Hallow: Prayer & Meditation Ratings and Reviews

Must Have App for Contemplatives

I am so thrilled with this app. The content is incredible. I love that the content regularly changes to reflect the liturgical seasons, as well as daily for such features as the gospel reflections & rosary. There are so many features to use from themed practices to specific types of prayer to seasonal and current event relevant prayers. I love the in depth challenge features of the Our Father and Stations of the Cross, the daily Examen, the Sleep prayer options, the liturgy of the hours . . . and I love that you can set and track goals, streaks, and journal thoughts from a session. The Guest section includes so many incredible resources from experts . . . this app is just packed with the best Catholic contemplative prayer content and it is very well engineered . . . super user friendly. Finally, it's great to have two different voice options as well as the option to choose ambient music, silence or gregorian chant to accompany your prayer/meditation sessions. I highly recommend this app. It has definitely revolutionized my prayer life because now when I wake up in the morning, I have an auto reminder to sit in prayer when I pick up my phone rather than scroll through other fluff and news. Bravo!

Mommy Finally Gets Quiet Time!

Before Hallow, my spiritual life was unorganized and reactive. I'd attempt to have quiet time with the Lord, but would be interrupted by my children or my own thoughts. 30 minutes would go by and I'd feel so defeated that I couldn't even make it through one prayer without becoming distracted.

My husband gifted me a subscription 2 years ago and it's now a recurring Christmas gift from him (I can't imagine anything better). Now, my thoughts and prayers are cohesive because the guidance from the app keeps me on track. I've learned so many new prayers that I never knew before, and I can "whip them out" in the middle of whatever chaos might be going on in our day. If my toddler comes in the room during my quiet time, he doesn't have to leave. He understands quiet time now and loves to listen and pray with me. He even requests Hallow in the mornings now! The "Kids" feature has been such a blessing.

If you're a busy mom or a busy anybody, Hallow is an amazing app you won't regret. I've recommended it to everyone I meet who mentions a struggle with their prayer life. It has truly helped change my life for the better. Thank you, Hallow!

Nice App!

My husband and I had both been looking for something to help our evenings wind down better with God. The daily readings are amazing. This app has a lot to it (reflection space, mood tracker, prayers for moods, daily gospel, rosary based on daily mysteries, bed time gospel stories, a kids zone that does stories and prayer how to based on age, music center, chants, prayer session challenges and more.) I started to use it to help me get my rosary in the mornings like I have been wanting to do. You can set routines into your phone to help carve time out of your day for God as well.

My only recommendation to the developers is to add the transcript in on the sessions. This would be helpful for 3 reasons. 1) New Catholic’s learning prayers and how things work no matter the age 2) To help when the mind is overly active to give something else to focus and help ease into the meditative process 3) Meditation can be great for relaxing or stimulating to wake up. With how things are currently set up, there is a lot of focus of relaxing versus stimulating to the day. Words on the screen can help be part of that stimulation.

Keep up the great app! Can’t wait to see what all you add!

I prayed

I haven’t opened the app yet. Recently I’ve been going through a tough time with the relationship I’m in. I’m 18 years old and I was raised Christian. Religion is something I’ve struggled with through out my short time here on earth but I’ve always known god was real. Recently my partner and I have hit a road block in our relationship and it’s my fault, my doing. I decided to pray, I prayed for forgiveness and I even prayed for that today but I also asked him, if it’s his will forgive me, if it’s his will allow me to have a second chance, you promised me love from the moment I was born. I promise you this, regardless of the outcome, I will be closer to you, I will choose you, I will love myself as you chose to love me. Then I started watching the videos of Cliffe Knechtle, I found them inspiring. Then I prayed again, and said thank you lord. Then I saw the ad for this app with the man who plays Jesus in the The Chosen, and instead of skipping the ad, I listened and what hit me the most was a part where he said, “Come on, let’s come close to God.” And I chose to download this app because I made a promise.

Wonderful app! With one complaint/suggestion

This app has transformed my prayer life! I was hesitant to pay the $$ at first, but after giving it a try through a free trial, I have found it well worth it! There are so many different prayer and meditation options for many circumstances. At times I find it overwhelming with the many options, but I love that there are so many and that they are continually being uploaded and updated.

My only minor complaint and suggestion is a technical one. When browsing through the many lists, if you hit “back” it will take you all the way back to the home screen instead of the previous page you were on. This can be frustrating as the many lists are like navigating a labyrinth at times, and if I was simply trying to browse the various novenas, for example, I have to go all the way back to the beginning each time I hit “back” and navigate the labyrinth again. This seems like it would be a simple technical fix from the developers of the app and would make it much easier for the users.

Developer Response ,

Hello! We are blessed and grateful for your feedback. Regarding your concern with the "back" feature, we do have that on the radar so please stay tuned! We appreciate that you are allowing us to improve. God bless you :)

Beautifully Crafted and Amazing

Amazing app. I’ve used it daily and it has helped me so much to grow in my life of prayer. Even if you don’t purchase a subscription, the app is completely functional, no ads and no distractions, simply a few prayers your are unable to access (e.g. they have several rosaries you can pray, such as a daily rosary, a rosary before bed, a scriptural rosary, a workout rosary, etc. but you are only able to pray the daily rosary and a few other variations) I truly believe there is something on here that will resonate with anyone whether it be overcoming grief, anxiety, or simply connecting with Our Lord. Another thing that intrigued me is, you are able to select which narrator reads the prayers to you, and one of the options is Jonathan Roumie, who plays Jesus in the chosen- this really makes you feel close to God, at least for me. You can even change at what speed each narrator reads, in case your in a hurry, or have some extra time. Honestly, I suggest everyone here should give it a try. What’s the worst that could happen? You pray? :)

Best decision of an app purchase!

