It’s ironic, isn’t it? Even though our smartphones are our greatest source of distraction, mobile mindfulness and meditation apps can be highly effective in helping us achieve the relaxation and calm we seek. While over the last few years, more and more have flooded the market, only a handful are truly worth your while.
We took a number of the top apps out for a spin and found the best mindfulness and meditation apps out there.
Our Top 10 Best Meditation Apps:
- Headspace - Best for quick, guided meditation sessions
- Omvana - Best for customizable meditations with ambient music
- Calm - Best for daily meditations and sleep stories
- Simple Habit - Best for on-the-go 5-minute meditations
- Buddhify - Best for meditation tracks for everyday tasks
- Insight Timer - Best for a large library of free meditations
- Smiling Mind - Best for mindfulness programs from educators
- The Mindfulness App - Best for meditation with tracking tools
- Healthy Minds Program - Best for science-backed wellness skills
- Breethe - Best for managing anxiety, stress, and sleep
Top 10 Best Meditation Apps - Reviews:
1. Headspace
Headspace welcomes users with it’s ‘Take 10’ program, 10 days of guided meditations hosted by Andy Puddicombe, a former Tibetan monk, and present-day mindfulness advocate and meditation teacher.
Andy’s meditations provide easy, 10-minute sessions each day that can help anyone get into the regular habit of slowing down, via thought-provoking metaphors and simple, relatable instructions.
Your first 10 days fly by, and then you’re invited to subscribe - for $12.99 per month, or $94.99 per year. The cool part is, though, you’re not in it alone.
There’s a fun buddy system feature that lets you and a friend sync up within the app and encourage one another other along down the path to nirvana.
2. Omvana
Omvana’s biggest differentiator is how the app allows you to fully customize your meditation experiences. The app essentially provides you with your own mixing board, letting you merge your favorite guided meditations, narrated lessons, and inspirational speeches with thousands of high-quality audio tracks and ambient sounds in the background.
You can even upload your own voice, mixing it in with any of the tracks they have on file, to create your very own meditations to share with others. How cool is that?
The app also comes loaded with a small number free starter meditations to enjoy, and provides you access to the Omvana Store, where you can purchase thousands of different meditation tracks, ranging from three minutes up to an hour, on hundreds of different topics, for $1-8.
3. Calm
Similar to Headspace, Calm provides a free, seven-day course for guided-meditation exercises, followed by a monthly subscription at $12.99, or a yearly one for $59.99.
Once you hop on as a paid user, you unlock access to a 21-day program for wellbeing, and week-long sleep stories for better sleep each night, as well as more than 50 other guided meditation programs and bedtime stories tackling anxiety, stress, focus, better breathing, and more.
Individual sessions range between 2 to 20 minutes, and there are countless “unguided” sessions that envelop the listener in pattering rain, birds cawing in a rainforest, the crackle of a campfire, and other sounds that make this app live up to its name.
4. Simple Habit
Simple Habit is a mental health and mindfulness app meant for people on the go, especially for those who want to squeeze in some wellness into their busy days. There are over 2,000 short meditations and audio therapy sessions on the app that you can use to build mental strength, gather resilience, or work on your focus.
There are even more sessions for more specific purposes like meditation for children or centering sounds for overwhelming or emergency situations. One of the best things about the app is that the content is created by experts in the fields of psychology and wellness.
Simple Habit’s pricing is “freemium”, meaning that many of the features are free but to unlock certain meditations or sounds, you need to pay a premium ($89.99 per year, $11.99 per month or $299.99 for lifetime access).
5. Buddhify
Buddhify caters to those who have always wanted to begin a meditation practice, but didn’t know where to begin. The app’s rainbow-colored spinning dial asks what you’re doing at the moment, then provides you with a variety of situation-focused meditations to jump into on-the-spot.
Trying to fall asleep? Spending unproductive time online? Or dealing with some difficult emotions? They’ve got something for each of those scenarios, and with more than 80 different meditation tracks, ranging from 5 to 30 minutes each, there’s likely something for everyone.
