You don't have to read anything to get through a panic attack.
One tap, and a calm recorded voice walks you through a panic attack: grounding and paced breathing, out loud. No screen to read, no menu to find in the moment.
Built for the moment it's hardest to use an app
Tunnel vision, shaking hands, a racing mind. Reading text and tapping through screens is exactly what's hard right then. So Ballast doesn't ask you to.
One tap
A single button starts the rescue. Nothing else to find or decide in the moment.
A voice, not a screen
A calm recorded voice talks you through grounding and an extended exhale. You can close your eyes.
Works anywhere
Every rescue is stored on your phone, not streamed. Airplane mode, a basement, the subway: it still works.
Designed to be steady, quiet, and human
From the instant panic hits to the quiet hours at 3 AM. Every screen is built without clutter, reading friction, or cognitive strain.
Every other app asks you to read your way through a panic attack
That's exactly backwards. Panic attacks come with tunnel vision and shaking hands, the same things that make reading text and navigating a menu genuinely hard.
Ballast's crisis screen is a breathing animation and two enormous buttons. A recorded voice does the rest, out loud, so there's nothing to read.
This peaks and passes.
Free forever, not a trial
The core of Ballast, the part you'd need in a crisis, is never paywalled. Premium adds depth for the days in between.
Free
No account required
- Unlimited voice-guided SOS rescues, always
- Core breathing patterns
- 7 days of journal history
- Introductory lessons
- Emergency contact
Premium
Cancel anytime
- Full lesson library
- All soundscapes and sleep stories
- Unlimited journal history and trends
- All breathing patterns
- AI reflection companion, post-episode only
What Premium adds
Tools for the days between attacks: noticing patterns, working through a thought, redirecting a racing mind, and being ready before it happens again.
AI Reflection Companion
Guided journaling and reflective conversation after an episode ends, never during one. You're told plainly before anything you write reaches it, and you can turn it off at any time.
CBT Thought Challenger
A step-by-step way to question an anxious thought: what's the evidence for it, what's the distortion, what's a steadier way to see it.
Personal Anchor Kit
Photos, a voice note, and a checklist you build in a calm moment, ready to open the next time you need it.
Clinical Data Export
A plain summary of your episodes and patterns, exported from the app to share with a therapist or doctor if you choose to.
Calming Games
Bubble Pop is free: tap floating bubbles to slow racing thoughts. Shade Match and Memory Match add two more quiet, focus-redirecting puzzles.
Questions people ask first
Straight answers, no hedging.
No. Ballast is a self-help and coping tool built around grounding and paced-breathing techniques. It doesn't treat, diagnose, or cure anything, and it isn't a substitute for professional care. Think of it as something steady to hold onto while a panic attack passes.
Yes. The entire rescue, every voice line, every asset it touches, is bundled in the app itself, not streamed. It's built to work in airplane mode, because that's exactly when a panic attack might happen.
The rescue itself, never. Unlimited voice-guided sessions are free forever. That's not a trial and it's not going to change. Premium adds extra breathing patterns, the full lesson library, soundscapes, sleep stories, and longer journal history.
No. You can use the whole free tier, including unlimited rescues, without ever signing up. An account is only useful later, if you want your history to follow you across devices.
Your written journal entries are end-to-end encrypted before they ever leave your device. We store only the encrypted blob; we can't read it, even if we wanted to. Episodes and settings are encrypted at rest on our servers. No ads, and we never sell your data. See our Privacy Policy for the full picture.
Most ask you to read text and tap through screens while you're in the middle of an attack, hard to do with tunnel vision or shaking hands. Ballast is voice-guided: one tap, and a calm recorded voice walks you through it out loud. No reading, no menu to find.
Not yet. Ballast is available on Android through Google Play. iOS is planned, but we don't have a date to share yet.
Ballast isn't a crisis line, but it's built with one close by. If anything you write suggests you need more support, the app surfaces crisis resources for your region, like 988 in the US or Samaritans in the UK, automatically. This is never limited to Premium. You can also set up your own emergency contact in the free tier.
Something steady to hold onto
Free, unlimited, and built to work with no signal at all. Android first, iOS to follow. Not a cure, not therapy, just something steady while it passes.
No ads. No account required. Free forever, for real.