Markday vs Spex
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side ā with what reviewers say about each.
Markday
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Mark the days that matter. Markday is a Lock Screen and Home Screen countdown widget that quietly counts the days until what matters most ā birthdays, anniversaries, weddings, trips, exam dates, and personal milestones. Beautifully native to iOS. Quiet by design. No clutter. No urgency colors flashing at you. No endless calendar grid to scroll through. Just the day count, presented quietly. Add an event in seconds, pick a category and an icon, and watch the days count down on a Home Screen or Lock Screen widget that respects your wallpaper, your battery, and your attention. Why people choose Markday - Calm, modern design that feels at home on iOS 17 and later, on iPhone and iPad - Multi-event dashboard, sorted by what is closest, with custom group labels you create yourself - Quiet, human-written notifications you can set for one week, two weeks, three weeks, one month, two months, or six months ahead - Yearly auto-rollover for birthdays, anniversaries, and other recurring days, so the next year is always ready - Lock Screen and Home Screen widgets that update when the day changes, not when an ad refreshes - Optional iCloud sync to keep countdowns aligned across your iPhone and iPad - Light and dark mode with a manual override, full Dynamic Type, and VoiceOver from the first day - Available in English, Turkish, French, Spanish, German, and European Portuguese Privacy you can verify Markday collects no personal data. There are no analytics, no advertising trackers, no third-party servers, and no account to create. When iCloud sync is on, your countdowns sync only to your private CloudKit database ā nobody at Markday can read them. The app works fully offline. If you opt in, Markday can read birthdays and selected events from your Calendar so you do not have to retype them, and it can also push your countdowns back into Calendar so they appear alongside the rest of your schedule. You stay in control of what comes in and what goes out. Markday Pro Most people will be happy on the standard tier. If you want more, Markday Pro unlocks: - Unlimited countdowns - Unlimited reminders per countdown, with multiple lead times (free tier includes 1) - Up to 15 custom group labels (free tier includes 1) - Calendar import from your existing events and birthdays - Calendar export to publish countdowns to Calendar - Future Pro features as they ship, included Designed for the day-to-day Built natively for iOS 17 and beyond with SwiftUI, SwiftData, and CloudKit. Widgets that update when the day changes, not when an ad refreshes. Mark the days. Forget the noise. Use of this app is subject to Apple's Standard Licensed Application End User License Agreement (EULA), available in the App Store under "License Agreement" and at https://www.apple.com/legal/internet-services/itunes/dev/stdeula/
Spex
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Know when smart glasses are advertising near you. Camera-carrying smart glasses announce themselves over Bluetooth when they power on, pair or come out of their case. Spex listens for those signals and tells you, calmly and plainly, when a matching device is detected nearby. Spex detects devices such as Ray-Ban Meta, Oakley Meta, Meta Ray-Ban Display, Snap Spectacles, RayNeo, Rokid, Looktech, Solos AirGo Vision and Xiaomi AI Glasses when they advertise over Bluetooth. Meta Quest headsets are recognized too, and named as headsets rather than mistaken for glasses. LIVE RADAR ⢠Detections appear in real time on the Radar while Spex is open ⢠Every detection carries a confidence band: Possible, Likely or Confirmed ⢠Proximity is shown as Immediate, Near or Far, with a closer, further or steady trend, never a made-up distance ⢠Open a detection to see the model, when it was first and last seen, its signal trend and the technical details behind the match ⢠Settings ⺠Nearby signals lists every Bluetooth device the scan hears while Spex is open, so you can see exactly what it is working with ALERTS WHILE YOUR PHONE IS IN YOUR POCKET ⢠Get a Lock Screen alert when glasses are detected nearby, even with Spex closed ⢠Confirmed alerts name the device and its range; Likely alerts name the device ⢠Possible-match alerts tell you when a nearby device partly matches smart glasses; turn them off in Settings if you only want stronger matches ⢠Alerts are throttled per device, so a busy street doesn't flood your phone APPLE WATCH ⢠A discreet tap on your wrist with the device name and proximity ⢠A complication shows whether Spex is watching and when it last alerted LOCK SCREEN AND DYNAMIC ISLAND ⢠While Spex is watching, a quiet Live Activity shows its status and how many devices are nearby, with a Stop button SHORTCUTS AND ACTION BUTTON ⢠Start and stop watching with Siri and Shortcuts: Arm Spex, Disarm Spex and Toggle Spex ⢠Assign Toggle Spex to the Action Button to arm or disarm with one press HISTORY ⢠A log of what was detected and when, with its confidence and proximity ⢠Delete single entries or erase the whole history. No location is recorded. YOUR CIRCLE ⢠Add your own glasses, or a friend's, so they stop alerting ⢠Where the signal allows, an entry covers that one device, so silencing your pair doesn't silence a stranger's of the same model ⢠Ignore any detection for an hour with one tap PRIVATE BY DESIGN ⢠Detection runs entirely on your iPhone ⢠No accounts and no analytics ⢠Scan data never leaves your phone: nothing about detections, History or Your Circle is ever sent ⢠Alert summaries go only to your paired Apple Watch ⢠Spex listens passively. It never connects to, pairs with or transmits to any device. ⢠Device support is built into the app, and new models arrive with app updates WHAT SPEX CAN AND CAN'T SEE Spex detects Bluetooth advertisements. It does not detect recording or streaming. It catches glasses as they power on, pair or leave their case. Glasses that are already connected and idle broadcast rarely, and no detector can promise otherwise; glasses that aren't advertising can't be seen at all. iOS also limits Bluetooth scanning in the background, so background alerts can be delayed, especially in Low Power Mode, and some devices, including Meta Quest headsets, can only be detected while Spex is open. Detection is best-effort: a quiet Radar is not a guarantee that no smart glasses are nearby. Use of this app is subject to Apple's Standard Licensed Application End User License Agreement (EULA), available in the App Store under "License Agreement" and at https://www.apple.com/legal/internet-services/itunes/dev/stdeula/
Screenshots
Verdict
Markday and Spex are too close to call on the numbers: across 5 compared parameters ā price, ads, in-app purchases and device support among them ā neither pulls far enough ahead to decide it. What separates them is feature set and interface, not measurable difference.
Scored on Price Ā· Rating Ā· Positive reviews Ā· Number of ratings Ā· Update frequency Ā· Ads Ā· In-app purchases Ā· Monetization Ā· Best chart rank Ā· Devices Ā· Requires iOS
Both are free to download. Markday sells 1 one-off in-app purchase and Spex sells 1 one-off in-app purchase. Whichever you choose, the download price is not the number that matters.
| Parameter | Markday | Spex |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free |
| Update frequency | Every 3 weeks | ā |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | Yes | Yes |
| Devices | iPhone, iPad | iPhone, Apple Watch |
| Requires iOS | 17.0 ā better | 18.0 |
| Further details ā not scored | ||
| Size | 14 MB | 18 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 4+ |
| Developer | Pinkod IT Solutions Ltd. | Zippy IT Solutions Ltd. |
In-app purchases
Markday
- Markday Pro ā Lifetime$3.99
Spex
- Spex Pro$3.99









