Alpacto › Apps & Comparisons › Best apps for couples
The best apps for couples, with what each one costs today
On September 18, 2026 we opened the store listing of every relationship app below and copied out what it charges, when it was last updated and which phone it still runs on. The articles on the first page date the article, not the price check; the freshest of them says its details are accurate as of a month, and that prices may vary. The table starts here, and Alpacto is our own app, in the same columns as everybody else.
Ten listings, four columns, one date on all of them.
In short
Every app here installs for nothing, and one of them is free the whole way through. Gottman Card Decks has no In-App Purchases section on Apple and no purchase or ad badge on Google Play. The rest sell subscriptions from $2.99 to $89.99, and one subscription name often carries half a dozen prices on a single page.
Two apps these lists keep recommending were last updated on iPhone in July 2024 and February 2025, and two more have no listing left to open. If your argument is about who does what at home, the last section is yours.
How we picked these ten, and what we will not pretend
We took every app named by the thirteen lists that rank for this search, and opened each store listing ourselves. Seven rules decided who stayed.
- For a couple that already exists. Dating apps are a different search and a different problem.
- An iPhone build and an Android build. Neither of you should have to change phones to agree with the other.
- The listing opened on September 18, 2026. Two names these lists still recommend did not.
- At least 1,700 ratings on the App Store, so the score in front of you means something.
- The price is readable before you install, in the In-App Purchases list on the listing.
- No feed, no public profile, no strangers. An app for two people does not need an audience.
- One app per job. Cards, lessons, calendar, money: one row each, and the rest of a category lives on its own page here.
Where we have an interest to declare
Alpacto is our own app, and it is the last row of the table. Four of the articles we read put their own app at number one and say nothing about it, which is why this box sits here rather than in a footnote. Two cells in our row are dashes: every store number in this table was read off somebody else’s listing, and quoting our own back at you would not be evidence of anything.
Ten apps for couples, side by side
Four columns, because a phone screen holds four: what the app is for, what its listing showed, and when each of its two builds was last touched.
| App | What it is for | What the App Store listing showed on Sep 18, 2026 | Last updated iOS / Android |
|---|---|---|---|
| Paired | A question a day, plus quizzes and games, sold as “5 minutes a day” | 4.7 from 207K ratings · 18+ · iOS 16.4+ · Paired Premium – Annual $39.99 and $74.99, Paired Premium – Monthly $14.99, plus Paired Premium at $29.99 to $59.99 with no period printed | Sep 9, 2026 Sep 17, 2026 |
| Evergreen | Exercises for two, “a few minutes a day” in its own description | 4.8 from 54K ratings · 18+ · iOS 15.0+ · every purchase named “Unlimited access”, $9.99 to $69.99, with no subscription period on the listing | Sep 5, 2026 Aug 11, 2026 |
| Agapé | “One question a day”, answered by both of you | 4.8 from 26K ratings · 16+ · iOS 15.6+ · Premium Annual at $19.99, $29.99 and $49.99, Premium Monthly $14.99 | Apr 5, 2026 Apr 3, 2026 |
| Gottman Card Decks | Card decks of questions from the Gottman Institute’s weekend workshop | 4.8 from 1.7K ratings · 18+ · iOS 18.0+ · no In-App Purchases section on the listing at all | Jun 15, 2026 Jul 22, 2026 |
| Lasting | Counseling-style sessions written for marriage | 4.7 from 25K ratings · 4+ · iOS 13.0+ · Lasting Premium $11.99 to $79.99, Lasting Plus $19.99 to $89.99 | Feb 19, 2025 Sep 16, 2026 |
| Love Nudge | The 5 Love Languages, turned into reminders | 4.6 from 18K ratings · 9+ · iOS 13.0+ · one purchase, “Learning the 5 Love Languages” at $9.99 | Jul 19, 2024 Oct 30, 2024 |
| Between | “A messenger just for two”, with photos and saved moments | 4.8 from 21K ratings · 4+ · iOS 14.1+ · Between Plus $2.99 for a month, $24.99 for a year, $26.99 lifetime; separately, packs of Hearts, its in-app gift currency, $0.99 to $8.99 | Sep 14, 2026 Aug 25, 2026 |
| Cupla | A shared calendar across two phones and two time zones | 4.7 from 2.3K ratings · 13+ · iOS 16.0+ · Monthly $4.99 to $7.99, Yearly $34.99 to $59.99, Cupla Plus $39.99 | Sep 10, 2026 Sep 1, 2026 |
| Honeydue | Bank balances and bills, read by two people at once | 4.5 from 10K ratings · 16+ · iOS 16.0+ · nothing to buy except a tip to the developer, $0.99 to $9.99 a month | Jun 19, 2026 Jun 18, 2026 |
| Alpacto | Pacts between two people: a task, a routine, a challenge or a bet, with coins and rewards you wrote yourselves | — | — |
Apps for couples built around one question a day
Paired, Evergreen, Agapé and Gottman Card Decks sell the same twenty minutes: a prompt, both of you answer, you compare. What separates them is the price and the phone they demand.
