Self-Help Mobile Apps
Below you will find a variety of apps for your smartphone or other device that are geared toward self-growth, stress management, mood management, behavior change, and other areas. Some of these apps are free, while others have an associated cost. Most are available for both Apple and Android devices.
CAPS provides this list as a resource. The list is incomplete, and inclusion in the list does not constitute endorsement.
Anxiety & Stress
- Breathe2Relax: A portable stress management tool that provides detailed information on the effects of stress on the body and instructions and practice exercises to help users learn the stress management skill called diaphragmatic breathing
- Bubbles: Draw, move, and pop virtual bubbles in this fun and relaxing game geared to kids.
- Calm: Includes various sections including stress reduction, meditation, mood boosting, sleep, and ASMR. Upgrade for additional features.
- eCBT Calm: Helps people who are feeling stressed and want to learn relaxation skills. Includes tools to assess your stress level, learn relaxation skills, and links to online resources for stress and anxiety.
- Harmony—Hypnosis Meditation: Contains three free hypnosis meditations. Listen to one of the sessions every day for five days and notice the difference in how good you feel. Meant to reduce stress and tension and increase relaxation and ability to sleep.
- HeadSpace: Learn to meditate in just 10 minutes a day with the Headspace app. Daily meditation has been shown to help people stress less, exercise more, and even sleep better.
- iRelax Soundscapes: Helps eliminate stress by providing continuous soundscapes without melody or lyrics help promote a feeling of relaxation.
- My Koi: A beautiful and relaxing koi pond app that you can customize. Escape and relax by naming, feeding, and enjoying your virtual fish.
- NeuraBoot: Track moods and emotions to see patterns and boost stress and mood management. Offers stress management and anxiety relief tips, with action steps.
- Relax & Rest Guided Meditations: Three meditations of varying lengths, with or without music or nature sounds, allow you to relax deeply regardless of how much time you have available.
- Tactical Breather: Gain control over physiological and psychological responses to stress through breathing exercises.
- White Noise Lite: Features ambient sounds of the environment that will help you relax during the day and sleep great at night.
- Zen Garden 3D Lite: Make your own virtual Japanese garden, with relaxing music! Use the rake or stick to make patterns and the leveller to erase. Choose sand color and decorate your garden.
Behavior Change & Habits
- Habitica: A video game to help you improve real-life habits. It "gamifies" your life by turning your tasks (e.g., habits, daily tasks, and to-dos) into little monsters you have to conquer.
- iQuit: A rewards-based app that builds motivation for quitting a habit by showing you the money you've saved and setting goals for other ways to spend the money.
- Momentum: Every day that you complete a habit, your chain grows longer. As your chain grows longer, you become less likely to give up in meeting your goals. App helps track the "chain" and gives reminders.
- Way of Life: Change behaviors and create new habits through this app that tracks progress, gives reminders, and helps you see triggers and patterns.
Medical
- epocrates: Provides in-depth information about medical conditions, medications, and more.
- Skyscape: A series of connected apps that allow you to obtain in-depth medical and drug information, relax, share files safely, and perform other functions.
Mood
- ACT Coach: Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) aims to help you live with unpleasant thoughts, feelings, and impulses without avoiding them or being controlled by them. This app, developed for Veterans and military service members but can be used by anyone; offers exercises, tools, information, and tracking logs. Best used in combination with therapy.
- AIMS for Anger Management: Designed for Veterans and military Service members but can be used by anyone coping with anger problems. Provides education about anger, opportunities for finding support, the ability to create an anger management plan, anger tracking, and tools to help manage angry reactions. Can be used solo or in combination with therapy or a companion online course.
- Bliss Gratitude Journal: Increases happiness, motivation, and effectiveness with scientifically proven techniques from top researchers.
- Calm: Includes various sections including stress reduction, meditation, mood boosting, sleep, and ASMR. Upgrade for additional features.
- eCBT Mood: Helps people who are feeling down or depressed to feel better by using the scientific principles of cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT).
- Feel Good Tracker: An easy-to-use activity log and star rating system to help you focus on the positive activities in your daily life and take control of your own happiness.
- Mood 24/7: Track your mood and print your chart or share it online with friends, family, or a health professional as a way to monitor patterns.
- T2 Mood Tracker: Track your emotional experience over time and to provide you with a tool to share this information with your health care provider.
