Shishi: Focus & Pomodoro Timer
Ink garden timer, ADHD & study
$5.99
A working shishi-odoshi from a Japanese garden, on your phone. Water fills the bamboo; every thirty seconds it tips and knocks. Simulated, not animated.
A shishi-odoshi is the bamboo fountain you have seen in Japanese gardens. Water runs into a tube until it can no longer hold the weight. The tube tips, empties, swings back, and strikes a stone. Kakon. It has been keeping time in temple gardens for four hundred years.
Shishi puts a working one on your phone.
The screen is a single ink painting. Water runs from a bamboo spout into the tube. After about half a minute the tube goes over all at once, pours, swings back, and knocks. Then it starts filling again. That is the whole app. There is no settings screen, no account, and nothing to optimise.
THE BAMBOO IS NOT AN ANIMATION
The tipping is simulated: the weight of the water against the balance of the tube on its axle. A brim-full tube only just outweighs its own tail, so it goes over reluctantly, then whips as the water runs to the low end, and comes back faster than it went out, empty and light. The rebound usually knocks a second time, quietly. Not one frame of it is a keyframe.
WHILE THE SCREEN IS OFF
A Live Activity keeps the remaining time on your Lock Screen, so you can put the phone down. The knocking itself only sounds while the app is open: iOS suspends an app once it is in the background, so no app can keep making a sound every thirty seconds. When the session ends, a single notification delivers the last knock, whether you are looking or not.
GOOD FOR
・Reading, writing, drawing. Work where you aren't staring at a screen
・Anyone who bounced off Pomodoro apps and their hurrying numbers
・Keeping a quiet stretch of time with the phone face-up on the desk
THE REST
・15, 25, 45 or 60 minutes
・No account, no sign-up, no settings screen
・No network of any kind. Nothing is collected
・One purchase. No subscription
Ratings & Reviews
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The developer, Mitsuhiro Ogata, indicated that the app’s privacy practices may include handling of data as described below. For more information, see the developer’s privacy policy .
Data Not Collected
The developer does not collect any data from this app.
Accessibility
The developer has not yet indicated which accessibility features this app supports. Learn More
Information
- Seller
- Mitsuhiro Ogata
- Size
- 8.7 MB
- Category
- Productivity
- Compatibility
Requires iOS 18.0 or later.
- iPhone
Requires iOS 18.0 or later. - Mac
Requires macOS 15.0 or later. - Apple Vision
Requires visionOS 2.0 or later.
- iPhone
- Languages
English and 10 more
- English, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Portuguese, Russian, Simplified Chinese, Spanish, Traditional Chinese
- Age Rating
4+
- 4+
- Copyright
- © 2026 Shiori Studio
