Comparison

Calm Harm vs Soft Challenge

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

Head to head
About

Calm Harm

This app offers immediate techniques to help manage urges to self-harm. It provides activities to distract, comfort, and express oneself, along with breathing exercises and journaling tools. It aims to help users ride the wave of urges until they fade.

Highlights
  • Manage self-harm urges
  • Distraction activities
  • Comforting techniques
  • Express yourself tools
  • Breathing exercises
  • Journaling and self-reflection
Features
Read full description

The urge to self-harm is like a wave. It feels the most powerful when you start wanting to do it. Join over 2 million users and learn to ride the wave with the free Calm Harm app by choosing activities from these categories: Comfort, Distract, Express Yourself, Release, and Random. There is also a breathing technique to help be mindful and stay in the moment, regulate difficult emotions and reduce tension. When you ride the wave, the urge to self-harm will fade. Calm Harm is an award-winning app developed for teenage mental health charity stem4 by Clinical Psychologist Dr. Nihara Krause, in collaboration with young people, using principles from the evidence-based Dialectical Behaviour Therapy (DBT). It is built to NHS standards and approved by ORCHA. Calm Harm provides some immediate techniques to help break the cycle of self-harm behaviours and explore underlying trigger factors; build a ‘safety net’ of helpful thoughts, behaviours and access to supportive people; and provides the opportunity to journal and self-reflect. It also provides signposts to help. The Calm Harm app is private, anonymous and safe. Reviews from Calm Harm app users: • ‘This app helps me so much. I can't thank you enough for improving my life.’ • ‘I was told by my support worker to download this, best thing I ever did!! It’s helped me a lot through the tough times and I would definitely recommend this!!!’ • ‘This app saves lives. It is a beautiful, beautiful tool. Thank you endlessly.’ Awards for Calm Harm include: • Health Tech Awards Winner ‘Best Healthcare App of the Year’ 2021 • Digital Leaders 100 Awards Winner ‘Tech for Good Initiative of the Year’ 2020 (for stem4’s app portfolio, including Calm Harm) • Third Sector Awards Winner ‘Digital Innovation of the Year’ 2019 Please note that the Calm Harm app is not a substitute for the assessment and individualised treatment by a health/mental health professional. Please also note that if you forget both your passcode and security answer, these cannot be reset as we do not create user accounts. You will need to reinstall the app, losing any previous data.

About

Soft Challenge

This app guides users in building healthy habits through a customizable daily routine. It offers recommended rules for fitness, diet, hydration, and reading, allowing users to adapt the duration and tasks to their personal goals and lifestyle.

Highlights
  • Customizable habit rules
  • Personalized goals and lifestyle adaptation
  • Recommended daily workout routine
  • Healthy diet tracking
  • Hydration goals
  • Reading habit tracking
Features
Read full description

The Soft Challenge has its own recommended set of rules and guidelines that are all about creating healthy habits at a steady daily pace.  The Soft Challenge is completely configurable to your personal goals and lifestyle, you can modify the tasks and or the duration as needed! The recommended rules for The Soft Challenge are as follows: - One 45-minute workout per day, with one day for active recovery every week. - Eat a Healthy Diet, of your choosing - Only Drink Alcohol socially, if any at all - Drink 3 liters of water per day - Read 10 pages of any book

Screenshots

Calm Harm4 screens
Soft Challenge4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is update cadence: Soft Challenge at fortnightly against Calm Harm's every 4 months. Soft Challenge also leads on rating (4.8 vs 4.4). Calm Harm's advantage is review sentiment (80% vs 64%) and device support (3 vs 1). On price, ratings volume, 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

CostPrice · In-app purchases · Ads · Monetization

Calm Harm costs $1.99 and Soft Challenge $1.99 up front. Neither carries in-app purchases, so what you see is what you pay.

