Knitting Buddy is an app available on both Android and iOS devices. I’ll get into the features below, but its name pretty well sums it up. This app should become your knitting or crochet friend. I’ve been using it for years (it’s actually already on my resource page), but just recently it became even better with Knitting Buddy 2. I’ve downloaded and played around with the app and here’s my experience.
Features
These features are cool in their own right but don’t merit much discussion.
- ruler
- full screen flashlight
- links to videos on YouTube to help you navigate and use the app
Reference features
Knitting Buddy lets you enter in your hooks, needles, looms, and yarn from your stash so you can keep track of them. A nifty part of the hook or needle entry is you can even choose the color of your hook on a full hex color scale. You can also list what material your hook or needle is made of.
If you’re using the free version of the app there are limits to this stash and inventory, but I’ll go into detail later.
There’s also an increase/decrease calculator for both knit and crochet. This is handy for if you think up your own patterns or are a designer. Then you can figure out how to spread your increases or decreases evenly over X amount of rows.
One of the most useful features, other than the project row trackers, is the library of reference information. Even if you keep track of your rows elsewhere to me it’s worthwhile to have this on your device to keep all this information handy. I don’t feel I need to go into detail for this, so I’m just listing them for you. There are a lot!
Charts:
- needle sizes
- hook sizes
- knitting chart symbols
- crochet chart symbols
- yarn standards (as per the Craft Yarn Council)
- laundry/yarn care symbols
Abbreviations:
- knitting
- crochet
- measurement
- Tunisian
- US/UK crochet term differences
Project features
Knitting Buddy, predictably enough, has project pages to help you keep your row counts (and more). The project page can also have a picture of your pattern. You can change the global setting so your device buzzes when you hit the plus or minus buttons. There also is a repeat counter to help you track your repeats.
I like to toggle the progress option so I can see the percentage I have done. Seeing that number change when I finish a row gives me a sense of progress. It makes it easier to stick with a longer project, like a temperature blanket. Also, there’s a little surprise for you when you finish the project.
One of the other project features is a timer. I like to use this to keep track of how long I spend on a project I’m making for the blog or to sell. But it can also be helpful to just know how much time you REALLY spent on that project. So you’ll know if it took forever or just felt like it did. 🙂
In the global settings you can set it to leave the screen on in the project page. I’m SO glad they kept this feature because it makes it easier to keep track of the rows. Otherwise I’d have to change the settings on my phone to never sleep and that would be bad. I’ll spare you why. (Kids, in short.)
Paid verses free
There is a paid version of this app. With the old one, it was one of two apps I ever bought and I’ve had phones with apps on them for over 10 years. The paid version is $0.99 USD a month. This is to pay for any cloud costs to store your information, since with the paid app you can save across devices.
Things you unlock with the paid version:
- unlimited projects (verses 25 with the free version)
- unlimited needle, hook, loom, and yarn entries (verses 50 each with the free version)
- yarn label photos
- changing the project theme
- tracking line on the PDF pattern
- ads removed (they’re not super invasive before like some free apps)
- lock screen orientation on the project page
- sort projects, needles, hooks, & yarn
Future features
I follow the Knitting Buddy developers on Facebook. They’ll keep adding more features, so you should follow their Facebook page if you want to stay in the loop. They also have a Facebook group you can join. I’ll update this review with added features at the bottom of this post.
Where to get it
I know, all you want to know now is how you can download this, right? Well wait no longer. You can get the iOS (Apple) app here and the Android app here.
Have you tried the Knitting Buddy app?
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