HowLong? vs FlashScan
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
HowLong?
Capture ideas and tasks with a simple tap. Set interval reminders that persist until completion. Track elapsed time with visual counters and celebrate achievements with fun feedback. Customize appearance and sync across devices.
- Tap to record ideas and tasks
- Interval reminders until completion
- Automatic elapsed time tracking
- Visual color-coded counters
- Achievement celebrations
- Light/Dark modes and accent color customization
- Home and Lock Screen widgets
- iCloud sync
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•Tap to record an idea, list, or any task. •Swipe left on anything you want to finish today to add it to “Today’s List.” •Set an interval reminder, and the app will remind you at the specified time until the task is complete. •Every task automatically tracks the number of calendar days since it was created. •A color-coded counter makes elapsed time easy to see; once a task is complete, the timer stops automatically. •Each time you complete a task, confetti, sound effects, and haptic feedback celebrate the achievement with you. •HowLong offers Light and Dark appearances to reduce eye strain and add a more polished feel. •You can also customize the app’s accent color: blue, purple, pink, red, orange, or yellow. •Choose from four Home Screen widget sizes—small, medium, large, and full-size—as well as a Lock Screen widget. •iCloud sync keeps your lists available across devices. •Available for iOS and macOS. Terms of Use (EULA): https://www.apple.com/legal/internet-services/itunes/dev/stdeula/
FlashScan
This app offers a privacy-focused way to scan documents, enhance images, and extract text. It automatically detects edges, corrects perspective, and offers various filters for clearer scans. Advanced features include redaction, PDF editing, and signature addition.
- Automatic edge detection and perspective correction
- Image enhancement filters
- Privacy redaction for sensitive information
- Text recognition (OCR) for text extraction
- PDF editing and watermarking
- Signature and stamp addition
- ID card scanning mode
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FlashScan is a privacy-first document scanner and PDF tool. Point your camera at any document and it automatically detects the edges, crops, corrects perspective and enhances the image. KEY FEATURES • Smart Crop — find the page edges and correct perspective, even when the photo is tilted. • Remove Handwriting — clear handwritten marks while keeping printed content and layout. • Text Removal — erase unwanted text or marks while keeping the paper background. • Exam Enhancement — remove shadows and background tint for clearer exam papers. • Receipt Enhancement — make receipt and invoice text and tables easier to read. • Remove Screen Moiré — reduce moiré patterns and glare from photos of screens. • Background Cleanup — remove paper tint and shadows for a clean scan. • Contract Cleanup — flatten and clarify contract pages for archiving and sharing. • Smart Scanning — automatic edge detection and perspective correction, with flash and auto/manual capture. • Image Enhance — filters such as Bright, Clarity, Print, Color Print, Grayscale and Black & White, applied to one page or the whole document. • Privacy Redaction — automatically detects names, phone numbers and addresses and redacts them in one tap; supports manual region drawing and per-word redaction with multiple colors. • Text Recognition (OCR) — extract text from documents, then select, copy and share it, with multi-language support. • PDF Tool — import PDFs and edit a copy (your original is never modified): insert pages, batch delete, jump to pages, convert pages to images, add signatures and watermarks, then export as a new PDF. • Signatures & Stamps — sign on screen, or extract a signature or stamp from a photo and reuse it from your library. • Watermark — protect your scans with a custom watermark. • ID Card — a dedicated mode for scanning both sides of ID cards. • Defaults — choose the default filter for scans and imports, plus auto or manual capture. • Export & Share — export as PDF, images or a ZIP archive, plus system printing. Smart Crop, Remove Handwriting, Text Removal, Exam Enhancement, Receipt Enhancement, Remove Screen Moiré, Background Cleanup and Contract Cleanup use credits per page (4 credits per page). New users receive starter credits, and inviting a friend gives credits to both of you. Only the selected pages are uploaded for processing; the third-party provider does not retain the original images. Credits for a page are refunded if processing fails. PRIVACY Everyday scanning, filters, redaction and text recognition happen on your device. The per-page enhancements listed above send only the selected pages to a third-party technology provider for processing; the original images are not retained afterward. Your documents are stored locally by default.
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is update cadence: FlashScan at every 3 days against HowLong?'s every 6 days. On price, review sentiment, 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. HowLong? sells 2 in-app purchases, starting at $2.99 per year and FlashScan sells 5 one-off in-app purchases. Whichever you choose, the download price is not the number that matters.
HowLong? ships an update every 6 days, FlashScan every 3 days. Both last shipped on October 31, 2026.
| Parameter | HowLong? | FlashScan |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free |
| Rating | 5.0 (4 ratings) — better | — |
| Positive reviews | 100.0% of reviews | 100.0% of reviews |
| Number of ratings | 4 — better | — |
| Update frequency | Every 6 days | Every 3 days — better |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | Yes | Yes |
| Monetization | Free with in-app purchases | Free with in-app purchases |
| Devices | iPhone, Mac | iPhone, iPad |
| Requires iOS | 17.6 | 16.0 — better |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 31 MB | 28 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 4+ |
| Developer | 权东 李 | 祖恒 廖 |
Customer experience
HowLong?
FlashScan
In-app purchases
HowLong?
- HowLong Premium Yearly1 Month trial$2.991 Year
- HowLong Lifetime Membership$5.99
FlashScan
- 120 credits$1.99
- 180 credits$2.99
- 500 credits$4.99
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- 1100 credits$9.99
- 2000 credits$14.99









