Schengen 90/180 Counter is a free, offline iPhone app for non-EU travellers that tracks how many of the 90 days allowed in any rolling 180-day period you have already spent in the Schengen Area. Version 1.0 arrived on 11 June 2026, weighs 23 MB and ships in 44 languages.
Disclosure: AppStoryo is operated by the studio that develops Schengen 90/180 Counter. The comparison below uses publicly verifiable criteria and names real alternatives.
What does Schengen 90/180 Counter actually do?
Schengen 90/180 Counter is a day ledger with a planner attached. Version 1.0 shipped on 11 June 2026, weighs 23 MB, needs iOS 13.0 or later and is listed in 44 App Store languages under Travel. You log each trip and the app draws the rolling window as a calendar heat-map with the days still available. A Ghost Trip planner simulates a stay that has not happened yet and proposes alternative dates when it would not fit. Past trips can be reconstructed from photo metadata in your library, or from a camera scan of boarding passes and passport stamps, both processed on the device. Beyond Schengen it tracks the post-Brexit UK allowance, US ESTA, a 183-day tax-residency count and custom rules. There are widgets, Lock Screen and Apple Watch views, Live Activities, calendar import, PDF and CSV export, and optional end-to-end encrypted iCloud sync. It runs offline with no account and no analytics. Schengen 90/180 Counter is free on the App Store.
What does the 90/180 rule actually say?
Less than most travel blogs imply, and the exact wording is the whole game. Article 6(1) of Regulation (EU) 2016/399, the Schengen Borders Code, permits stays of no more than 90 days in any 180-day period, which entails considering the 180-day period preceding each day of stay. Article 6(2) settles the two questions travellers argue about most: the date of entry counts as the first day of stay and the date of exit as the last, so a Friday-to-Sunday break costs three days and not one; and periods authorised under a residence permit or a long-stay visa are not counted at all. The area this applies to is now 29 countries — 25 EU Member States plus Iceland, Norway, Switzerland and Liechtenstein, Bulgaria and Romania having joined on 1 January 2025.
How does the rolling 180-day window really work?
It never resets on a fixed date, and that is the single most common misunderstanding. Because the law looks back 180 days from each day of stay, the answer changes every morning. Spend 90 days between 1 January and 31 March and you are not free again on a clean slate in July; you regain days one at a time as old ones fall out of the back of the window. Schengen 90/180 Counter draws this as a moving bar rather than a countdown, and links out from Settings to the European Commission's own short-stay calculator so you can run the same dates twice. That is worth doing before a flight: the app is orientation, the Commission's tool is the reference implementation.
What changed at the border on 10 April 2026?
Counting by hand got harder and easier at once. The EU Entry/Exit System started operations on 12 October 2025 with a progressive roll-out across 29 European countries and became fully operational on 10 April 2026, replacing the ink stamp with a biometric record of every external crossing. Harder, because there is no longer a page of stamps to add up. Easier, because the authorities now hold an exact record, so a guess that disagrees with it is a problem. ETIAS is next: it is expected in the last quarter of 2026 and will be mandatory for nationals of 59 visa-exempt countries and territories entering 30 European countries. The app carries an overview of both, and is candid about its own standing:
The app is a mobile aid for everyday orientation; the final decision on entry always rests with the border authority of the country you visit.
That sentence is from the app's own English App Store description, and it is the right framing. Install Schengen 90/180 Counter as a planning aid, not as a ruling.
Which Schengen calculator should you actually use?
Four free iPhone apps, all checked on the App Store on 13 October 2026.
Choose Schengen Simple if you want the most-tested option
- Roycroft Labs Ltd, free, version 4.2.2, last updated 7 October 2026.
- 4.8 stars from 364 ratings — the largest public track record of the four, and the reason to pick it if you would rather trust a crowd than a changelog.
- It does Schengen and little else, which is exactly right when Schengen is all you need.
Choose Schengen Calculator 90/180 if you want the longest release history
- Vitaliy Golubenko, free, version 6.6.1, last updated 12 October 2026 — the freshest update in this group.
