Basho Steps vs StepQuest
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side โ with what reviewers say about each.
Basho Steps
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Walk, and Basho's journey moves with you. In 1689 the poet Matsuo Basho set out from Edo on foot and walked the deep north for about 150 days. This pedometer turns your own steps into that road. Each milestone opens a new station of Oku no Hosomichi, with the original hokku and a fresh English rendering written for this app. THE FREE ROAD - TO MATSUSHIMA Leave the grass door at Fukagawa. Pass Senju, Nikko, the barrier at Shirakawa, the twin-trunk pine, and the morning bell at Shiogama. At 18,000 steps you reach Matsushima Bay - the most beautiful place on the journey, and the one where the master wrote no poem at all. Some places are already poems. You only walk into them. THE OKU ROAD - ONE PURCHASE, THE DEEP NORTH Past the bay the road bends inland: the summer grass of Hiraizumi, the stillness of the mountain temple, the gathered rains of the Mogami, the rough sea at Izumozaki, the scent of the springs at Yamanaka, and the clam-shell parting at Ogaki, where the journey ends by beginning again. WHAT THIS APP IS - Real hokku by Basho in the original, with original English renderings - Your steps only, counted on your iPhone and kept on your iPhone - An Apple Watch companion that sends each station to your wrist - A travel pack of ten things you cannot use, and are glad to have WHAT THIS APP IS NOT No ads. No account. No tracking. No data collection. No location. No health claims - this is a book that happens to count steps, not a fitness program. One purchase opens the second half forever. There is no subscription.
StepQuest
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Your hero is only alive while you keep walking. StepQuest exists to make a daily walking habit something you actually keep. Not with another streak badge or a reminder you learn to ignore, but by turning your step count into a roguelite RPG where a character's survival is the thing at stake. -= How It Works =- You pick a daily step goal, and it locks in for the whole adventure, so you set your own difficulty. Every day you hit it, your character earns XP and levels up. Every day you miss, you lose a heart. Run out of hearts and the run is over. Steps come straight from Apple Health, so there is nothing to log by hand. You walk, the game keeps score. -= Missing a Day Is Survivable, Not Free =- Six days in a row earns a rest day, and your next miss is forgiven automatically. A full seven day streak regenerates a heart. Blue hearts, earned only from the hardest quests, absorb a missed day as a last resort. Use all of it and a run can last months. Ignore it and five bad days end everything. -= Death Is Not a Reset =- When the last heart goes, your level resets, but your gold and your avatar collection are permanent. You cash out gold based on how long you survived, spend it on cosmetics, and start the next run with everything you have collected. A bad run costs you progress, never your collection. -= Your Steps Are the Currency =- More than 140 avatars across five styles: standard, casual, edgy, fantasy, and cyberpunk. Every one of them is priced in gold, and walking is what earns it. The rarest take real distance to reach, so your character ends up wearing the ground you covered. -= Quests Worth Chasing =- Daily, weekly, monthly and legendary quests. A perfect month. Half a million steps in a single run. A hundred consecutive days. -= On Your Wrist and Home Screen =- An Apple Watch app, a Watch complication, Home Screen widgets and Lock Screen widgets keep today's steps and your remaining hearts one glance away, so you always know how close the day is to costing you a heart. Raise your wrist or glance at a locked phone, no need to open the app. No accounts. No sign up. Just your steps. Disclaimer: StepQuest is free to play and shows ads. Optional in-app support tiers grant bonus gold and remove ads. Nothing you can buy affects your hearts, your step goal, or your progress.
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is ads: Basho Steps at none against StepQuest's shown. StepQuest's advantage is iOS requirement (15.1 vs 17.0). On price, update cadence, in-app purchases and device support there is nothing between them.
Scored on Price ยท Rating ยท Positive reviews ยท Number of ratings ยท Update frequency ยท Ads ยท In-app purchases ยท Monetization ยท Best chart rank ยท Devices ยท Requires iOS
Both are free to download. Basho Steps sells 1 one-off in-app purchase and StepQuest sells 5 one-off in-app purchases. Whichever you choose, the download price is not the number that matters.
Basho Steps ships an update every 4 days, StepQuest every 3 days. The most recent releases landed on October 7, 2026 and October 10, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | Basho Steps | StepQuest |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free |
| Update frequency | Every 4 days | Every 3 days โ better |
| Ads | No โ better | Yes |
| In-app purchases | Yes | Yes |
| Devices | iPhone, Apple Watch | iPhone, iPod, Apple Watch โ better |
| Requires iOS | 17.0 | 15.1 โ better |
| Further details โ not scored | ||
| Size | 3 MB | 60 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 4+ |
| Developer | RIEKO NAITO | Adam Golczak |
In-app purchases
Basho Steps
- The Oku Road$2.99
StepQuest
- Toss a Coin$1.99
- Tavern Round$2.99
- Squire's Tribute$4.99
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- Royal Benefactor$9.99
- Legendary Patron$19.99









