Review Insights · App Store
Elevate - Brain Training Games
The Mind Company · 528,173 ratings · ★ 4.8
4.8
★★★★★
528,173 ratings
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Top complaints - extracted from 25 negative reviews
Recurring phrases mined from 1-2★ reviews. The bigger the percentage, the more users have the same problem. Fix the top 2-3 in your version and you have product-market fit on day one.
1
"free"
8 negative reviews mention this · 32% of all complaints
★★★★★ "Need account + payment. Another garbage app to take then sell our data. This should be free, but is of course a subscription based app with sneaky fees. Skip." - Kbear212!
2
"subscription"
5 negative reviews mention this · 20% of all complaints
★★★★★ "Need account + payment. Another garbage app to take then sell our data. This should be free, but is of course a subscription based app with sneaky fees. Skip." - Kbear212!
3
"better"
5 negative reviews mention this · 20% of all complaints
★★★★★ "Points System Sucks. I use to play the daily challenge every day to learn and develop my brain. 3+ years straight. I could literally feel my mind changing for the better. Now I play for the new points reward system. How many points can I get to lead the leader…" - Apple Inmate 52379
4
"every"
4 negative reviews mention this · 16% of all complaints
★★★★★ "The rewards all gone from 1 dead battery. I had this thing going for well over 400 days. I was happy with it. It was my routine every morning and then my phone died one day so I couldn’t sign in the next time I login it says starting a new streak at one day, which at that exact mom…" - DaveyLuv
5
"annoying"
4 negative reviews mention this · 16% of all complaints
★★★★★ "barely free. would be great if you didn’t have to pay for everything in the app. i like the app, its great, but atp just make the app itself cost money. so annoying" - ave bows
6
"daily"
4 negative reviews mention this · 16% of all complaints
★★★★★ "Points System Sucks. I use to play the daily challenge every day to learn and develop my brain. 3+ years straight. I could literally feel my mind changing for the better. Now I play for the new points reward system. How many points can I get to lead the leader…" - Apple Inmate 52379
7
"game"
4 negative reviews mention this · 16% of all complaints
★★★★★ "need subscription to do anything. fun games! although i’m not certain they would actually do much to improve mental aptitude given most of them weren’t that difficult. i would have given it more of a chance to find out if there were more games available without paying a sub…" - Asahirata
8
"these"
4 negative reviews mention this · 16% of all complaints
★★★★★ "Lovely game, greedy developers.. This is an app I’ve had since middle school and I’m 24 now. I’ve used it pretty continuously throughout the years off and on. I’ve seen all the new things they have implemented and seen the game become overran with the “bypassable” paywall …" - baaaallllzzzz
9
"another"
3 negative reviews mention this · 12% of all complaints
★★★★★ "Need account + payment. Another garbage app to take then sell our data. This should be free, but is of course a subscription based app with sneaky fees. Skip." - Kbear212!
10
"days"
3 negative reviews mention this · 12% of all complaints
★★★★★ "The rewards all gone from 1 dead battery. I had this thing going for well over 400 days. I was happy with it. It was my routine every morning and then my phone died one day so I couldn’t sign in the next time I login it says starting a new streak at one day, which at that exact mom…" - DaveyLuv
11
"streak"
3 negative reviews mention this · 12% of all complaints
★★★★★ "The rewards all gone from 1 dead battery. I had this thing going for well over 400 days. I was happy with it. It was my routine every morning and then my phone died one day so I couldn’t sign in the next time I login it says starting a new streak at one day, which at that exact mom…" - DaveyLuv
12
"everything"
3 negative reviews mention this · 12% of all complaints
★★★★★ "barely free. would be great if you didn’t have to pay for everything in the app. i like the app, its great, but atp just make the app itself cost money. so annoying" - ave bows
📋 All 25 negative reviews
Every 1-2★ review we fetched. Use the copy button to grab them all for your own analysis (paste into ChatGPT/Claude with a prompt like "summarize core user problems, group by theme, ignore bugs, focus on missing features").
Need account + payment
Another garbage app to take then sell our data. This should be free, but is of course a subscription based app with sneaky fees. Skip.
Not a free app
This app advertises itself as free. This is incorrect. This app does not tell you until after you’ve already signed up with your email and taken their test that there is a $40 subscription to use it.
Was charged for the free trial
I canceled my free trial 1 hour after the download, my bank shows me still being charged!!
Fees,fees,fees
It would be really nice to just have an app that doesn’t try to monetize off of you and actually cares of the brain health of their users! Ads and fees for everything on this app. Looking for another one that doesn’t have these annoying ad ons
Canceled the trial in advance, billed anyway
I signed up for the free 7-day trial of the app but did not find it worthwhile after four days. I canceled the trial both in the app and in the App Store. I received a follow up email from the company with “return” offers. Despite taking all of these actions, I was billed in full on Day 7. Now I’m pursuing a fraudulent charge case with my credit card company. Buyer beware!
Broken streaks.
I had a streak of 589 and never missed a night and yet was reduced to start at 1 again. And now a second time, I played yesterday and yet it is marked as a missed day.