I really struggle with prayer and anxiety at night. I was looking for something to help as I fell asleep or while laying in bed to calm my heart and mind. But I wanted something that was 1- Catholic! And 2- orthodox! I was honestly skeptical when I randomly saw a Facebook add for Hallow. Most “catholic” prayer aides I’ve come across saying things like “meditation” have a very skewed idea of meditation and it tends to quickly digress into things like “finding your third eye” 🤢 what I LOVE about the creators of Hallow is that they desire to reclaim meditation as a unique Christian form of prayer. It has always belonged to the Church and we are responsible for continuing this life giving practice!

This is my 4th day using the app and it has already been a game changer! I’m excited to get to bed now, so I can have those last few moments of my day in prayer! The guided meditation is not cheesy and has so many options! I feel more peace then I have for awhile and I find that I’m more aware during my day of the Lord, communicating with Him as my day goes on. I love this app and have been telling everyone about it!

Prayer

It is wonderful to pray and read scripture in this blessed app. Especially to do so with the calm voice of Jonathan Roumie or the actor that plays the Savior in the hit series The Chosen. I love that show and how the portray Christ with a sense of humor I have not seen shown before or since it began now 4 seasons ago. I am looking forward to seeing the ending of thus new fourth season. I’m currently binging Jesus as they say to remember all the plot that came before in preparation for the showings on March 28-30. You can see the whole season in many theaters around the world, but I know at least in the US those days just before Easter Morn are set aside for that re-release into theaters. I appreciate them doing that for I missed it the first time or at least I watched the first 1-3 episodes and then got sick and could not come to the rest. I invite you all to come to the theaters across the US at least, and join in a celebration. It is not just for Christians either, but anyone seeking a good, clean, and very comical new side to the scriptures. And great storyline might I add.

A lot great some really annoying

Overall I love this app, such a variety of choices to help strengthen my faith. The content is excellent . My biggest complaint is the way the actors who read some of the parts speak them with an extremely annoying fake foreign accent. I mean, why would they portray Jesus as speaking English with a fake foreign accent. There was no English during that time. I don’t mean to diminish the actors for their contribution but please just speak English without a fake foreign accent. One more small request would be to allow audio playback to have adjustable speed. Thanks for providing this content

Also, I can’t believe people expect this extensive app to be free. I understand I am very fortunate that I am able to pay the subscription cost and I know all can’t but it’s certainly not free to develop and produce all of this information. In an ideal world there would be plenty of people donating enough money to offer it for free but that’s not reliable. I am happy to support the program and maybe allow people the free content if they aren’t able to pay for it.

Could be way better.

As someone who doesn’t know much about this whole christian stuff and wants to get closer to god, read the bible more, learn about god, this is really helpful. That is, if you pay. No one should have to pay money for something they should be able to learn for free. Yes, yes, i know that you can just read your bible for free but let’s just be real, how many apps that you know of can personally help you get to understand all of this christian stuff good? (For free). None i couldn’t find a single one. Sorry i just thought that since i saw a tiktok saying that this was number one in all of these bible apps, that you wouldn’t have to pay to actually understand the app. Without paying, i have no clue how to work this app. Sorry i know i sound kind of like a karen but if you think about it, these people know you need help getting closer to god and need help learning how to study the bible so they are drawing your money out of you, instead of giving help for free like if they really wanted to help you get closer to god and stuff like that, don’t you think they would have helped you for free? Well anyways i may be completely wrong about all of this but this is just my opinion and i wanted to share it bc i feel like people should know. Thank you.

Developer Response ,

Hi Auedrey. Thanks so much for giving the app a try and apologies for any confusion. Please know that our goal is to build the best resource we can to help as many people as possible grow in their faith lives. We decided on a subscription model in order to help us achieve this mission and support the development of the app and content, and help the app truly reach as many people as possible. We are incredibly grateful to our subscribers (priced at ~20% discount to the secular meditation apps), but understand not everyone can afford, or will want to pay for, a subscription, which is why we offer the free version of the app that you mentioned with a lot of content. Sorry that you weren't able to easily find the free pieces! We will work on fixing this for users in the future. The free version includes Lectio Divina on the Daily Gospel and the Rosary, plus a intro 9 day challenge, many minute meditations, Bible in a Year, daily examen, daily meditation, guest sessions, Chaplet of Divine Mercy and two guides per prayer, 3 length options per prayer, and background music all free. Hope you try the free trial or use the free content and find it fruitful! In the end, please know that every decision we make is geared entirely toward what we think will help the most people with their spiritual journey in the long-run. For more information, feel free to read our blog post here: https://hallow.com/2020/01/23/why-do-we-charge-for-hallow-plus/ or to reach out to us directly at info@hallow.app. We also offer a free year to those who can't afford it. Please send us a note at support@hallow.app to learn more. God bless!