BreathStack
Breathe with intention. Nothing leaves your phone.
Box, 4-7-8 and coherent breathing for calm, sleep and focus. A full-screen pacer, soundscapes and HRV in Apple Health. Pay once — no subscription.
BreathStack
wellness
Breathe with intention. Nothing leaves your phone
Account
Not required
Analytics
None at all
Your data
Stays on device
Ads & trackers
Zero
What you get
Built for exactly this — and nothing you don't need.
Fall asleep, sharpen focus, or calm a racing chest with proven breathing patterns
Box breathing, 4-7-8, Coherence (5.5), and a slow 4-6 calming breath: each with the right counts already dialled in.
Build your own breath
tune the inhale, hold and exhale to any rhythm, watch your breaths-per-minute update live, and save the custom pattern to your library.
Just follow the orb. A full-screen breath pacer expands and contracts with every phase, with gentle synthesised audio cues and a light haptic tap on each inhale
eyes open or eyes closed.
Pick a goal
Sleep, Calm, Focus or Energy: and drop into curated sessions like One-Minute Reset, Deep Sleep or Anxiety Relief, layered with soundscapes: rainfall, ocean shore, night forest, warm drone, embers, or pure silence.
See it actually working. With your permission, BreathStack reads your heart-rate variability (HRV) and respiratory rate before and after a session and logs Mindful Minutes to Apple Health
honest feedback, no vanity metrics.
Track your streak and weekly mindful minutes on a clean, local timeline
completely private and offline. Your patterns, sessions and history live only on your device (SwiftData). No account, no analytics, no tracking, nothing phoning home.
How it works
Up and running in under two minutes.
- 01
Build or pick a stack
Choose from six techniques or a starter stack, set durations to taste, and reorder the blocks.
- 02
Press play
Follow the full-screen breath guide — an animated circle, audio cues, and a light haptic tap on each inhale.
- 03
See the effect
With Apple Health permission, BreathStack captures your HRV delta and logs the session as Mindful Minutes.
A note from the studio
“I wanted a breathing app I could actually trust: correct rhythms, a calm pacer, and real feedback from my own body — without a subscription, a streak nagging me, or my data leaving the phone. So I built BreathStack with no analytics and no servers of its own; it genuinely can't phone home. It just helps you breathe.”
Questions
The honest answers.
Is BreathStack free?
Yes, you can start free: a set of starter sessions and one full session every day, no account needed. A one-time unlock removes the daily limit and opens every pattern, soundscape, session and sleep stack.
Is it a subscription?
No. BreathStack is a one-time unlock ($19) — pay once and it's yours, with no recurring charge, no auto-renew and no ads. Restore your purchase anytime on a new device.
What data does BreathStack collect?
None. There's no account, no analytics, no crash tracking and no servers — the app makes no network calls of its own. Your custom patterns, sessions and history are stored only on your device with SwiftData.
Does it work offline?
Completely. Every breathing pattern, soundscape and audio cue is generated on-device, so BreathStack works on a plane, in the mountains, or in airplane mode — no connection required.
What breathing techniques are included?
Guided Box breathing (4-4-4-4), 4-7-8, Coherence (5.5 breaths a minute) and a calming 4-6 breath — plus a builder to create your own rhythm. Choose a goal (sleep, calm, focus or energy) and the app matches the pace and sound.
Do I need an Apple Watch for the HRV feature?
No — the app works fully without it. The Apple Health integration is optional; if you allow it, BreathStack reads your HRV and respiratory rate before and after a session (HRV usually comes from an Apple Watch) and writes Mindful Minutes back to Health.
How is it different from other breathing apps?
It's a precise, owner-built tool, not an influencer-audio subscription. Correct ratios, a clean pacer, real biometric feedback, build-your-own patterns — and a hard privacy line: no analytics, no tracking, pay once.
Is this medical advice?
No. BreathStack is a wellness tool, not a medical device. Some breathing patterns are vigorous — stop if you feel light-headed or unwell, and check with a doctor first if you have any heart or respiratory condition.
Launching soon
Be first to know when BreathStack ships.
It'll launch at $19 — pay once. Free tier: full technique library plus one session a day, free to try.
One email when it lands on the store. No drip sequence, no spam.
No spam. No tracking. Email only — unsubscribe with one click.
Your techniques, custom stacks, and session history are stored locally on your device using SwiftData; nothing is uploaded.
From the journal
Notes on the practice.
- 01
Coherent Breathing: Why About Six Breaths a Minute Tunes Your Heart
Coherent breathing means slowing to roughly six breaths a minute to hit your body's resonance frequency. Here's the baroreflex science and how to find your own pace.
2026-06-14
7 min read
- 02
CO2 Tolerance: Why You Feel Breathless So Easily (and How to Train It)
How to improve CO2 tolerance with simple breathing practice. Learn why air hunger hits early, what your BOLT score reveals, and how slower breathing retrains it.
2026-06-13
7 min read
- 03
The Physiological Sigh: The Fastest Breath to Calm Down in Real Time
The physiological sigh — a double inhale and long exhale — is the fastest evidence-based way to calm down in real time. Here's the physiology behind why it works.
2026-06-11
6 min read
- 04
How to Build a Breathwork Habit That Actually Lasts
Most breathing practices die in week two. Building a breathwork habit that lasts means small fixed sessions, the right anchor, real feedback, and dropping the streak obsession.
2026-06-11
7 min read
- 05
Box Breathing vs. Pranayama: Which Should You Actually Learn?
A clear comparison of box breathing vs pranayama — what each is good for, where box breathing's even ratio falls short, and when the classical system is the better investment.
2026-06-09
7 min read
- 06
Breathing Exercises for Sleep: A Wind-Down That Actually Lands
The best breathing exercises for sleep aren't about forcing yourself unconscious. They lower arousal through the long exhale, humming, and a slow, sedating sequence before bed.
2026-06-05
7 min read
- 07
Pranayama for Beginners: What to Actually Do in Your First Week
A grounded pranayama for beginners guide — what the word means, two safe techniques to start with, how long to practise, and the mistakes that make people quit early.
2026-06-01
7 min read
- 08
Why Breathwork Doesn't Work for You (Yet)
If breathwork isn't working for you, it's rarely because breathing is useless. It's usually wrong technique, wrong moment, no consistency, and no feedback. Here's the fix.
2026-05-26
7 min read
- 09
The Vagus Nerve, the Long Exhale, and Why Slow Breathing Calms You
Vagus nerve breathing isn't mysticism. The long exhale, parasympathetic braking, and heart-rate variability explain exactly why slow breathing settles the nervous system.
2026-05-20
8 min read
- 10
Does Deep Breathing Give You More Oxygen? The Myth, Corrected
The idea that deep breathing floods you with oxygen is one of the most persistent breathwork myths. The real mechanism is about carbon dioxide and the nervous system.
2026-05-13
7 min read
- 11
Nadi Shodhana: How Alternate Nostril Breathing Actually Works
A practitioner's guide to nadi shodhana, or alternate nostril breathing — the hand position, the 4-4-4-4 ratio, the nasal cycle, and what it does to your nervous system.
2026-05-07
7 min read