Buddhify also offers a timer, stats page to track your progress, and social sharing to connect your meditation practice to a wider community. Unlike other apps on this list, however, Buddhify has a model where you pay for access entirely upfront - $4.99 on iOS and $2.99 on Android - without any intro period, or additional in-app purchases later.
6. Insight Timer
Insight Timer is a meditation app that is full of surprises. The app is suitable for both amateurs and professional meditators, as it has 100,000+ guided meditations that can suit any level of practice.
The free app provides lots of flexibility and features including a customizable meditation timer and the ability to track your progress with milestones and stats. The user interface of Insight Time is quite modern and welcoming.
One of the more interesting features of Insight Timer is the possibility to join a community of meditators. Not only can you get better at breathing, relaxing and sleeping with Insight Timer, but you can also join groups and discuss spiritual topics, poetry, transcendental meditation, and more.
7. Smiling Mind
Smiling Mind is an Australian-based non-profit organization that works to make mindfulness meditation accessible to all. Their free app is a little different than others on this list because it was originally designed by psychologists and meditation educators for people as young as 7.
Content is categorized by age group, with specific meditations for those 7-9, 10-12, 13-15, 16-18, and adults, alike. Even for kids who shy away from the idea of meditation, Smiling Mind is a fantastic place to start if they are struggling with their emotions, anxiousness, or insecurity. The guide’s fun Australian accent doesn’t hurt for engagement, either.
8. The Mindfulness App
The Mindfulness app offers just about everything: a number timed meditation sessions by influential teachers ranging from 3 to 30 minutes, customized personal meditations with guided introductions and bells, statistics that help you keep track of your meditation journey, and optional daily reminders, to take time out for your meditation practice.
The app also has a unique timer that shows a circle of dots that slowly moves around until it gets to 360 degrees, instead of numbers, which helps you stay in the moment.
As with others on this list, there’s an introductory period to get to learn all the app has to offer for you, and this one a month long, which is plenty of time to feel your way around. Should you decide to go all in after that month, a monthly subscription costs $9.99 and a yearly one’s just $59.99.
9. Healthy Minds Program
One thing that makes the Healthy Minds Program stand out is its scientifically backed process. The app was developed at the University of Wisconsin-Madison with neuroscientific research in mind. Healthy Minds doesn’t just provide you with meditations and wellness sessions, but also a curriculum to track progress and develop skills for the long run.
You can also reflect on your progress and see where you stand when it comes to life coaching and well-being. Healthy Minds ultimately focuses on four key ideas for your well-being practice: Awareness, Connection, Insight, and Purpose.
The Healthy Minds Program app is entirely free as part of the project’s mission to help people heal and grow through mindfulness. Healthy Minds Innovations is a non-profit organization that is donation based.
10. Breethe
Breethe focuses on providing you with meditations that can match any season of your life, time of day. With the app, you can get the hang of making wellness part of your daily routine.
You can answer questions through “My Life Kit” to help the app better help you, start listening to the huge variety of extremely specific sounds and meditations, or receive masterclasses from professionals. Breethe’s offerings are creative and down-to-earth.
You can sign up for a Breethe free 14-day trial, but afterwards the app costs $12.99 per month to use. The most competitively valued package is the lifetime subscription which costs $170.00, billed as a one-time payment.
What is Meditation?
Meditation is a practice that dates back hundreds of years, originally rooted in spiritual and religious traditions, especially in Buddhism and Hinduism. Today, meditation is widely recognized as a powerful tool for enhancing health and well-being, promoting better breathing, focused attention, and heightened awareness.
Whether you're feeling stressed, anxious, or caught in repetitive thinking patterns, meditation can help you break through these cycles. With various techniques and breathing exercises, meditation encourages a state of calm and clarity beyond habitual thought patterns.
