iOS
Mightier is a set of video games that a child plays while wearing a heart rate sensor on the arm. It grew out of a research program at Boston Children’s Hospital and Harvard Medical School, where psychologist Jason Kahn and psychiatrist Joseph Gonzalez-Heydrich built a game called RAGE-Control for kids with serious anger problems. Their company, Neuromotion Labs, now sells it as Mightier.
Headspace is one of the best-known meditation and mindfulness apps. It was founded in 2010 by Andy Puddicombe, a former Buddhist monk whose voice still guides many of its core courses, and Rich Pierson.
Proloquo2Go is an AAC (augmentative and alternative communication) app for kids who can’t rely on speech. A child taps picture buttons or types on a keyboard, and the app says the message out loud in one of more than 100 natural-sounding voices, including real children’s voices. AssistiveWare, a Dutch company, launched it in 2009 as one of the first full AAC systems for the iPhone and iPad, and AssistiveWare says it is now the most popular AAC app in the world.
Joon is a chore and routine app for kids ages 6 to 12, built with kids who have ADHD in mind. It works as two linked apps. Parents use the Joon app to assign everyday tasks, which Joon calls Quests, such as brushing teeth, packing a backpack, or starting homework. Kids use a separate app, Joon Pet Game, where they adopt and raise a virtual pet called a Doter. When your child finishes a Quest, they tap it done in the game. You get a notification, check the work, and approve it or send it back with a note. Approved Quests pay coins that your child spends to feed, bathe, and level up the Doter.
Focus Friend is best suited for children, teens, and adults — roughly ages 9 and up — who struggle to put their phones down during work or study sessions. It is particularly well-matched to individuals with ADHD who respond well to immediate, concrete rewards and who find traditional timers cold and abstract. The app is not a therapeutic tool, does not include mental health features, and should not be positioned as a clinical intervention; its value is specifically as a habit-formation and focus-support aid for people whose phone itself is their primary distraction. For younger children (under 9) or those with more significant executive function challenges, adult scaffolding to set the timer and explain the mechanic at the outset will improve uptake considerably.
Finch is a self-care app built around a virtual pet bird, developed by Finch Care Public Benefit Corporation — a corporate structure that signals the company’s stated commitment to social impact over pure profit maximization. The app’s central premise is disarmingly simple: users take care of their Finch bird by taking care of themselves. Daily check-ins, completed self-care goals, and mindful exercises earn the bird energy to go on adventures; at the end of each day, the bird returns with a small story to share. The mechanic is not incidental to the app’s effect — it is the engine of it.
Impulse is a brain training app developed by GMRD Apps Limited that has accumulated over 100 million downloads worldwide and a 4.7-star rating from approximately 829,000 App Store reviewers — making it one of the most widely used cognitive training applications available. The app offers a personalized daily training plan built around a library of games targeting working memory, attention, processing speed, mental math, and problem-solving. It also includes a self-discovery layer — personality tests, IQ-adjacent assessments, and emotional intelligence tools — alongside performance tracking with longitudinal progress data.
Mood Tools, developed by MOOD, LLC, is a free mental health app for tweens and teens ages 9–17, offering 50+ evidence-based coping tools drawn from CBT, DBT, and ACT. Built for immediacy rather than scheduled sessions, it lets a child in the middle of a meltdown or a surge of anxiety find a useful tool within seconds.
Habio is a habit tracker that focuses on the user’s approach to creating and keeping habits rather than just tracking them. When the user opens up the app, they begin by choosing one habit they would like to begin. Users can choose from pre-set options or create their own custom habit. They will then be asked to choose how often they want to track this habit and how many times within those days they would like to do it.
Clearful is a writing and mindfulness app that focuses on journaling in a consistent way to plan, reflect, and practice self-care. The user opens the app each day and receives a writing prompt that they can complete. The user builds up a streak for every day where they open the app and complete the daily prompt.
