Free on Google Play · in testing on iPhone

Four Dials

A mood log that turns ten seconds a day into a report your doctor can read.

The four dials are mood, energy, anxiety and irritability, each a row of answers you tap. Beside them: last night’s sleep, your medications, and any of 23 feelings and 40 triggers. Then Compare shows which of them turn up on your low days and your high ones.

Get it oniPhone Try the four dials

On iPhone, it installs through Apple’s free TestFlight app.

  • Never goes online
  • No account
  • Four-digit passcode
  1. Four Dials. Not one number.
  2. How’s your mood, 1 to 10?
  3. Mood: Low. Energy: Fast.
  4. A low day with the engine racing.
  5. Stats keeps every day. Nothing averaged.
  6. Two weeks before a change. Two weeks after.
  7. Mood on days with work, and on days without.
  8. Your daily notes. Your gratitude journal.
  9. A report for your psychiatrist.
  10. Skipped days stay blank.
  11. Dark or light.
  12. A four-digit passcode.
  13. Four Dials. Not one number. Never goes online. No account. No ads.

Four dials, kept apart, so a low day with the engine racing shows up as exactly that. Tap a rung on each, or two if the day moved.

Energy

  1. Shut down
  2. Drained
  3. Low
  4. A bit low
  5. Steady
  6. A bit high
  7. High
  8. Fast
  9. Hypomanic
  10. Manic

Mood

  1. Extremely low
  2. Very low
  3. Low
  4. A bit low
  5. Neutral
  6. A bit up
  7. Up
  8. Very up
  9. Hypomanic
  10. Manic

Anxiety

  1. None
  2. Mild
  3. Moderate
  4. High
  5. Very high

Irritability

  1. None
  2. Mild
  3. Medium
  4. High
  5. Very high

Four dials. Twenty-three feelings. Forty triggers. Never goes online.

Mood’s Every answer, counted, in the Light look: each rung’s color beside its name and its count of days, and a line that a day with two answers sits in two rows
Open a dial in History: every answer named and counted.

The whole idea

One number flattens a mixed day

Most mood apps ask how you feel on a scale of one to five. A day that was low and wired at once has no answer on that scale. Four Dials keeps mood and energy on separate dials, with anxiety and irritability beside them.

If the day turns, tap a second rung. Four Dials keeps both answers and never averages them.

  • Ten rungs for mood and energy
  • Answer twice if the day turns
  • About ten seconds

What you log

Every answer is a tap. Nothing is required.

Four dials

Mood and energy, ten rungs each. Anxiety and irritability, five.

  • Mood
  • Energy
  • Anxiety
  • Irritability

Sleep, three ways

How the night felt, how long it ran, and whether the day ended up back in bed.

Medications

Daily, weekly, monthly, or as-needed. A skipped dose, a dose change or a new medication is one tap, and Compare shows the two weeks either side of a change, or four.

Feelings and triggers

23 feelings and 40 triggers. Hide any, or add your own. Compare lines them up against all four dials.

LAST NIGHT’S SLEEP answered: Quality Rough, Hours 7 to 9 and Nap Short, and an Edit square
Last night. How it felt, how long, any nap.
MEDICATION: the scheduled list by name and dose, As usual and Not as usual, and a line that an as-needed medication is not part of the question
Your medications. One question a day.
WHAT SHOWED UP: a grid of painted feeling tiles, Grateful, Motivated and Rested lit, each with a check mark
How you felt. Tap every one that fits.

Optional, and off until you switch them on: a gratitude journal, two lines a day that never print; Hormonal, Period, Cramps, Cycle start and four more under What was around; and Relationship Mode, a second part of the day for a partner, below.

Patterns

See what turns up on your hard days

Compare lines your triggers up against all four dials. Pick a dial, and see what was around on its low days beside its high days. Pick a trigger, and see a dial on the days it was there and the days it wasn’t. It counts; it never says why.

On which kind of day, in the Light look: the Same day and Any day past the middle fields, then mood’s 32 low days beside its 48 high days and, in gray, every logged day, then a row for each trigger with three bars: Late night on 6 of 32 low days, 14 of 48 high days and 16 of 82 days in all, then Work and Bloating
Your low days beside your high days. In the example year, late nights came on 6 of 32 low-mood days, 14 of 48 high ones, and 16 of 82 days in all.
Mood on days with and without Work, in the Light look: mood’s color key, then three bars of mood colors, each sorted by answer over a strip of the same days by date: with Work, 6 days that answered; without Work, 22; and every day, both together, 28
One trigger, with and without. Mood on the days Work was around, beside the days it wasn’t.

The same day, or the day after. A late night can show up in the next day’s mood, so Compare can look one day on. The Full PDF prints what was around on low and high days, for the appointment.

  • Every trigger, against every dial
  • The same day, or the day after
  • Counts, never causes

What it shows

Then the days add up to a shape

Four weeks to fifty-two, or exact dates.

First, every dial day by day: six rows of squares on the same dates, so a mixed day reads as one column. Then a row for each thing you track: its counts and one bar, sorted by answer. Open one for a calendar of its days.

History’s first row, Every dial, day by day, opened in the Light look: six rows of day squares, mood, energy, anxiety, irritability, sleep quality and sleep length, on the same 28 columns, one column framed, and that day read out under them: Mon, Oct 19, Mood A bit low, Energy Steady, Anxiety Mild, Irritability High, Sleep quality Rough, Sleep length 7 to 9
Every dial, day by day. A mixed day is one column of clashing colors. Tap it to read the day.
History’s Mood row opened, in the Light look: its counts and its bar, then One answer a day: 28 days answered, 12 with two answers, the longest run below neutral and above it with their dates, then four weeks as a calendar, one square a day in the dial’s colors, some split corner to corner in two colors, and the tapped day read out under it
Every day, on its square. A day answered twice is split corner to corner.

