That’s good to know!
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I’ve used both Hemingway and Grammary, and definitely would use Grammarly, especially if someone else is paying for it, although I admittedly haven’t use Hemingway for awhile.
Speaking of subscriptions we love, Setapp has ProWritingAid which I think might be as good or better than Grammarly.
There are a few caveats, however:
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Grammarly has integration with Gmail, which is very nice since we use G-Suite for our work email. ProWritingAid does not have this, as far as I know.
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ProWritingAid has some more advanced tools, including Scrivener integration, which are not available with a Setapp subscription. Basically you just get access to their Mac app via Setapp. To get their “pro” features you’d have to pay them directly for another subscription:
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1 year = $70
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2 years = $100
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3 years = $140
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Lifetime = $240
So if you use it for 5 years, a lifetime subscription would be the best price. But who knows what other options might be available in 5 years?
- The UI of their Mac app is astoundingly awful. It’s as if someone designed the UI on Linux doing a poor job of emulating a bad Microsoft Windows app, and then they had someone’s nephew port it to macOS over the weekend.
Having said that, the performance of the ProWritingAid app on the Mac is pretty good, especially compared to Grammarly’s app, which is so terrible that I won’t even install it on my Mac but just use the website instead. I presume it’s some Electron monstrosity.
ProWritingAid can also work on plain text files, which is handy.
I have to say that as far as subscriptions that I love I think Setapp is top of a very short list.
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I recently needed TextSoap so I subscribed to Setapp instead (for the same price!) Thanks for the detailed ProWritingAid recommendation. I probably would have skipped it if the UI is awful, but now I’ll check it out.
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I’ve just tried Calendar 366 when I discovered Fantastical was moving to subscription. I was converted straight away! Offers pretty much what Fantastical does but with a better UI, IMO. 
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not sure if anyone has said this yet, but in the UK at least you can setup a household and share the prime benefits between accounts.
This is true in the U.S., too. And while it isn’t true for movie/tv purchases, books at least can also be shared between accounts (and each adult on the account — you can have two — can pay their own bills).
The downside is that there’s no way to link particular Echo devices to particular accounts, or to limit a skill to particular devices.
So I had to unlink my calendar from my Amazon account, because my dad doesn’t really need or want to know when I have class, when my colleague’s birthdays are, etc. We can also activate each other’s Echos and any skills connected with them (though of course we don’t do that).
I suppose that could be Amazon’s way of making sure that, if you set up a household with someone you don’t actually live with, it’s someone you really trust.
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Online library resources are amazing. Our library system has a digital presence where very useful things are free: in addition to Lynda – access to the OED; major newspapers and smaller newspapers from across the U.S. and the world (including historical archives); e-books, movies, magazines; academic journals; song archives; Alexander Street library of digital scores; and on and on.
I’d encourage everyone with access to a library’s digital resources to sign up. The value returned for a $0 subscription is incomparable.
(Not to mention digital resources from national libraries around the world.)
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I might try out Zengobi’s Curio now that it’s offered on an annual sub on MAS. I don’t think i’ll get as much value from a basic Mindmap app and Curio does this and so much more. I may stick with iThoughts for basic MindMaps and Curio for the larger projects that are coming.
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You can also purchase Curio outright, for around the cost of two years’ subscription. I’ve always been intrigued by Curio, and it has unique features that have been honed over the years, but I’ve given up on depending on Mac-only solutions at this point.
It’s got a strong base in the edu market, and if you’re a teacher or student there is better pricing available, or at least there used to be.
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Curio 13 has “EDU” licenses for these tiers with a healthy discount:
Academic discounts also apply to upgrades. The lowest, “Core”, tier does not offer an academic discount.
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Not true is Aus sadly. But maybe we pay less for Prime, I don’t know
I try to keep subscriptions to a minimum. I still wish Apple would bring in upgrade pricing simply because I think the subscription model puts a pressure on developers to be “ever-expanding” their app; I’ve seen a few become less useful because of feature bloat that the developers didn’t really manage properly when migrating to subscriptions.
