Whether it is a fight with your best friend, an issue at work, the pressure of exams, or problems in the family, most of us have felt stressed at some point or the other.
In fact, eight in 10 people in America are affected by stress. According to Gallup, 79% of Americans feel stressed sometimes(44%) or frequently(35%) throughout their day.
And while professional help (think of talk therapy or medications) can work as a long-term solution, what can you do to manage your stress at home? This is exactly where stress management apps come to play.
While they might not replace professional care, a variety of stress management apps exist that can help with dealing with your stress. We have curated a list of the top 15 stress management apps to help you navigate through stress and manage it effectively.
1. Sanvello
Cost: Both free and paid versions available.
Sanvello was created with the help of psychologists. It uses clinically sound techniques like cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) to help users deal with their stress. Along with this, it provides various breathing exercises that help you de-stress quickly. It also consists of a mood tracker that enables you to track your mood and keeps a record of it.
2. My Fitness Pal
Cost: Both free and paid versions available.
My fitness Pal is one of the best apps for stress management. Your mood and stress levels are dependent on the food you intake. Healthy nutrition helps you maintain a good mood and reduces your stress-related symptoms.
My Fitness Pal helps you to track your eating pattern, weight, calorie intake, etc. This app also provides you with various articles and recipe ideas to help you maintain a healthy diet.
3. Fitbit
Cost: Both free and paid versions available.
Fitbit is an activity tracker and a sleep monitor that can help you in stress management by reporting how much more sleep you need and how productive you have been throughout the day, thus boosting your mood and confidence to a great extent.
Fitbit has also expanded to include a smartwatch called ‘Fitbit Sense.’ Together the stress management app and the smartwatch can measure your body’s response to stress, give you a daily stress management score, and help to track your mood from time to time.
4. My Mood Tracker
Available for: iOS
Cost: Both free and paid versions available.
My Mood Tracker is a well-known stress management app that helps in tracking your emotions and activities throughout the day, with the sole aim of finding the triggering points that keep you stressed. You can even record your daily sleeping timing, medications taken, your monthly period cycle, etc.
5. Pay It Forward
Cost: Free
According to a study by Keiko Otake, performing simple acts of kindness and gratitude makes people feel good. It helps in spreading happiness and gratitude among all. Pay It Forward; a free stress management app, is based on this simple idea. This app encourages people to do small acts of kindness every day and keeps a record of it.
The interface of the app is as simple as the idea. Every morning the app suggests a to-do list containing simple things you can do for others, e.g., pay for a person’s coffee today, etc. It keeps a trace of your improvement and helps you to connect with your friends who are using the app too.
6. Self-Help Anxiety Management
Available for: iOS
Cost: Free
Self-Help Anxiety Management (SAM) was created by a team of scientists, student users, and psychologists. This app helps you figure out the triggering points that make you anxious and stressed and suggests you the techniques to combat them. The app also provides various graphs of your stress and anxiety for you to self-monitor yourself.
7. Breathe2Relax
Cost: Free
Do you know that proper breathing can help you in calming down when you are stressed out or having a mini panic attack? In fact, diaphragmatic breathing has been proven to reduce a person’s stress and anxiety issues.
The Breathe2Relax app is based on this concept to help people learn various techniques for relieving stress. It is one of the best free stress management apps offering articles and resources on depression, stress, anxiety, and more.
8. Happify
Cost: Both free and paid versions available.
Happify helps you improve your mood using positive-thinking activities. It suggests that you have more control over your emotions than you think. By practicing certain exercises and positive-thinking activities, you will be able to choose your thoughts, behaviors, and actions. This app helps you to set your daily goals and suggests tips to achieve them.
9. Personal Zen
Cost: Both free and paid versions available.
If you are a game lover, try this stress control app which is no less than a game. In the app, the game takes place in a garden where two faces, one happy and one sad, drop onto the ground. The happy face creates a trail of grass, and you have to trace it with your finger. The more you play, the more conscious you become to find the happy face instead of the sad one. It takes around 20-25 minutes of playtime to reap the positive benefits of the app, i.e. happy and uplifted mood.
10. Relax Melodies
Cost: Both free and paid versions available.
Some people feel anxious and stressed out while sleeping, and some can’t even sleep due to stress. This stress management app helps you relax before bedtime so that you can have a proper night’s sleep.
It lets you choose from 48 relaxing and meditating sounds that provide a very soothing effect and calm your mind. It also has a timer element that helps you to set a timer for them to stop playing after a certain period of time.
11. Headspace
Cost: Both free and paid versions available.
Meditation is a great tool for busting stress. Headspace is one of the best apps for guided meditation techniques, especially if you are a beginner. The app helps you with all the instructions and tips so that you can meditate effectively and reduce all your mental stress.
12. MindShift
Cost: Free
Mindshift is a stress management app that helps people monitor and track their daily moods. It is primarily made for adults and teenagers to cope with their pressure and anxiety. MindShift is freely available to download and is a good choice if you want to track how you have been feeling lately.
13. Insight Timer
Cost: Both free and paid versions available.
This app is basically a 5-in-1 solution. Insight Timer allows users to search through a wide variety of guided meditation and soothing music to cope with their mental issues. It also allows the users to manage their stress, sleep well, and improve the quality of their happiness levels through self-love and self-care.
14. Buddhify
Cost: Both free and paid versions available.
Buddhify is an app that allows users to access custom meditation programs for approximately 12 hours for free. When done properly, meditation can reduce stress and boost your immune system. It is uniquely developed to influence every part of an individual’s life to uplift their mental and physical health.
15. Calm
Cost: Both free and paid versions available.
Calm offers its users a wide range of options to reduce their stress and improve sleep quality. This app combines various soothing sounds that can be very comfortable and relaxing for your mind and soul and also help you pace your breathing. This app is free to download but requires a subscription fee to access all the premium features.
Conclusion
We hope this list of stress management apps helps you cope with your daily-life stress better. However, if you have been feeling stressed out for a long-time now, maybe it is something deeper than what these apps can heal.
Therapy is a potent solution for stress in the long term. Moreover, it is now accessible right from the safety of your homes. To learn more about online therapy, click here. To learn more about mental health and wellness, subscribe to Your Mental Health Pal.
Very good article. I certainly appreciate this site. Keep it up!
Thank you Dusty!
Thank you so much for sharing those. I love how in depth article is, explaining each app just enough so we can decide whether it is fit for us.