Two looks

Dark midnight, or light cream

Dark to start. Pick Light, or Match phone, in Customize.

The log in the Dark look: energy and mood as rows of painted tiles on midnight blue, A bit up lit on mood and Mild on anxiety, each with a check mark
Dark
The same log in the Light look: the same tiles on cream, A bit up lit on mood and Mild on anxiety, each with a check mark
Light

The report

Paper a psychiatrist can hold

Preview every page, then download the PDF. The short one is two or three pages: the appointment, with each dial’s days in a row and its longest run on each side, then the weeks around the latest medication change. The full one adds every change, every answer four weeks at a time, and what was around on low and high days. In color or black and white.

Printed page in black and white: every mood and energy answer counted four weeks at a time, each count with a small bar beside it Printed page in black and white: around a medication change, each dial's answers in the two weeks before beside the two weeks after The page for the appointment, in color: days logged, mood and energy counted below, at and above their middle, anxiety and irritability from None to High or Very high, each dial with one thin mark a day and its longest run on each side, sleep in three numbers and how many nights sat far from your usual, medication, and the days that pulled two ways at once

View a page: For the appointment · Around a medication change · Four weeks at a time

Preview every page on the phone before you save it.

The Relationship Mode row in History: Drinks, Fights and Work, each one bar of days in its colors under its counts, then how the four dials seemed, and what was around for them
The Relationship Mode row in History: drinks, fights and work, counted in color.

Relationship Mode

Two of you, one log

Up to four things you choose to ask about, like drinks. Their work, what was around for them, and how they seemed to you. Then the two of you: a fight or not, a good thing, a hard thing, and the repair. Facts only, never a verdict.

  • Off until you switch it on
  • An optional code of its own
  • Prints only as counts

The whole app

Built to be trusted.

Four Dials

Free on Google Play · in testing on iPhone

  • Four dials: mood, energy, anxiety and irritability
  • Sleep three ways, and medications on their own schedules
  • 23 feelings and 40 triggers, plus your own
  • History and Compare: every answer counted, what was around, medication changes
  • A journal of your notes, and optional gratitude, Hormonal and Relationship Mode parts
  • A printed report: a page for the appointment, or every answer, in color or black and white
  • Dark or light mode, and optional increased text size
  • A backup file you keep, and an optional four-digit passcode
  • An Emergency link on the home screen
Get it oniPhone

What it won’t do

On purpose. The restraint is the design.

  • No streaks, and nothing to keep up
  • No scores. A rung is a reading, not a grade
  • No reminders or notifications of any kind
  • No averaging a day you answered twice
  • No predictions and no diagnosis
  • No subscription, and nothing to buy. It is free
  • No account, and it never goes online: what you log leaves your phone only when you share it, or in an iPhone’s own iCloud backup if that is on

Before you ask

Questions people ask

Is this a diagnosis, or a treatment?

Neither. It is a log. What it produces is a record you can hand to someone, not an assessment of you.

Is it only for bipolar disorder?

No. It is for anyone whose mood and energy don’t always move together. The dials are built so a low day with the engine racing has a place to go; the rest of the app works the same for anyone.

What do I give my doctor?

The Short PDF, two or three pages: the appointment page, with mood, energy, anxiety, and irritability counted and each dial’s days in a row, then a snapshot before and after your last medication change. Or the Full PDF, which adds every change, every answer four weeks at a time, and what was around on low and high days. Preview, download, and print.

What if I miss days?

Nothing happens. Every count divides by the days that answered, so gaps never read as zeros.

What about a day that changes halfway through?

Tap a second rung. The day keeps both answers, and nothing is averaged.

Can anything I log leave my phone?

Only if you share it. Four Dials has no code that goes online. On Android it has no internet permission. On an iPhone, iCloud Backup copies Four Dials’ data into your iCloud account by default along with every other app’s. Apple holds that copy, not us, and you can leave Four Dials out in the iPhone’s iCloud Backup settings.

What if I get a new phone?

A new phone starts empty. On the old one, tap Back up in Customize and copy that file to the new phone. Install Four Dials there, then tap Restore and choose the file.

Can I lock it?

Yes. Set a four-digit passcode in Customize and it asks every time you come back to the app. Relationship Mode can have a second code of its own. It is a lid against someone picking up your phone, not encryption, and we cannot see or reset it.

Can I see it working before I log anything?

Yes. Until you have logged a week, Stats offers Example data, so you can try every view.

Can I make the text bigger?

Yes, in Customize, up to half again as large. It scales the whole app, not only the labels.

Is there a light look?

Yes. Dark is the default, and Customize offers Light or Match phone. Dark is midnight blue; Light is cream.

Can I track my partner too?

If you want to. Relationship Mode is off until you switch it on. It adds a second part to each day: taps for up to four things you choose to ask about, like drinks, and for how your partner’s day seemed to you; and boxes for the two of you, from what a fight was about to how you repaired it, with two more for joint therapy.

Which phones does it run on?

Android 7.0 and up, and iPhone, in portrait.

Four Dials is a log, not a clinician. If you are in crisis, reach a professional or a crisis line: in the United States, call or text 988 at any time, and findahelpline.com lists lines elsewhere.

The four dials

Four Dials

Ten seconds a day, and a report your doctor can read.

Get it oniPhone

Free on Google Play · in testing on iPhone · Privacy policy

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