That said, I currently pay for:
- Caffeine Tracking by RECaf: I do shift work, so there are several health metrics that are important to track (at least in a general sense). Caffeine is a great little app with a cheap subscription that I can integrate into Shortcuts and gives me some nice little added metrics.
- CARROT Weather: Tier 2 subscriber; one of the most customziable and well designed weather apps out there. A great variety of data sources. Can load data from my own personal weather station right into the main display. It’s great!
- Drafts: A relative newcomer on my list, but I’ve fallen in love with the app. The Inbox → Archive/Delete workflow is really effective for what I use a writing application for and after configuring a few Workspaces and getting a bunch of actions coded up, it lets me do pretty much anything I want to or need to do with my text. I’ve been able to integrate it into my workflows in ways that save me noticeable amounts of time, so although it took a bit of work to set up, it was absolutely worth it.
- RadarScope: I’m a meteorologist by trade and RadarScope is by far the best RADAR app for my use available on both iOS and macOS. I have just the Tier 1 subscription as the higher levels I have no use for.
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Ulysses: I’m honestly probably going to cancel my subscription this year. I signed onto Ulysses back when the new version launched in 2013 and used it for many years. Since its transition to a subscription, I’ve been underwhelmed with the additions and haven’t really felt that the cost has been justified. I’ve also come to realize that I don’t really write large documents or projects, so a core aspect of its focus just isn’t for me. I think that a lot of what I need out of a writing app is actually handled pretty well by Drafts 5. The only thing at this point I feel I’m missing from Ulysses is the aesthetics, but it sounds like full theming is coming to Drafts later this year.
There’s a few apps I haven’t signed up for subscriptions yet, namely 1Blocker (I rarely ever see adds, so I don’t really feel the need for rapid updates) and 1Password (for now, I prefer to buy a license). I’ve also moved away from some pay services. Last year I ended my subscription to Feedbin and moved over to News Explorer on iOS/macOS; it’s quite good, but I hope the developer can make some speed improvements for syncing.
I think that subscriptions make sense for a lot of applications, however I think I still prefer upgrade pricing. It honestly wouldn’t bother me if there was faster depreciation of old versions; if I upgrade to a new operating system and there are some incompatibilities, I don’t mind paying for the upgrade to fix those things.
I’m still old-fashioned and don’t pay for streaming media. I like to buy my music and keep my library slim, and my consumption of television and movies is pretty limited.
Thanks to this thread, though, I’m definitely going to check out Calendar 366. The new Fantastical upgrade priced me out of the market and the macOS version is way to limited if moving over from only owning Fantastical 2 on iOS.
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It is. I already had Ulysses, and then got setapp. Not the best order to do this in!
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I’ll be trimming most, if not all, app subscriptions given the coming economic shockwave.
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I think this is going to be a difficult time for app developers. Depending on how many higher end users (which I assume is the primary market for app subscribers) are hurt by the coming economic recession/depression, developers are going to find it hard to sell subscriptions.
On the other hand, it may be a boon for them given how many people are going to be working from home.
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TJ,
Do you know if it integrates with Scrivener for the iPad? It looks like it just went mobile with one review in the App Store.
I’d already pruned back my subscriptions quite a bit over the last six months, and I’m thinking long and hard before I commit to any more, or even to one-off app purchases. Also, I want to make sure that I’m getting the most out of the apps that I already have.
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I was happy to fork over $ upon reading about their price model. It’s a wonderful app. The user interface is gorgeous. Agenda is a new approach to get organized etc. that can be attached to dates. Plus you cannot beat their responsive support! And you can doodle with your Apple Pencil 
!
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Unfortunately I have no idea.
I too left Adobe CC. Use On1
Here are my current subscriptions:
Setapp
Fantastical
Day One
Omnifocus
Dark Sky
YouTubeTV
Disney+
Readly
Sirius XM
iCloud
Amazon
Netflix
Google Play (include YouTube Music)
Grammarly (check my kids homework )
Evernote
Physique57 (workout)
Ones I am considering:
Drafts
Instapaper (have used in the past)
Readwise (trying right now)
Roam (trying right now)
Overcast
YNAB (have used in the past)
Notion
Carrot instead of Dark Sky ?
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