Calm at a Glance
Pros
- Offers a wide variety of mindfulness methods of varying lengths
- Includes kid-centered mindfulness content
- Option to track your feelings and progress through self-reporting, including “mood check-ins” and a “feelings wheel”
- Notifications encourage self-care
Cons
- Free option of the app lacks content
- App’s many options may overwhelm some
Signing Up
Signing up for Calm is a straightforward process. The app prompted me to enter my name and payment information up front, although I would also have been able to sign up for a free seven-day trial. I noted that, in that case, they would automatically charge me for a one-year subscription once the free trial ended. The subscription would also automatically renew every year unless I cancel.
Once the app collected and verified my billing information, I set up my credentials, including username and password. The app then presented me with questions about how I planned to use it, and I completed a self-evaluation of my overall feelings and emotions. While the app has a mental health focus, it’s not for those with a mental health emergency or a severe condition, and it is not a replacement for therapy.
Using the App
My experience with the Calm app includes both benefits and drawbacks. At times, I wondered if the practice was really helping, but other times, I felt confident that I’d want to keep using functions like the sleep stories and guided meditations for years.
As I got more comfortable navigating the app, I discovered which programs and recordings motivated and energized me versus which ones calmed me down. After three weeks of testing, I’m happy to say that I will continue using it well into the future, both for myself and my kids, who benefited from bedtime stories on the app. (If you have kids, note that they need a grown-up to sign up.)
Navigating the App
When I started using the app, it gave me guiding prompts for setting goals based on answers from my self-evaluation, such my desire to reduce anxiety and get more sleep. From there, it suggested next steps to take on the app, which I appreciated. However, as I continued using the app, I became overwhelmed with all of the options I could try next.
While Calm’s multitude of offerings was tricky for me to navigate, I would still say it’s a good feature overall. I imagine many people appreciate the many options and lack of structure. Calm offers users the freedom to choose what works best for them at their will, and I never felt pressured to try a new activity that I wasn’t interested in.
Sleep Stories
True to its name, I found the Calm App to have a calming effect. I suffer from moderate insomnia and sometimes have trouble sleeping, but when I use Calm before bed, I often fall asleep during its guided meditations more quickly than when I try to fall asleep on my own. In fact, within the sleep stories library is a prerecorded bedtime story read by Outlander star Sam Heughan that lulled me to sleep and made me feel like a kid again.
Gratitude Practices
Special Programs
Another program I enjoyed within the app was “Daily Jay” with Jay Shetty, a bestselling author, award-winning podcaster, purpose-driven entrepreneur, and former monk. I opted to use his brief program shortly after I woke up, and it helped to put me in a positive mindset for the day. He shares how to practice moments of stillness during the day’s busy hustle. He also offers other activities, including a wind-down body scan before bed. (Overall, I used the app most often for a presleep wind-down.)
Goal Tracking
Some of Calm’s activities help users meet certain goals, so it can be a great tool for someone looking for a way to stay accountable. For example, suppose one of your goals is to relieve stress and anxiety. The app will suggest multiple activities under sections like “mindful activities” and “quick and easy actions,” such as taking a hot shower or softening tension through a one-minute body scan.
On the flip side, however, these suggestions may worsen stress for users who feel like the app is just adding to their daily “to-do” list.
I liked the quick and easy practices the app suggested, and it gave me more tools, other than just breathing, that I could use to self-regulate in a stressful situation. Once I became even more familiar with the exercises, I was able to do these things more readily in daily life without even checking the app. The more you use the app, the less frequently you end up needing it later.
Kids Features
As a mom, I was thrilled to see Calm’s offerings for kids. I tested multiple programs with my kids, including bedtime stories featuring characters like the Minions and Winnie the Pooh. I appreciated that various story lengths were available, many of which corresponded with my kids’ typical wind-down time of 10 to 15 minutes before getting sleepy. Several of my kids, ages 10 down to 2, fell asleep listening to it, making it a great tool for siblings of different ages. The app has some target age ranges grouped together, such as ages 7 to 10, ages 11 to 13, and so on. The app helped my kids unwind from their busy lives and calm their bodies far better than screen time.
Calm also provides kids with anxiety-reducing activities, helping them to calm down throughout the day through introductory mindfulness education and practices such as breathing, which you can also discuss with your pediatrician at their next well-visit if you need additional guidance.
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He graduated with a bachelor's in biology from the University of Wisconsin and a medical degree from the University of Minnesota Medical School. During medical school, he completed a graduate certificate in integrative therapies and healing practices through the Earl E. Bakken Center for Spirituality & Healing. He completed his three-year residency training in internal medicine at the University of California in Los Angeles on the primary care track and a two-year fellowship in integrative East-West primary care at the UCLA Health Center for East-West Medicine.
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