Stop asking for feedback
I’m giving 1 star every day because you’ve added so many ads and ask me to submit a review daily. Fix this feature or enjoy my honesty
Why is the app free?
the entire app is essentially blocked by a paywall. you’re better off just doing wordle.
Disappointing
The “tests” are excessively difficult and the times are too short. I expected a much better, more tailored experience. Will not be subscribing.
Not free
$40+ a year. Ripoff
Surprise, it costs you
I have no respect for apps that subject you to a lengthy registration process and then reveals its costs at the end. It should be the first thing that’s disclosed.
you have to pay to learn
you have to pay for a premium service to do more than three games a day and a reduced library it’s annoying to have to pay to want to learn and better ourselves company’s like this are just money grubbing freaks
Requires email
You have to either give them your email or link an existing account. Hard pass. They’re gonna say something along the lines of “we are very careful with your information and only use it for creating an internal blah blah blah” yea… we know…. That’s what we DONT want. How about just let us use the app??? Either way, no app is worth my privacy, regardless of how “helpful” it may be.
Next
Next
Pay wall
Unfortunately you can’t use the app much at a free capacity. Nearly everything is grey and locked behind a pay wall. Doesn’t give me a reason to keep it installed if I’m unable to use the app without paying for premium access.
The rewards all gone from 1 dead battery
I had this thing going for well over 400 days. I was happy with it. It was my routine every morning and then my phone died one day so I couldn’t sign in the next time I login it says starting a new streak at one day, which at that exact moment, I said no, I’m not and cancel my subscription. I investigate if there’s other ways to recover it but no, they offer freezes that you can purchase but they’re not effective retroactively so once you’ve missed it you’re gone. I guess the idea is that you’re gonna stockpile them.
I prefer
Not to login. Maybe next year.
barely free
would be great if you didn’t have to pay for everything in the app. i like the app, its great, but atp just make the app itself cost money. so annoying
Points System Sucks
I use to play the daily challenge every day to learn and develop my brain. 3+ years straight. I could literally feel my mind changing for the better.
Now I play for the new points reward system. How many points can I get to lead the leaderboard?! This quickly reveals there's limited content and a lot of repetitive things.
I'm not doing math anymore, I just know the answer. I'm not reading anymore, I just know the word that's wrong or extra. I'm not reading faster, I just remember the answer to the question.
I can feel my mind quickly turning to mush.
Now I play for the new points reward system. How many points can I get to lead the leaderboard?! This quickly reveals there's limited content and a lot of repetitive things.
I'm not doing math anymore, I just know the answer. I'm not reading anymore, I just know the word that's wrong or extra. I'm not reading faster, I just remember the answer to the question.
I can feel my mind quickly turning to mush.
need subscription to do anything
fun games! although i’m not certain they would actually do much to improve mental aptitude given most of them weren’t that difficult. i would have given it more of a chance to find out if there were more games available without paying a subscription
Lovely game, greedy developers.
This is an app I’ve had since middle school and I’m 24 now. I’ve used it pretty continuously throughout the years off and on. I’ve seen all the new things they have implemented and seen the game become overran with the “bypassable” paywall after every touch of the screen. It’s such an amazing app that genuinely would and I’m sure genuinely does help so many people that struggle with so many things like lack of time to further educate on these areas, people with learning disabilities, elderly losing their memory, etc. But it’s so sad to see that now you have to pay for this stuff when I remember being genuinely fascinated I had access at a young age to something that would develop me and feel healthy for my brain. And for whatever reason it’s ranked now? So now it’s a competition which is another driving force of why people don’t want to try to do better. Way to go, what an absolutely amazing fumble of such a useful app. Defeats the entire point.
Misleading
You have to pay for it
Used to Work
Used to enjoy this game, but now it has so many glitches it has ruined my experience. Keeps forcing me to buy streak freezes even though I have completed the workout. Doesn’t give me credit/coins for the daily achievements I have made. Update to fix problems worked for a few days then started acting up again. Customer service gave me a few coins to cover all my losses but didn’t come close to what I lost. Having been playing for years, but will probably look for a new game that works properly.
Premium Subscription is Limited
One would think that with a Premium subscription it would unlock all content that isn’t progress based, but that is not the case. To access the archive of daily crosswords, you have to use in game currency. The in game currency trickles in incentivizing users to pay real currency to buy a block of in-game currency. I was onboard to renew after my trial, but I’m not going to entertain this slipper slope. Next they will block access to new game types and who knows what else. This is a SUBSCRIPTION, not a one time payment. It’s like a streaming service suddenly having adhoc pricing on certain items. Enough is enough, tired of companies like this.
Pretty fun
I play Elevate and I should get more money on Elevate easier instead you have to do all these quests which is really annoying and I’ll take you maybe even a full month to get $1000
Not what I expected
This is more stressful like a test than a game to strengthen memory.
Sentiment summary
96%
Positive (4-5★)
3%
Neutral (3★)
2%
Negative (1-2★)