The Happier app is a revolutionary habit-tracking tool designed to help you to become happier, healthier, more productive, and more creative. It offers a range of personalized, practical strategies to support your aims and put happiness within reach. Research suggests that we repeat about 40% of our behavior almost daily, so if we change our habits, we can change our lives—starting today.

Set up your aims

Start a new aim. You can do this from your Home screen or Toolkit in the app. You can add multiple aims, but keep it manageable.

Select an aim category. Choose an area where you’d like to make progress. Not sure where to start? Foundational habits like sleeping, moving, and decluttering can make a big difference in your happiness, and they make other habits easier to maintain. Note: Most aims can fit in several categories, so don’t worry about slotting your aim into the “correct” category. Find more aim ideas here.

Write your aim. Craft your aim as a concrete, measurable action. For example, if your “Energy” aim is to get better sleep, resolve to “Go to bed at 10 pm every night” or “Turn off my phone one hour before bed,” not “Get more sleep.” It’s ok to start small, even small steps make a big difference when they’re taken consistently over time. Get more tips for writing effective aims.

Select the frequency of your aim. Choose whether you want to track your aim daily, weekly, or monthly. Turn on notifications to get helpful reminders.

Choose a habit-tracking tool. We’ll recommend the most effective tool for you based on your Tendency. Or, if another tool works better for you or your aim, you can select it from the menu.

Find the right tools for you

There’s no one-size-fits-all solution to building habits and becoming happier—different tools work for different people. Gretchen Rubin's research and observations have shown that people can change their habits, but only when they go about it in the way that's right for them.

How it works

If you haven’t already, take the Four Tendencies personality quiz to find out how you respond to inner expectations (like New Year’s resolutions) and outer expectations (like work deadlines). Learn more about the Four Tendencies Personality Framework.

Once you’ve set up an aim, the Happier app will recommend the most effective habit-tracking tool for you, based on whether you’re an Obliger, Questioner, Upholder, or Rebel. By learning your Tendency, the Happier app will identify the tools that are most likely to help you make changes that will stick.

For example, for an aim of taking a daily walk:

If you are an Obliger, we might recommend  sharing your progress with an Accountability Partner to get the outer accountability most Obligers need.

If you are a Questioner, we might recommend that you capture daily insights in the One-Sentence Journal so that you can satisfy your need for information and clarity.

We’ll suggest a tool that will be a great fit. Or if you’d rather use a different tool from the one we recommended, try it out! It’s all about finding the strategies that work for you and your aims. Tools include: Don’t Break the Chain Photo Log One-Sentence Journal Numbers Tracker Accountability Partners

Explore happiness every day

The Happier app is packed with features designed to support your Happiness Project, whether you’re on Day 1 or Day 100. An atmosphere of growth is one of the keys to happiness, so check your homescreen daily to see what’s new.

Ready to get started? Download the Happier app from the Apple App Store or Google Play.

FAQs

How can I modify an aim?
At the moment, the only way to modify an aim is to delete it and start over, unfortunately. We’re at the very early stages of developing this app so we don’t have all the features that we would like yet. But we are working on new features and updates like this one as we continue to improve the app.

How can I reference my “results” screen from the Tendency quiz?
At the moment, there is no way to go back to that screen but this is a feature we are looking into. In the meantime, if you’d like to read more about your Tendency, you can read this guide.

I already know my Tendency, do I have to take the quiz again?
When you first open the app, you have the option of starting the quiz or clicking "I already know my tendency." You can then select your Tendency and skip the quiz.

Can I edit my Tendency?
Once you’ve taken the quiz or selected your Tendency, you can’t go back and change it.