If you’re looking for an accessible guided meditation, now is the perfect time to get started. The widespread popularity of meditation has caused a boom in the creation of guided meditation apps designed for everyone from complete beginners to master meditators.
But with so many choices, how can you decide which app is right for you? The overwhelm is understandable. That’s why we’ve put together these reviews of some of the most popular meditation apps. If you’re struggling to choose the app that will best help you meet your personal meditation goals, check out this list before you download.
Headspace
Headspace is one of the most popular meditation apps on the market for good reason. The app offers meditation courses for people of all levels, sleep sounds and meditations that change with each use, and they’ve even implemented a movement section to their app. They offer a wide selection of guided meditations varying in length and subject, a daily meditation selection for the more adventurous, and a meditation timer for those looking to customize their meditation.
While Headspace is a well made app with tons of options, it’s also a little on the pricier side. At $13 per month or $70 per year, Headspace can be an investment. If you’re willing to take the plunge after the Headspace free trail, we’d recommend this app to someone looking to learn the art of meditation in an easily digestible and user-friendly way.
Calm
The Calm app is a meditation app with a more recent rise in popularity that is similar to Headspace both in content and in price. For $70 per year or $15 per month, Calm offers daily curated meditations, sleep sounds, music, and introductory meditations. Calm also offers stretching and other movement. Where the Calm app differs from Headspace is in it’s courses, we couldn’t find an easily accessible introductory course to meditation in the app. Calm seems to specialize more in meditations for very specific purposes.
But, the feature that has given the Calm app an edge over its competitors? Celebrity narrators. From Harry Styles to LeBron James to Kelly Rowland, celebrities of all kinds have recorded meditations for the Calm app. So yes, with Calm, Harry Styles can talk to you until you fall asleep.
Overall, the Calm app offers a great selection for those looking to get into meditation, and their celebrity narrators are a fun way to get people interested in the idea of meditation, but their selection might not work for someone looking for a course to really learn the skill of meditation.
Ten Percent Happier
Ten Percent Happier has the most personalized experience of any of the apps on this list. When creating your account for the app, they take into consideration things like age and whether or not you have children into account along with your goals for meditation. Based on your answers to these questions, they create a custom meditation plan for you in their app.