCHEDULER • Unlimited rules, each with its own Shortcut, interval (from 1 minute) or list of exact times • Optional active window per rule (e.g. only 8:00–17:00), overnight windows supported • Wall-clock scheduling: if a fire time passes while the schedule was paused, Relay catches up the moment it becomes active again • Live countdown to the next trigger, per rule and overall LOCAL NETWORK TRIGGER • Built-in HTTP endpoint on your Wi-Fi: GET /run?shortcut=Name — from a laptop, home server, Raspberry Pi, or any browser • Token-protected (query token or Bearer header), with one-tap token generation • Bonjour advertising (_relay._tcp) so other devices find the phone even when its IP changes • /health and /next endpoints for monitoring and scripting, plus a built-in status web page • Foreground-only and LAN-only by design — nothing is ever exposed to the internet KIOSK ESSENTIALS • Keep-awake (never lets the screen sleep) while active • Stall detection: if another app kept focus and the loop stopped, Relay shows a one-tap resume banner and can notify you • Battery level and charging state on screen, with Guided Access guidance for true kiosk setups • Live event log of every trigger, request, and state change EXTRAS • Home-screen widget with the next trigger and last run • Live Activity countdown in the Dynamic Island while the schedule runs • Diagnostics page: foreground state, listener state, address, recent triggers • Step-by-step onboarding that builds your first automation loop with you Relay is 100% free — every feature, forever. It runs the Shortcuts you created, and it never collects any data.

Screenshots

Pomodoro Focus Timer4 screens
Relay Shortcut Trigger4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is device support: Pomodoro Focus Timer at 4 against Relay Shortcut Trigger's 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.

Scorecard1 real difference · 9 level
Pomodoro Focus Timer versus Relay Shortcut Trigger: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterPomodoro Focus TimerRelay Shortcut Trigger
PriceFreeFree
Rating5.0 (1 ratings) — better—
Positive reviews100.0% of reviews—
Number of ratings1 — better—
Update frequencyEvery 5 days—
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesNoNo
MonetizationFree with in-app purchases—
DevicesiPhone, iPad, Mac, Apple Watch — betteriPhone, iPad
Requires iOS17.017.0
Further details — not scored
Size102 MB2 MB
Age rating4+4+
DeveloperGourav BagoraAll Things AI, Inc

In-app purchases

None

Pomodoro Focus Timer

No in-app purchases

None

Relay Shortcut Trigger

No in-app purchases

Questions

Is Pomodoro Focus Timer free?
Pomodoro Focus Timer is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Is Relay Shortcut Trigger free?
Relay Shortcut Trigger is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Do Pomodoro Focus Timer or Relay Shortcut Trigger have ads?
Neither Pomodoro Focus Timer nor Relay Shortcut Trigger shows ads.

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