10+ Best Apps to Help You Build Better Habits
With a new year upon us, there are also a lot of new goals in people's minds. Like most of us, you probably have already written down all your New Year's resolutions, which is a great way to help you get started.
That said, sticking to your resolutions and building better habits is way more challenging than most of us realize.
Luckily, we don't have to do it alone; there are many apps that can help us achieve our goals and build better habits in 2025.
Whether you want to lose some weight, eat healthier, or just keep your life more organized, there are plenty of apps to help you crush your goals this year and any year.
To help you get started, read on for 11 iPhone apps that will help you build better habits in 2025.
Streaks
Streaks is an app that has been on the App Store for a long time, and there's a reason for that: it's a useful and simple app that can help you build good habits and eliminate bad ones.
Streaks lets you create up to 24 different habits in the app. You can set the days you want to do a specific task, and the app will remind you. After you're done, you can let the app know you completed the task, and Streaks will keep track of all the days in the week and month when you worked on your new habit.
Another helpful feature of Streaks is that it automatically helps you make your habits easier. If you haven't completed your task in a few days, the app will suggest making the habit a bit simpler to achieve. For instance, if you created a task to work out for 45 minutes every day but haven't done it, Streaks will suggest that you reduce the time from 45 minutes to 30 minutes to make it easier on yourself.
Another great thing about Streaks is that it works almost anywhere on your iPhone. You can add it to your Home Screen as a widget and even add a control to your Control Center. It's also available on the Apple Watch, making it easier to track your habits on the go.
Habitica: Gamified Taskmanager
Some people say life is a game, and that couldn't be truer thanks to apps like Habitica. This powerful app will help you gamify your life and motivate you to crush your goals in 2025.
Habitica turns your life into a role-playing game (RPG). You create your own character, and your goal is to level it up and find weapons, armor, and even pets to help you on your quests. And how do you do that? By completing tasks in your real life.
You can create goals or tasks in Habitica, and by completing them, the app will give experience to your character. You can also choose the difficulty of a task so you can receive more rewards when you complete it.
Another great feature about Habitica is that you don't have to use it alone; you can join quests with other people and go on adventures together. The more tasks all users complete, the easier it'll be to fight enemies in your quests.
Overall, Habitica is a really fun app to use. If you have trouble staying motivated or get bored easily, this app might be the solution for you.
Water Tracker by WaterMinder
Most of us have difficulty doing it, but drinking water is vital. Drinking water will help your body in many ways, including regulating body temperature and lubricating your joints.
With that said, remembering to drink water can be challenging, but that's why you have apps like WaterMinder to help you out.
WaterMinder is a valuable app that keeps track of your water intake for the day. Once you launch the app, it will ask you a few questions about your body to determine how much water you need to drink daily.
Waterminder will also send you corny but helpful notifications to remind you to drink water throughout the day.
To keep things more interesting, you can also take on challenges like drinking water for 21 days, which will help you start to be motivated while you build a new habit.
Forest: Focus for Productivity
If you want to complete all your 2025 goals, you need to stay focused and be more productive. Of course, it's not as easy as it sounds, but you can get help from apps like Forest to make productivity much more manageable.
Forest is a pretty straightforward app that will help you stay focused on a task for the amount of time you choose. You just set the timer, get to work, and the app will let you know when you're done.
After you've worked for some time, you'll grow a tree in your forest. The more work you do, the more trees you'll get to plant. With that said, if you don't work enough during the week, your treess will begin to wither.
You can also set different categories and timers in Forest, so you know how much time you actually spend working or wasting time.
Gola - Goal Tracking
If all you want to do is track your goals throughout the year, there's no better option than Gola. This straightforward app will help you see your progress and even suggest some tips to crush your goals this year.
All you need to do is create the habits you want to build, like losing weight, or the habits you want to destroy, like quitting smoking, and Gola helps you track everything. And if you're having a hard time with your goals, the app will also help you define your targets and even give you a bit of help with its artificial intelligence technology.
Trello: organize anything!
If you have multiple goals for this year, you probably already know how important it is to keep things organized. And there's no better app to do that than Trello.
Trello is a project management app, but you can also use it for your personal life. All you need to do is create a board and fill it with different cards for all your projects for 2025.
For instance, you can create a board for your fitness journey and another for a trip you want to take this year. You can also set up a daily to-do list in a flash.
Whatever you choose, Trello helps you visualize and organize your projects almost instantly. Then, you can access them on almost any device, as Trello offers smartphone and desktop apps, and it's accessible from any web browser.
YNAB (You Need a Budget)
Having a budget is one of the best habits you can create in 2025. Even though it's hard to start budgeting, you have apps like YNAB to help you.
YNAB — or You Need a Budget — is a budgeting app that helps you give your hard-earned money a job. You can assign it to different categories for your immediate obligations and even set some money aside for those yearly payments you haven't given much thought to.
You can also sync the app with your bank accounts, so it's easier to know how much money you have and where you've spent it.
And, of course, if you're new to the budgeting world, YNAB also comes with different articles and videos showing you how to budget and the benefits you get out of it.
MacroFactor - Macro Tracker
MacroFactor is an amazing app for those who want to lose weight. Yes, working out is essential, but keeping track of your diet is just as, if not more, important.
With MacroFactor, you can create your personal goal — like losing weight or gaining muscle — and the app will tell you how many calories you should eat each day to achieve that goal. It will also tell you an estimated time when you will complete the goal if you stick to your calorie intake.
What's great about the app is that it comes with an extensive database of foods, making it easier to log in to what you eat without having to create it yourself.
Another benefit of MacroFactor is that it analyzes your goal and your progress every week. Depending on how well you're doing, the app will suggest a calorie reduction or increase to ensure you hit your goal at the expected time.
Calm
Life can be stressful sometimes, which is the reason why so many people want to learn how to handle stressful situations and meditate as part of their new year's goal.
If you're in the same boat, you can try an app like Calm. This app is one of the most popular meditation apps on the App Store. It's filled with different classes, articles, and guided meditation lessons to help you learn more about meditation and how to practice it wherever you are.
Calm also comes with different white noise sounds and relaxing stories that make it easier to go to bed at night and improve your sleep quality.
Duolingo - Language Lessons
You've probably heard about Duolingo before, but this is a great time to start using it. Duolingo is one of the most popular apps to learn a new language, and it will help you crush your goals this year.
What makes Duolingo great is how complete the app is. You can learn over 40 languages in the app and take multiple classes at once. Once you've chosen the language, many different classes are here to help you, no matter what your level is in that language.
You'll learn new vocabulary, pronunciation, and even grammar. These lessons are extremely short so you can take a class a few minutes before work or when you're on the bus.
Duolingo has become larger than ever, too, and you can also use it to learn other things like math and how to read music. Overall, it is an incredibly complete app that definitely has something new to teach you every day.
Couch to 5K - Run training
The app's name says it all, but Couch to 5k is the perfect app to crush your fitness goals in 2025.
As you can guess by the name, this app comes with guided classes to help beginners complete their first 5K run. The app comes with tips and even personal virtual trainers that will teach you how to run and improve your health.
You can also log your running times and distances and keep track of your progress within the app.
As you can also guess by the name, this isn't an app you should use permanently. The app offers a program you can complete in nine weeks if you practice three times a week for at least 20 or 30 minutes.
After nine weeks, you should be ready to run your first 5K. Don't worry, though, after you're done, the developers have another app called 5K to 10K that will help you — you guessed it — run your first 10K after a few weeks.