ReceptionRating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings

Soft Challenge holds the better App Store score, 4.8 against 4.4. Both are backed by a comparable volume of ratings — 681 and 286 respectively. Written reviews complicate that: 80% of Calm Harm's written reviews are positive against 64% of Soft Challenge's, so the app with the better star average is not the one people write more warmly about.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

Calm Harm ships an update every 4 months, Soft Challenge fortnightly. The most recent releases landed on October 20, 2026 and October 21, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard6 real differences · 5 level
Calm Harm versus Soft Challenge: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterCalm HarmSoft Challenge
Price$1.99$1.99
Rating4.4 (681 ratings)4.8 (286 ratings) — better
Positive reviews80.3% of reviews — better64.0% of reviews
Number of ratings681 — better286
Update frequencyEvery 4 monthsFortnightly — better
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesNoNo
MonetizationFreeFree
Best chart rank#17 — better#68
DevicesiPhone, iPad, iPod — betteriPhone
Requires iOS13.4 — better16.4
Further details — not scored
Size38 MB60 MB
Age rating12+4+
DeveloperStem4White Belt Development LLC

Customer experience

Calm Harm

All ratings681 ratings
Positive86.6%
Neutral3.4%
Negative10.0%
Written reviews244 reviews
Positive80.3%
Neutral5.3%
Negative14.3%

Soft Challenge

All ratings283 ratings
Positive94.0%
Neutral3.2%
Negative2.8%
Written reviews25 reviews
Positive64.0%
Neutral12.0%
Negative24.0%

User reviews

Calm Harm

From 681 App Store ratings

What we love

  • 👍 Helpful for self-harm, anxiety, and mental health issues
  • 🚀 Free app with no ads or in-app purchases
  • 💡 Wide range of activities and coping techniques
  • 👍 Customizable themes and mascots
  • 👍 Tracks progress and urge patterns

Room to improve

  • 🐛 Login/password issues, unable to reset or recover account
  • 🔒 Concerns about privacy and data usage
  • 👎 Some activities require physical resources not always available
  • 👎 Repetitive or boring activities for some users
  • 👎 Doesn't work for all users, not a substitute for professional help

Soft Challenge

From 286 App Store ratings

What we love

  • 👍 Highly customizable and flexible
  • 👍 Great for tracking 75 Soft
  • 👍 Simple and easy to use
  • 👍 One-time purchase, not subscription
  • 👍 Helpful reminders

Room to improve

  • 🐛 App gets stuck on Day 1
  • 🐛 Navigation can be tricky
  • 🐛 Cannot edit/disable certain features
  • 🐛 Weight unit change not saving
  • 🐛 Cannot go back to fix missed tasks

Bugs and requests

Calm Harm

Reported bugs

4 issues
  • App freezing or crashing on certain devices
  • Inconsistent or buggy behavior of certain features
  • Layout and UI issues on newer smartphone models
  • Syncing or data loss problems when switching devices

Requested features

6 requests
  • Add more in-app activities and distractions
  • Implement dark mode or customizable themes
  • Allow users to edit or delete journal entries
  • Add support for Apple Watch or other wearables
  • Provide more language options and localization
Show 1 more
  • Integrate with other mental health apps or services

Soft Challenge

Reported bugs

6 issues
  • App stuck on Day 1 congratulation screen
  • Water consumption not saving
  • App won't allow moving forward without checking all tasks
  • Cannot save changes to weight units
  • App stuck on 'great job keep on crushing it' screen
Show 1 more
  • Cannot go back and fix missed tasks

Requested features

4 requests
  • Allow users to share progress with others
  • Option to edit/disable certain features
  • Photo option for tracking
  • Extend the number of days for challenges

In-app purchases

None

Calm Harm

No in-app purchases

None

Soft Challenge

No in-app purchases

Questions

Is Calm Harm free?
Calm Harm costs $1.99, with no in-app purchases.
Is Soft Challenge free?
Soft Challenge costs $1.99, with no in-app purchases.
Which has better reviews, Calm Harm or Soft Challenge?
Soft Challenge is rated higher. Calm Harm averages 4.4 out of 5 from 681 ratings, while Soft Challenge averages 4.8 from 286 ratings.
Do Calm Harm or Soft Challenge have ads?
Neither Calm Harm nor Soft Challenge shows ads.
Which is updated more often, Calm Harm or Soft Challenge?
Calm Harm ships an update every 4 months, and Soft Challenge fortnightly. Most recently, Calm Harm was updated on October 20, 2026 and Soft Challenge on October 21, 2026.
Which is more popular, Calm Harm or Soft Challenge?
Calm Harm currently peaks at #17 in the App Store charts, and Soft Challenge at #68. Chart position reflects recent download velocity rather than total install base.

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