- 4.5 stars from 187 ratings, and a version number that has been through six major cycles.
Choose 180 Days: Schengen Calculator if you want the highest average rating
- Splinterware Ltd, free, version 1.32, last updated 14 April 2026.
- 4.9 stars from 111 ratings, the best average here, though that April date is the oldest of the four.
Choose Schengen 90/180 Counter if one app has to cover more than Schengen
- Free, version 1.0, released 11 June 2026, 44 App Store languages.
- Tracks UK, US ESTA, a 183-day tax count and custom rules beside the Schengen window, reconstructs old trips from photo metadata on the device, and exports PDF and CSV for an adviser.
- It has no ratings yet. If a public track record matters more than scope, one of the three above is the safer pick today.
When is Schengen 90/180 Counter the wrong tool?
In four situations. If you use Android there is no build: the app is iPhone-only, and the studio's Google Play listing held 28 packages when it was read on 13 October 2026, none of them this one. If you want evidence that a counter has been right for other people, version 1.0 has no ratings at all, while the three apps above have 662 between them. If you need a figure that will hold up in a dispute, no app qualifies — the border authority's EES record is the one that counts. And if your days come from a residence permit or a long-stay visa, Article 6(2) leaves them outside the 90/180 count entirely, so any tool that simply counts days in the country will mislead you unless you exclude them yourself. See the App Store listing before you decide.
Schengen 90/180 Counter — what else do travellers ask?
Does the 180-day window reset at the start of the year?
No. The window is rolling, not calendar-based: Article 6(1) requires looking at the 180 days immediately before each day of stay. There is no 1 January reset and no six-month clean slate. Allowance comes back gradually, as individual days drop out of the back of the window.
Do the day I arrive and the day I leave both count?
Yes, both. Article 6(2) makes the date of entry the first day of stay and the date of exit the last. A Friday-to-Sunday city break therefore costs three days of your 90, not one. This is the detail that most often makes a hand-written tally come out short.
How many countries does the rule cover?
Twenty-nine. The European Commission lists the Schengen area as 25 EU Member States plus Iceland, Norway, Switzerland and Liechtenstein, Bulgaria and Romania having joined on 1 January 2025. ETIAS will apply to 30 European countries, so the lists differ and a tool should say which one it counts.
Is Schengen 90/180 Counter free?
Yes. The App Store lists it at no cost: version 1.0, 23 MB, iOS 13.0 or later, 44 languages. There is no account, no sign-in and no analytics, and the listing states it works offline with your data staying on the device unless you enable end-to-end encrypted iCloud sync.
Is there an Android version?
Not at present. The app is iPhone-only. The studio's Google Play developer listing was read on 13 October 2026 and held 28 packages, none of which is this app, so an Android user needs a different tool. This article links no Play page because there is none to link.
Can the app prove my compliance to a border officer?
No, and it does not claim to. Since the Entry/Exit System became fully operational on 10 April 2026, the authoritative record of your crossings is the biometric one held at the border. The app's store text says the final decision on entry rests with the border authority of the country you visit.
How does it know about trips I never logged?
It can reconstruct them from metadata attached to photos in your library, or from a camera scan of boarding passes and passport stamps. Both run on the device. That fills gaps in an old travel history, but it is an inference drawn from your own photos, so the dates still need checking.
What does the Ghost Trip planner do?
It simulates a trip you have not taken. You enter candidate dates and the app indicates whether that stay would fit inside the days available in the relevant rolling window, proposing alternatives when it would not. It is an estimate built from the trips you entered, never a guarantee of entry.
Does it handle anything other than Schengen?
Yes. The listing names post-Brexit UK, US ESTA, a 183-day tax-residency count and user-defined rules beside the Schengen window. The US test is stricter than a plain count: the IRS requires 31 days in the current year and 183 weighted days across three years.
Should I still use the official EU calculator?
Yes, before anything that matters. Run the same dates through the European Commission's short-stay calculator and compare. If the two disagree, trust the Commission's result and find out why the app differs — usually a trip entered with wrong dates, or a stay Article 6(2) should have excluded.
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