Pornography Addiction
- Brainbuddy: Rewires your brain through exercises and challenges, freeing you from sexual addiction and helping you become stronger, healthier, and happier. Includes a built-in Internet filter to help minimize temptation, and a progress tracker.
- Porn Addiction Calendar: Addresses the need to stop watching porn and helps you become accountable for making the changes happen! Includes motivational quotes, progress tracker, rewards, and other features.
PTSD
- PTSD Coach: Provides you with education about PTSD, information about professional care, a self-assessment, opportunities to find support, and tools that can help you manage PTSD symptoms.
- PTSD Family Coach: Provides support for concerned family members of those with PTSD.
Quit Smoking & Vaping
- iQuitSmoking: A rewards-based app that gives you time, money, and health updates, encouraging you to continue with quitting smoking.
- Quit Vaping: A buddy system helps you team up with someone so you can quit together, thanks to streak timers and trackers that keep count of the vape-free days.
- QuitNow!: Includes community support, a clock reminding you of your progress, and a summary of your health improvements.
- SmokeFree: A four-week program that offers support and encouragement to help you quit smoking, as well as a savings calculator and other features.
- Unsmok'd: Collect rewards to motivate you to keep going, take out your frustrations on the Smoky character, and watch a random video when you're feeling the urge to smoke.
Sleep
- Calm: The Sleep Stories section has bedtime stories (for kids and adults!) read aloud by people with soothing voices, including celebrities like Matthew McConaughey. Has other sections, including stress reduction, mood boosting, and ASMR. Upgrade for additional features.
- CBT-i Coach: For people who are engaged in Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) for insomnia with a health provider or who have experienced insomnia and would like to improve their sleep habits. It provides a structured program that teaches strategies proven to improve sleep and help alleviate symptoms of insomnia.
- HeadSpace: Learn to meditate in just 10 minutes a day with the Headspace app. Daily meditation has been shown to help people stress less, exercise more, and even sleep better.
- Noisli: A simple app that lets you choose from a bunch of different sounds (e.g., thunder, wind, white noise, and even the buzz of a coffee shop) to create your ideal sleep soundtrack.
- Pzizz: Set a timer for the length of sleep session, so the app plays a soothing dreamscape (a combo of music, voiceovers, and sound effects) while you snooze; then, you can wake up to the built-in alarm. Upgrade for additional features.
- Relaxing Sounds, Sleep Easy: Provides beautiful pictures, relaxing sounds, and other features to help you relax and fall asleep.
- Sleep Cycle: Tracks your sleep patterns and provides tips to optimize your sleep habits.
- Slumber: Offers a combination of sleep-inducing stories, meditations, and sounds. You can also choose a background noise (like rain or the ocean) to play for up to 10 hours after the main track ends. Upgrade for additional features.
- White Noise Lite: Features ambient sounds of the environment that will help you relax during the day and sleep great at night.
Substance Use Issues (Also See "Quit Smoking & Vaping")
- Field Guide to Life: Expert Guidance for Staying Clean and Sober: Daily guidance, inspirational messages, and reminders, videos, a sobriety counter, progress tracking tool, and more.
- I Am Sober: Track your sober days and milestones, build new habits, and enjoy ongoing motivation from a community of people who get it. Includes a withdrawal timeline feature and daily pledges.
- iQuit: A rewards-based app that builds motivation for quitting a substance use habit (or any behavior) by showing you the money you've saved and setting goals for other ways to spend the money.
- Pocket Sponsor: Offers Sobriety Tracker, downloadable Virtual Tokens, Sharing Passages, Favorite's Page, and Sponsor Connect.
- Rebos: ("Sober" spelled backwards.) Find sober connections and community.
- Sober Grid: A sober social network that connects you to sober people nearby, offers a 24/7 peer support group, tracks your recovery with check-ins and quests, and includes a sobriety counter. Your information on the app can be as private or as public as you choose.
- SoberTool: Uses proven techniques to help you stay sober. Features include daily motivational messages, a search engine, a tool to avoid relapse if you have a craving, a chat forum, and more.
- 12 Steps Companion AA Big Book: Includes a feature-packed Big Book reader, search tool, sobriety calculator, notes, AA contacts database, and more.
- Twenty-Four Hours a Day: All 366 daily meditations from Hazelden's classic best-selling meditation book for people in recovery from addiction.