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Cadence Keeper

Running & cycling metronome.

A free way to hold your tempo: dial in a target BPM, pick a tick you like, hit play, pocket the phone. The beat sits on top of your music at full volume and keeps ticking with the screen locked, so you can hold your cadence without thinking about it.

How it works

Set the BPM you want, 40 to 240, with a slider, ± buttons, or a tap on the big readout to type an exact number. Tap play. The metronome keeps a sample-accurate tick going in the background, mixed over whatever you're already listening to. Choose Mix to keep your music at full volume under the beat, or Duck to dip the music while the beat sounds, and set exactly how loud the click sits on top. On headphones, flip on Alternate ears to bounce the beat from one side to the other each tick. Lock the screen, drop the phone in a pocket or a jersey, and run or ride to the beat.

Pick a tick you can actually hear

Twelve sounds ship with the app, so you can find one that cuts through your music, your headphones, and the road noise around you: Click and Tock, plus Beep, Blip, Chirp, Clap, Clave, Cymbal, Drum, Pop, Snap and Tick. A Tick sound picker sits right on the main screen, and there's a full list in Settings: tap a name and it plays at your current tempo, so you hear it the way you'll hear it on a run, then tap Keep. Change it mid-session and the new sound starts on the next beat. A sharp click is easy to pick out over a podcast, a wood clave or a drum sits better under music, and a soft pop is kinder on a long run.

Control it from your wrist

The companion Apple Watch app turns your wrist into a full remote. A big BPM readout fills the screen, the Digital Crown dials the tempo, and ±1 / play/pause buttons sit right under your thumb. By default the iPhone makes the click and the watch drives it, but flip on watch playback and the watch makes the click itself, through AirPods or its own speaker, so it keeps ticking even with no phone nearby, wrist down, for up to an hour at a time. A minute before the hour is up the watch buzzes twice and offers another. Tap Play with your iPhone out of reach and the watch offers to play on its own. Reachability drops are handled gracefully, the watch reconciles its state as soon as the phone is in range again.

The Smart Stack widget on the watch surfaces the current BPM and play/pause at a glance, tap to jump straight back into the watch app.

Adjust without unlocking (iPhone)

• Home Screen widget, small for a glance, medium with tap-to-control ± and play/pause right from the home screen.
• Lock Screen Live Activity, play/pause and ±BPM right from the Lock Screen.
• Dynamic Island, same controls, one tap away.
• Control Center toggle, start and stop without ever opening the app. The icon flips to a pause-bar state while playing so you can see what's going on.

On iPhone, every surface, phone, watch, widgets, Live Activity, Control Center, stays in sync, so you never wonder which one is right. On Android the app runs on the phone, with a lock-screen transport control.

Great for

• Runners working on stride rate (~170-185 spm is the usual target)
• Cyclists holding a steady pedal cadence on flats or climbs
• Rowing, jump rope, lifting tempo work, anything tempo-driven
• Coaches who want a no-fuss beat for drills
• Anyone tired of metronome apps cluttered with subscriptions and modes

What you get

• Sample-accurate tick that stays locked over long sessions
• Twelve tick sounds to choose from, click, tock, beep, blip, chirp, clap, clave, cymbal, drum, pop, snap and tick, auditioned in place before you keep one
• Plays over your music at full volume, with the screen locked, Mix or Duck, and a click-volume slider to dial in the balance
• Alternate ears, on headphones, the beat bounces left then right with each tick
• A visible beat, a ring around the play button fills once per tick, so your cadence stays readable when the click is silenced
• Set the tempo your way, slider, ± buttons, or tap to type an exact BPM
• Start and stop from the lock screen, without unlocking
• Works fully offline, no account, no feed, no subscription

On iPhone you also get

• Apple Watch app + Smart Stack widget, drive everything from your wrist, or let the watch make the click itself with no phone nearby
• Home Screen widget (small + medium, tap-to-control)
• Lock Screen & Dynamic Island Live Activity, change the BPM too, not just play/pause
• Control Center toggle, start and stop without opening the app