Paired couples app: a question a day, and six prices for one subscription
Paired’s listing shows Paired Premium – Annual at $74.99 and again at $39.99, Paired Premium – Monthly at $14.99, and four more lines called simply Paired Premium, at $59.99, $44.99, $36.99 and $29.99. Four of those names never say what period you are buying. Which line you are shown and who pays: how much the Paired app costs.
Apple prints the ten most-purchased items, so any of them can be the offer that reaches you. The listing also asks for iOS 16.4 or later.
Evergreen and Agapé, which almost nobody’s list names
Evergreen holds 54K ratings and Agapé 26K, and among the thirteen lists we read Evergreen appears in one and Agapé in none. Those lists have been copying a 2021 set of names from each other.
Agapé’s listing is the clearest lesson in reading Apple’s price list: Premium Annual Subscription appears at $19.99, at $29.99 and at $49.99, three prices under one name. Evergreen’s purchases are all called “Unlimited access”, from $9.99 to $69.99, and the listing never says what period any of them buys.
Gottman Card Decks, free on both listings
This is the only app here with no In-App Purchases section on the App Store and neither an “In-app purchases” nor a “Contains ads” badge on Google Play. Free on the button and free inside are two different claims, and this is the one app where both listings back the second.
The catch is the phone: it needs iOS 18.0 or later, so an iPhone that still runs Lasting and Love Nudge will not install it.
A couples communication app and a relationship tracker are separate purchases, however close they sit in the store. Two listings here carry “tracker” in the app’s own name: “Between, Couples Love Tracker” and “Lovewick: Relationship Tracker”. A counter of days gives you a number; a question gives you an evening.
The same app, two storefronts
Two apps that sell a course, and the dates on their listings
Lasting: an app for marriage, priced like a program
Lasting sells a course of sessions, at Lasting Premium $11.99 to $79.99 and Lasting Plus $19.99 to $89.99. Its age rating is 4+, the mildest here, and it still runs on iOS 13.0.
The date is the thing. The iPhone build on that listing is from February 19, 2025, while the Android build shipped on September 16, 2026, two days before we looked.
Love Nudge: the 5 Love Languages, last touched in 2024
Love Nudge turns the five love languages into reminders and sells one thing: “Learning the 5 Love Languages” at $9.99, which is the book. Its iPhone build is from July 19, 2024 and its Android build from October 30, 2024.
Ten of the thirteen lists we read recommend it, and none of them prints that date. Two other names in those lists have gone further than being old.
Five articles recommend Official, whose domain getofficial.co did not answer on September 18, 2026 and which an App Store US search does not return. Coupleness sits first in one comparison table, and the same search returns nothing. We are not reviewing either app; we are telling you we could not find them.
Apps for long distance couples: the problem is the calendar
You already have messaging, and another chat window will not help. What distance breaks is the calendar: a nine-hour gap turns “call me tonight” into arithmetic, and your free evenings stop landing on the same day.
Between, the biggest of them, with ads on the Android side
Google Play counts 536,827 ratings and 10M+ installs for Between, and puts a “Contains ads” badge next to the install button. Its App Store description calls it “a messenger just for two”, with photos and saved moments.
That listing also argues with itself about money. The description offers a year for $13.99, while the In-App Purchases list on the same page shows Between Plus (1year) at $24.99.
Cupla, a shared calendar in two time zones
Cupla sells the calendar itself: two schedules on one screen, with the time difference handled for you. Monthly runs $4.99 to $7.99 and Yearly $34.99 to $59.99, and Cupla is the one app here whose Google Play score drops to 4.0. Free against paid, line by line: what the Cupla app costs.
