Hallow Review (2026): Features, Pricing and Who It Fits

Hallow at a Glance

Who Hallow Fits Best

Hallow fits a Catholic who wants someone to lead them through prayer for 5 to 20 minutes a day. The app is built around the forms Catholics already know: the Rosary, the Divine Mercy Chaplet, the Ignatian Examen, Lectio Divina and Night Prayer from the Liturgy of the Hours. Each one is narrated, so a person who has never prayed the Rosary alone can press play and follow along.

The second group Hallow serves well is Catholics who want structure through the Church year. Hallow runs a Pray25 Advent Challenge before Christmas and a Pray40 Lent Challenge that starts on Ash Wednesday. Those challenges give a parish, a family or a single reader the same prayer to pray on the same day, which keeps a Lenten commitment going past the first week.

Non-Catholic Christians can use Hallow, and the Bible stories, Christian meditations and chant work for anyone. A large share of the library assumes Catholic practice, though, so a Baptist or non-denominational reader pays for content they will skip. For them, the comparison further down points to better fits.

What Hallow Is and Who Makes It

Hallow is a subscription prayer app made by Hallow, Inc., a company based in Chicago. Alex Jones, Erich Kerekes and Alessandro DiSanto founded it, and the first version reached the App Store in December 2018. Alex Jones serves as chief executive officer (CEO).

As of October 2026, Hallow lists more than 10,000 sessions across prayer, meditation, Bible readings and music. The Apple App Store listing shows a 4.9 rating from about 380,000 ratings and support for seven languages. Hallow is also available on Google Play for Android phones.

Hallow's narrators are well-known Catholic voices. Jonathan Roumie, who plays Jesus in The Chosen, reads Bible stories. Fr. Mike Schmitz leads Bible in a Year and Catechism in a Year, and Bishop Robert Barron leads a Rosary and Stations of the Cross series. In 2026 Hallow's homepage promotes Mark Wahlberg alongside Roumie.

Hallow's Unique Benefits

Six features set Hallow apart in daily use, and each one changes something concrete about a prayer routine.

• Bible in a Year and Catechism in a Year with Fr. Mike Schmitz are free permanently, so a reader can finish the whole Bible in 365 short audio episodes without paying.
• The Daily Rosary rotates through the mysteries for each day of the week, so the reader never has to look up which mysteries to pray.
• Pray25 (Advent) and Pray40 (Lent) give everyone in the app the same daily prayer, which lets a family or parish keep a seasonal commitment together.
• Sleep Bible stories and Taizé and traditional chant replace a secular sleep app at bedtime with Scripture and sacred music.
• Night Prayer from the Liturgy of the Hours puts the official evening prayer of the Church into a guided audio session of a few minutes.
• A Parish Partnership program lets a pastor record custom content, run community challenges and give a parish its own virtual "Parish Home" inside the app.

What Sets Hallow Apart from YouVersion, Abide and Pray.com

Hallow's clearest difference is Catholic depth. Of the four apps compared here, only Hallow narrates the Rosary, the Examen, Divine Mercy and Night Prayer and follows the liturgical calendar with seasonal challenges. The three closest alternatives each win on a different measure.

YouVersion is free with no subscription at all. It reports more than 710 million installs and more than 3,500 Bible versions. YouVersion is the better pick for reading Scripture in many translations; Hallow is the better pick for being led through a prayer. Our Hallow vs YouVersion comparison goes through the trade in detail.

Abide is a non-denominational Christian meditation and sleep app with more than 2,000 meditations and more than 365 bedtime stories. Abide lists its annual Premium plan at $39.99 in the US on its help center, which is $30 less than Hallow's annual price. Abide has no Rosary or Catholic liturgical calendar, so Protestants who mainly want sleep content should look there first. See Hallow vs Abide.

Pray.com is a broad Christian media app with daily prayers, Bedtime Bible Stories, Pray Radio and a Bible in a Year podcast led by Pastor Jack Graham. Pray.com is free with ads and offers PRAY Premium to remove them, with a 7-day trial. It suits Protestant households that want a wide mix of audio. Our Hallow vs Pray.com comparison covers that pairing.

Hallow Pricing in 2026

Hallow pricing in the US is $9.99 a month or $69.99 a year as of October 2026, according to Hallow's pricing help page (last updated August 12, 2026). The annual plan works out to about $5.83 a month. Paying monthly for twelve months costs $119.88, so the annual plan saves $49.89 for anyone who expects to keep the app for a year.

The Friends & Family plan costs $119.99 a year and covers up to six members. Split six ways, that is about $20 per person per year, against $69.99 for one individual plan. Two people on individual annual plans already pay $139.98, so the family plan is the cheaper choice for any household of two or more.

Individual plans start with a free trial that renews automatically; the Friends & Family plan has no trial. Prices exclude sales tax and vary by country and by where you subscribe (the Hallow website, the Apple App Store or Google Play), so the price in your app store is the one that applies. Hallow also gives complimentary access to priests, religious, faith immersion programs, retreats and many Christian nonprofits, which a parish staff member can ask about before paying.

What the Free Version of Hallow Includes

The free version of Hallow includes hundreds of prayer sessions and needs no subscription. Hallow lists Bible in a Year, Catechism in a Year, the Examen, the Daily Gospel, the Daily Rosary, Divine Mercy, a Daily Meditation, Daily Mass Readings and Spiritual Writing as free content. It also keeps several series free, including homilies with Fr. Mike Schmitz, the Rosary and Stations with Bishop Barron, and Be-dad-itudes with Dr. Greg Popcak.

For a Catholic whose goal is a daily Rosary plus the Bible in a Year podcast, the free version may be all they need. The subscription adds the seasonal challenges, most of the music including Music Radio, and the bulk of the long-form series. A reasonable test is to use the free version for two weeks and subscribe only if you keep reaching for locked sessions.

Drawbacks to Know Before You Subscribe

Hallow has four drawbacks worth weighing, and each one has a workaround.

• The trial renews automatically into a paid plan. Set a phone reminder two days before it ends, and cancel through the store you subscribed in (Apple, Google Play or the Hallow website), because each one manages its own renewals.
• A large share of the library is Catholic-specific. Protestant readers who want meditation and sleep content can get it from Abide for $39.99 a year.
• The app is audio-first. Readers who want to study the text of Scripture side by side in several translations should pair Hallow with the free YouVersion app.
• Prices vary by country and store. Check the subscription screen in your own app store before paying, since the US prices above may not match yours.

Who Should Pick a Different App

Three kinds of readers should skip Hallow. A reader who wants a Bible to read, with many translations and reading plans, should use YouVersion, which costs nothing. A Protestant reader who wants Christian sleep stories and short meditations should start with Abide, which costs less per year and does not assume Catholic practice. A reader who wants only a prayer list to track requests and answered prayers needs a journaling app; our list of the best prayer apps includes Echo Prayer and PrayerMate for that job.

What would change this verdict: if Abide or Pray.com added a narrated Rosary and a Catholic liturgical calendar at a lower price, Hallow's main advantage would shrink. A Hallow price increase above $69.99 a year without new free content would also weaken the case for the annual plan.

Frequently asked questions

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