5K Easy Runner vs StartRunning
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
5K Easy Runner
This app guides you from a sedentary lifestyle to running a 5K in just 8 weeks with a personalized plan and voice coaching. It uses adaptive walk-run intervals and tracks your progress, making running accessible to everyone.
- Personalized 8-week running plan
- Adaptive walk/run intervals
- Real-time voice coaching
- GPS distance and pace tracking
- Calorie burn estimates
- Progress tracking
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Go From Couch to 5K - No Experience Needed Every year, millions of people say they'll start running but never do. 5K Runner gets you off the couch and across the finish line in just 8 weeks. No gym. No coach. No guesswork. Just a plan that works. Why 5K Easy? You don't need to be an athlete or know anything about training. 5K Runner breaks running into simple walk-and-run intervals that anyone can follow. Our mission is to help you build a running habit that sticks - at your pace, on your schedule, with voice coaching every step of the way. What you get: Personalized 8-week plan based on your fitness level Smart walk/run intervals that adapt as you progress Real-time voice coaching and motivation during runs GPS distance and pace tracking Calorie burn estimates based on your body weight Scheduled reminders so you never miss a run Progress tracking with day-by-day completion How it works: 1. Tell us about yourself and your goals 2. Get your custom plan in seconds 3. Press go and follow the voice cues 4. Watch yourself go from zero to 5K Whether you want to lose weight, reduce stress, or just prove to yourself you can do it - 5K Easy is the simplest way to start. 5K Easy uses Apple's Standard EULA: https://www.apple.com/legal/internet-services/itunes/dev/stdeula/
StartRunning
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From the couch to thirty minutes of continuous running in nine weeks. No experience needed, no gear, and no prior idea of what "interval training" means. StartRunning takes you through 27 workouts, three a week. Each one opens with five minutes of brisk walking and ends with five minutes of cooling down. In between, running and walking alternate — at first one minute of running, ninety seconds of walking. By week nine you run for half an hour without stopping. WHAT GUIDES YOU • Spoken coaching tells you when to run and when to walk. You never have to look at your phone. • Tones and vibration for every change — even with music in your ears and the phone in your pocket. • A screen you can read in one second: one huge number, two buttons, nothing else. • GPS records your route and works out distance, pace and kilometre splits. • Your history shows every run with its map; the progress grid shows the whole plan at a glance. THREE LEVELS OF COACHING Voice and tones, vibration only, or nothing at all. Switchable mid-run — for the day you run with someone and still want to feel the interval change. YOU SET THE PACE All 27 workouts can be started and repeated at any time. Nothing is locked, nothing pushes you. If a week feels too fast, run it again. If you end a workout early, the time you ran still counts — only the plan doesn't move on. CUSTOM WORKOUTS You set total duration, run interval and walk break; the app works out the rest. For after the plan, or for the day you have something else in mind. WHAT THIS APP DOES NOT DO No ads. No subscription. No sign-up. No account. No tracking, no analytics, nothing shared with anyone. Your data stays on your device. What you export, you export yourself — as a backup file or as GPX. If you want, the app writes your workouts to Apple Health; that is off by default. Training and all your data work completely offline. Only the map view loads tiles from the network. ACCESSIBILITY Every interval type is signalled by word, icon, colour and vibration pattern — never by colour alone. The app holds up at triple system text size and respects the reduce-motion setting. WHAT IT COSTS The first 9 workouts are free — about three weeks of training, with everything included. After that you unlock everything once: all three plans, custom workouts, for good. No subscription, no follow-up costs. Your history stays open either way, unlocked or not.
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is device support: StartRunning at 4 against 5K Easy Runner's 1. StartRunning also leads on iOS requirement (15.0 vs 26.1). On price, ads and in-app purchases 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. 5K Easy Runner sells 2 in-app purchases, starting at $14.99 per 3 months and StartRunning sells 1 one-off in-app purchase. Whichever you choose, the download price is not the number that matters.
| Parameter | 5K Easy Runner | StartRunning |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free |
| Rating | 5.0 (1 ratings) — better | — |
| Number of ratings | 1 — better | — |
| Update frequency | — | Fortnightly |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | Yes | Yes |
| Monetization | Free with in-app purchases | — |
| Devices | iPhone | iPhone, iPad, iPod, Apple Watch — better |
| Requires iOS | 26.1 | 15.0 — better |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 32 MB | 29 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 4+ |
| Developer | Oleksandr Lisovyk | Patrick Engels-Kolodziej |
In-app purchases
5K Easy Runner
- 5K Runner: Unlimited Access7 Days trial$14.993 Months
- 5K Runner: Unlimited Access$19.99
StartRunning
- StartRunning Lifetime$6.99
Questions
Is 5K Easy Runner free?
Is StartRunning free?
Do 5K Easy Runner or StartRunning have ads?
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