Hay fever apps for your iPhone
Your eyes start to itch and your nose is constantly clogged. In short: the hay fever season has arrived. With these hay fever apps we help you with a reliable pollen forecast, where you can receive notifications on difficult days. There are not many developments in the field of hay fever apps, but this year we have again made a current selection for you.
We think these are the best hay fever apps for your iPhone in 2023:
- Air Matters
- Pollen news
- Hay fever radar
- Weatheronline
- Rain radar
- Other apps
- When is the hay fever season?
The iPhone is of course not the cure for hay fever, but your phone can warn you with apps if the chance of an allergic reaction is high. There are numerous iPhone apps that detect pollen, but not all of them are useful or up to date. iCulture therefore lists the best hay fever apps that will be useful to you. In this comparison of pollen and hay fever apps, we explain what the strengths and weaknesses of the apps are, to make the choice easier.
Air Matters
Air Matters has a very good forecast and observation, detailed by area and pollen type. This is a tip from iCulture reader @IrisvanMastrigt and admittedly: this app is very versatile!
Air Matters, as the name suggests, specializes in everything related to air quality. You will see the current air quality, but also the pollutants and of course information about pollen. The app distinguishes between grasses, birch, alder and mugwort, among others. This real-time information is available for more than 180 countries and you can easily switch between air quality standards for the US, China, Netherlands, Europe, Great Britain and India.
When it comes to pollen and forecasts, you can view them for European countries and the US. You will receive a warning if there is a lot of pollen. To have an immediate view of the situation, there is an Apple Watch complication for your watch face. And you can immediately share air quality information with others thanks to the iMessage extension. Air Matters also has widgets, both for your home screen and your lock screen.
What’s nice is that you can connect Air Matters to your Philips Smart Air Purifier or your Laser Egg air monitor to monitor indoor air quality in real time. You can also control the Philips device. Air Matters contains advertisements, which you can remove for a small amount per year.
- Strong: Lots of information about everything related to air quality, handy widgets and Apple Watch app.
- Less strong: Maybe a bit overwhelming if you’re just looking for a hay fever app.
Pollen news
The Pollennieuws app from developer World of Warmth has been around for years. It has been a while since the app was updated, but it still looks quite up to date in 2023. It even has an AR function. You can use this to view all kinds of 3D models of different pollen. Furthermore, the app uses colors on a map to show how much pollen is in the air. There is also a pollen journal, written by biologist Maurice Martens. You can also indicate in the app how much trouble you have today and use the statistics to view the complaints from the whole of the Netherlands or just from your region.
With the pollen videos you can view information about pollen, plants and hay fever in general. These videos were made at various locations in the Netherlands. There is also a poll calendar, where you can see what the most important flowering period is for trees, shrubs, grasses and herbs. Pollennieuws goes one step further than the expectations for the coming days, because anyone who wants to know more information about the different forms of hay fever and their causes will find what they are looking for at Pollennieuws.
Pollennieuws is a paid app, but those who do not want to pay can also visit the website for many of the functions.
- Strong: Clear map, information about different pollens and grasses, compare statistics with other users, pollen and flowering calendar.
- Less strong: No push notifications, paid app with many similar features to the website.
Hay fever radar
The Hay Fever Radar app has been around for many years. There is a free and paid version, with the paid version being completely ad-free. The app shows a simple card from Pollennieuws. The app is from the same makers. On the card you can see the forecast for the day in colors and you can also read which trees and grasses are in bloom. The app also keeps track of an average complaint score, so that you can see at once whether you are not the only one with itchy eyes or huge sneezing fits. There is also an interactive graph that shows you how the growth of certain trees is progressing. Hay fever radar is primarily a web app, which in our opinion could use an update. It has been many years since this app was updated, so it is a good thing that there is a free version. We therefore recommend the paid version less.
- Strong: Interactive graph with complaint score and pollen counts.
- Less strong: Not always intuitive due to web app.
Weatheronline
The well-known weather app Weeronline has its own section for hay fever. Weeronline does not provide a map with hay fever forecasts, but focuses mainly on the types of trees and grasses. Via the settings you can switch the ’tile’ for health complaints on or off, which also includes hay fever. You will then see how likely it is that you will get complaints from a certain type of tree. If you want a more detailed forecast, you will see it in the next screen. A division is made for trees and grasses, where you can see exactly how bad the spread and flowering will be in the coming days. This app is especially useful if you know exactly what you are allergic to.
- Strong: Simple display of the extent of hay fever complaints at your location, provides a prediction for different trees and grasses.
- Less strong: No map with hay fever forecasts, no detailed hourly display.
Rain radar
Buienradar has, as we now expect from the app, a radar map with pollen forecast. In the wheel, select the Pollen option via the button at the bottom left, after which the card with the different colors will appear. The darker red a region, the greater the chance of hay fever complaints. There is no distinction between trees, grasses or herbs, so the app only provides a general picture. You can view the daily forecast for the next five days as well as check the 24-hour forecast.
- Strong: Forecast for five days or next 24 hours, clear map.
- Less strong: No detailed information about pollen types, no other additional information for hay fever patients.
More pollen apps
Isn’t there what you need? Then try these alternative apps to do something about your allergy:
- A.Vogel Hay fever weather report (Free, iPhone/iPad, iOS 10.0+) – The hay fever weather report, from the well-known homeopathic herb factory. The map is a bit unclear in our opinion. There is an extensively written hay fever weather report and you can see which trees and grasses are active. In addition, the app regularly receives a (bug fix) update.
- Pollen-News (Free, iPhone, iOS 11.0+) – Multilingual app for when you go on holiday to Switzerland.
- MASK-air (Free, iPhone, iOS 11.0+) – For the really fanatical hay fever sufferers. This allows you to keep a diary of your hay fever symptoms.
Hay fever: from January to mid-October
When should you actually watch out for the hay fever season? You can see this in the image below. In the spring, the birch in particular is a formidable culprit. From early June until well into September you have to watch out for various grasses, while mugwort mainly strikes in August.
