Comparison

HookTrace vs Marshal Stack

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

Head to head
About

HookTrace

Features
Read full description

HookTrace is the ultimate bridge between your iPhone’s high-precision GPS and your private automation infrastructure. Tired of cloud services owning your location history? HookTrace puts you back in the driver's seat. It turns your device into a universal GPS sensor that transmits live location data directly to any Webhook URL you specify. Perfect for: β€’ Smart Home Automation (Home Assistant, OpenClaw, Jeedom) β€’ Workflow Engines (n8n, Node-RED, Zapier) β€’ Custom Developer Projects & Dashboards Key Features: β€’ FULL PRIVACY: No third-party servers. Data goes from your phone straight to your endpoint. β€’ BACKGROUND TRACKING: Runs reliably in the background, optimized for iOS 18+. β€’ FULLY CUSTOMIZABLE: Set custom Authorization headers and Device IDs. β€’ BATTERY OPTIMIZED: Choose between "Significant Change" mode for extreme battery saving or "Real-time" for high-precision tracking. β€’ LIVE MAP: See your current location and breadcrumb trail at a glance. Technical Specs: β€’ Standard JSON Payload (Latitude, Longitude, Accuracy, Speed, Battery, Timestamp). β€’ Supports HTTPS and custom Auth-Headers. β€’ Distance-based filters to prevent unnecessary data spam. Stop sharing your life with big tech. Start hooking your traces to your own home.

About

Marshal Stack

Features
Read full description

Marshal Stack is one screen for everything you have already shipped. Your apps in the App Store, the sites and APIs behind them, the servers you run yourself and the coding agents working on your projects β€” all read by one rule: green is fine, amber needs a look, red is down. WHAT IT WATCHES β€’ App Store β€” rating, review count, latest version, and the release state: in review, rejected, live. β€’ Sites and APIs β€” checked every minute, with the latency next to the result. A notification arrives when an address stops answering twice in a row, and again when it recovers. β€’ Your own servers β€” CPU, memory, disk, load and the heaviest processes, reported by a small agent you install with one line on a machine you already own. β€’ Cloud servers β€” connect a read-only Hetzner Cloud token and see your servers' status, CPU, disk and network next to the rest. β€’ Alerts that say what to do, not only what broke β€” memory over the threshold, a process running from /tmp, a port that was not open yesterday. WAITING FOR YOU When an agent working on your project needs a decision, the question appears on Home and in a notification. Answer with one tap or a typed reply; risky actions ask you to unlock and confirm. The first answer wins everywhere. AGENT USAGE See how much your Claude Code agents used: the 5-hour and weekly usage limit, when it resets, and tokens by task, project, role and model over 7 or 30 days. YOUR KEYS, YOUR MACHINES Connect your own App Store Connect key, Hetzner token and GitHub repositories, or none at all. The server agent dials out over HTTPS: it opens no port, reads no files, touches no databases, and uninstalls with one command. There is no registration form. Sign in with GitHub, or just open the app and look around on sample data bundled inside it β€” no account, no keys, no network. ON THE WRIST The same three states on Apple Watch, plus your projects ranked worst first. A glance tells you whether anything needs you, and a tap opens the one thing that does. THIRD-PARTY SERVICES Marshal Stack works with services you connect yourself: GitHub (sign-in and repositories), App Store Connect (app ratings and release state), Hetzner Cloud (read-only server inventory), Trello and Telegram (optional task boards and alerts), and Claude Code (the coding agents whose questions and usage you see). Marshal Stack is an independent app and is not affiliated with, endorsed or sponsored by GitHub, Hetzner, Trello, Telegram or Anthropic. No ads, no third-party trackers.

Screenshots

HookTrace3 screens
Marshal Stack4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is update cadence: HookTrace at every 2 days against Marshal Stack's every 3 weeks. Marshal Stack's advantage is iOS requirement (17.0 vs 26.0). On price, ads, in-app purchases and device support there is nothing between them.

Scored on Price Β· Rating Β· Positive reviews Β· Number of ratings Β· Update frequency Β· Ads Β· In-app purchases Β· Monetization Β· Best chart rank Β· Devices Β· Requires iOS

CostPrice Β· In-app purchases Β· Ads Β· Monetization

Both are free to download. Neither carries in-app purchases, so what you see is what you pay.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

HookTrace ships an update every 2 days, Marshal Stack every 3 weeks. Both last shipped on October 31, 2026.

Scorecard2 real differences Β· 4 level
HookTrace versus Marshal Stack: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterHookTraceMarshal Stack
PriceFreeFree
Update frequencyEvery 2 days β€” betterEvery 3 weeks
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesNoNo
DevicesiPhone, iPadiPhone, iPad, Apple Watch β€” better
Requires iOS26.017.0 β€” better
Further details β€” not scored
Size13 MB11 MB
Age rating4+4+
DeveloperJakob KramerAlexandr Degteari

In-app purchases

None

HookTrace

No in-app purchases

None

Marshal Stack

No in-app purchases

Questions

Is HookTrace free?
HookTrace is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Is Marshal Stack free?
Marshal Stack is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Do HookTrace or Marshal Stack have ads?
Neither HookTrace nor Marshal Stack shows ads.
Which is updated more often, HookTrace or Marshal Stack?
HookTrace ships an update every 2 days, and Marshal Stack every 3 weeks. Most recently, HookTrace was updated on October 31, 2026 and Marshal Stack on October 31, 2026.

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