What a couples games app fixes
A game fills an evening you have already agreed on, and does nothing for the evening you have not. If you want an app for LDR couples that does more than chat, the division is plain: Between keeps the memories, Cupla keeps the calendar, Agapé keeps the daily question.
There are thirty challenges here that work at any distance.
What is actually free in free apps for couples
The word on the store button covers the download and nothing else. All ten apps install for nothing, and three different things happen next. The badges on the listing tell you which one you are walking into.
- Free the whole way. Gottman Card Decks: no In-App Purchases section on Apple, no purchase or ad badge on Google Play. One of the nine listings we read.
- Free, paid for with ads. Between and Honeydue carry the “Contains ads” badge on Google Play. Honeydue carries that badge alone, with no purchase badge and nothing to buy except a tip to its developer; Between carries both badges at once.
- Free until the paywall. The remaining six of the nine listings we read carry the “In-app purchases” badge, and the App Store listing is where you can read the amounts before you install.
Here is the check, run on an app we left out of the table. Lovewick’s own site says “NO SUBSCRIPTION REQUIRED” and prices its optional premium at “$2.50 / month” in one block and “under $2 per month” in another, both on lovewick.com.
Its App Store listing shows Lovewick Plus at $9.99 for one month, $14.99 for three months and $29.99 for a year. Both statements are true at once, and only the listing tells you what a month costs if you pay by the month.
The check takes a minute on any app here: open the listing, scroll to In-App Purchases, read the names next to the amounts. Inside the app, that screen arrives with a trial countdown on it.
Accountability apps for couples: when the fight is about who does what
Every app above is built around talking: a question, a lesson, a saved memory, a shared calendar. None of them holds the sentence “you said you would call the plumber on Tuesday” in a form you can both look at on Wednesday.
That is the job behind the phrase accountability apps for couples. A calendar shows an event; what is missing is the agreement behind it, which is what counts as done, by when, and what it is worth.
Alpacto, which is our app
Alpacto turns “will you?” into a pact you both signed: a task, a routine, a challenge or a friendly bet. Both of you see the same card, one marks it done and the other confirms, so nobody has to do the reminding.
Coins pay for what gets done, and they buy rewards from a list you wrote for each other: a free evening, breakfast in bed, the good chair. Coins are not money, they never leave the app, and a lost bet stays visible as a debt until it is settled.
There is no feed, no people search and no public profile, and no ads or tracking across services. The only people in your Alpacto are the ones you invited by a link or a code. Accounts are for people aged 13 and over, on iPhone and Android.
If the argument is about money
Then the row you want is Honeydue, which puts both of your balances on one screen and asks for a tip instead of a subscription. It wants your bank logins to do it.
Questions people ask before installing
Which is the best app for couples?
There is no single best one, because these ten do four different jobs: a daily question, a course, a shared calendar and money. Pick the job first, read the prices in the table, then check that the last update is recent enough for the phone you own.
What is the best free couple app?
Gottman Card Decks, on the evidence of its two listings: no In-App Purchases section on the App Store, no purchase or ad badge on Google Play. It needs iOS 18.0, so an older iPhone will not take it. Love Nudge is the runner-up: one $9.99 purchase and no subscription.
Do we need two subscriptions?
No listing here answers that, so ask the app’s support before you pay rather than after. Every app in the table needs both of you signed in, and Apple sells a subscription per Apple Account. Between’s listing is the clearest: it describes Plus as opening the paid features “for you & your partner”.
Do relationship apps actually work?
They do one thing reliably, which is put a question or a plan in front of you at a set time. None of these listings claims to be a clinical treatment. What you can check before paying is whether the app is still maintained: two of the ten were last updated on iPhone in 2024 and 2025.
Is there an app for LDR couples that is not just a chat?
Yes, and they split by job: Cupla for two calendars in two time zones, Between for a private space with photos, Agapé for one question a day answered apart. All three run on iPhone and Android.
Can couples apps replace therapy?
No. The one app here with a counseling background says as much on the tin: Lasting sells counseling-style lessons, and a lesson is not a therapist. A scheduled hour with a person is a different thing from a prompt in the evening.
Are couples’ apps safe and private?
Read two things on the listing first: the “Contains ads” badge and the data safety panel on Google Play. Between and Honeydue carry the ads badge, and Honeydue also asks for your bank logins. An app with no feed and no ads has fewer reasons to know where you are.
The agreement, not the conversation
Alpacto is our app, and it holds the part the ten above leave out: one card you both see, with what counts as done and what it is worth.