A habit tracker app with no streaks to break.
Ethos measures how settled your routine is becoming with one calm number, Rhythm. It rises with good days and eases slowly with poor ones, so a missed morning costs a few points and never your whole record.
Why there are no streaks.
A streak counts the days in a row you’ve done something and drops to zero the first time you don’t. After a few months, one bad night’s sleep or a poorly child wipes the lot. That’s a strange way to reward months of effort, and it turns an ordinary off day into a loss.
Ethos doesn’t count days in a row at all. It looks at the whole picture, so the day after a miss is just another day.
Rhythm: one gentle number.
Rhythm is a number out of a hundred that shows how settled your routine is. Every day since you started counts, and the recent ones count most. Keep things up and it climbs. Have a poor day and it eases down a little.
Underneath, a grid shows the weeks and months in shades of green, so you can see how a routine has taken hold over time. Each habit also gets its own reading against a fortnight ago: getting easier, steady, or needs a nudge.
Rest days count as kept.
Rest is part of a routine, so Ethos treats it that way. Set your rest days in Settings, take a day off from the day’s menu, and those days count as kept.
When a day is hard but not a day off, make today light. Only the tasks you’ve marked as anchors count, so you can keep the two things that matter and let the rest go.
Habits that live in your day.
In a lot of habit trackers, habits sit on a separate checklist you have to remember to open. In Ethos, a habit is a task in your routine, with a time and the weekdays it belongs to: the run on Tuesdays, reading before bed. You tick it on Today, and that same tick is what Rhythm counts.
That also means reminders, the Apple Watch and the widgets all work for habits without any extra setup. See the daily planner page for how the day itself works.
A weekly review that suggests one change, or none.
Once a week, Ethos offers a review that takes about a minute. It looks at what you actually did and suggests at most one change. If you keep a task, but usually half an hour after it’s set, it might suggest moving it there. If you reliably skip something on Fridays, it might suggest taking it off Fridays.
When the week is holding, it says there’s nothing to change. If a change doesn’t help, move it back the next week.
Rhythm beside your day on iPad.
On iPad, Rhythm sits next to Today, with each habit’s kept and asked counts over thirty days, six months or all time. With Ethos Plus, “What the weeks say” points out a pattern once eight weeks of days back it up, and not before.
If you keep routines with other people, each group has a Rhythm of its own. Sharing yours with a group is your choice, and it shows only the number and which way it’s heading.
Compared with a habit grid on paper.
A printed grid of boxes works for a week or two. Then a gap appears, the gap is all you see, and the sheet goes in a drawer. It also can’t remind you, and it only counts what you remember to colour in.
Ethos fills its grid in from the ticks you were already making, counts rest days as kept, and never treats a gap as a reset.
Private, free to start, on every device.
There is no Ethos account and no Ethos server, and the app has no analytics, advertising or tracking. Ethos runs on iPhone, iPad, Mac and Apple Watch.
The routine, the week and Rhythm are free. Ethos Plus adds iCloud sync and a few extras, including your week’s history and what the weeks say. Prices are shown in the app.
Questions
What happens if I miss a day?
Your Rhythm dips by a few points and nothing resets. It rises again with good days. One poor day costs a little, not everything.
How is Rhythm worked out?
It is a number out of a hundred that shows how settled your routine is. Every day since you started counts, and the recent ones count most.
Do rest days break anything?
No. Rest days you set in Settings, and days off you take from the day’s menu, count as kept. On a light day, only your anchor tasks count.
Can I track habits that aren’t daily?
Yes. A habit can sit on any weekdays you choose, and a monthly task only counts on the days it actually falls, so it never pulls your number down in the weeks between.
Is the habit tracker free?
Yes. Your routine, the week and Rhythm are free. Ethos Plus adds your week’s history, what the weeks say, iCloud sync and a few extras. Prices are shown in the app.