Benefits of Meditation
Meditation is widely recognized for its ability to reduce stress. Beyond this, it can significantly enhance self-awareness, inner peace, and mental resilience. Research also highlights meditation as a valuable tool for managing neurological and mental health challenges. Here are some key benefits of meditation:
- Anxiety reduction
- Pain management
- Enhanced emotional well-being
- Improved problem-solving skills
- Better sleep quality
- Increased attention span and focus
- Reduced mind-wandering
- Present-moment awareness
- Lower resting heart rate
- Stabilized blood pressure
- Relief from symptoms of asthma, cancer, heart disease, IBS, headaches, and migraines
- Increased self-reflection and insight
- Reduced age-related memory decline
- Promotes self-compassion and kindness
- Supports addiction recovery and reduces addictive behaviors
What Are the Benefits of Using a Meditation App?
Meditation apps provide a convenient way to bring mindfulness and inner peace into your daily routine. With these apps, you can easily access numerous health benefits that come from regular meditation practices.
Plus, they allow you to meditate wherever you are, whether on your computer, tablet, or smartphone, making it easier to fit meditation into any lifestyle.
Important Meditation App Features
- Beginner courses
If you’re new to meditation, look for an app that offers beginner courses to ease you into the practice without feeling overwhelmed. Even if you’re inexperienced or haven’t enjoyed past programs, beginner courses allow you to start with simple habits and progress gradually. - Variety of meditation options
When choosing a meditation app, consider the range of meditation styles offered. Beginners may prefer guided sessions, while more experienced meditators might enjoy practices like transcendental meditation or loving-kindness meditation. The key is to choose an app that lets you explore at your own pace and according to your preferences. - Clear curriculum
Meditation requires discipline and consistency. An app with a clear curriculum, reasonable goals, and motivational incentives can help you stick to your practice. Seeing your progress within a structured program can boost your commitment and satisfaction over time. - User-friendly design
A meditation app should be easy to use, with a streamlined, stress-free interface. Since meditation focuses on relaxation and mindfulness, a well-designed app can help you dive into meditation without any extra distractions or complications. - Generous trial periods
The best way to explore meditation is often through a free trial or free version of an app. These options allow you to experiment with different routines and programs to find the approach that works best for you before committing. - Downloadable meditations
The ability to download meditations ensures you can practice anywhere, even in remote areas without internet access. This feature is perfect for setting up a meditation session wherever you are, providing flexibility and freedom in your practice.
How Do Meditation Apps Work?
Each meditation app offers a unique approach to the ancient practice of meditation, often focusing on mindfulness techniques. Meditation apps make this discipline accessible to everyone, eliminating the need to spend hundreds of dollars on classes. You can start meditating right from the comfort of your home, using just your phone.
Most apps let you customize your experience by choosing the number of sessions you'd like to complete each day and selecting specific areas to focus on, such as relaxation, concentration, or stress relief.
Many apps also include introductory questionnaires to understand your goals, helping tailor the experience to what you want to achieve through meditation.
How Do I Start Meditating?
An easy way to begin meditating is by downloading a meditation app designed for beginners. Look for an app with a clear, step-by-step curriculum that helps you build a simple meditation habit. Many platforms offer beginner-friendly programs to guide you through the basics at your own pace.
Once you feel comfortable with the practice, you might consider joining in-person classes to deepen your skills in a supportive, communal environment.
What Are Some Other Types of Meditation?
Meditation comes in many forms, each with unique techniques and benefits. Some popular types include:
- Guided meditation
- Mantra meditation
- Spiritual meditation
- Focused meditation
- Calming meditation vs. Insight meditation
- Movement meditation (such as Yoga, Qi Gong, or Tai Chi)
- Progressive relaxation meditation
- Mindfulness meditation
- Loving-kindness meditation
- Visualization meditation
Each type offers different ways to achieve relaxation, focus, or self-awareness, so you can choose the style that best suits your needs and preferences.
Are Meditation Apps Worth It?
Meditation apps can be powerful tools for making meditation a regular part of your life. They’re easy to download, simple to use, and offer the flexibility to find a practice that suits your unique needs and abilities. Meditation apps are especially valuable if you want to go at your own pace, allowing you to experience the numerous physical and mental health benefits that meditation can bring.
Since most of us carry our phones everywhere, a meditation app can be the most convenient way to integrate meditation into your daily routine.
