Groups Reviews

by AJW IPod

Not only does Groups not do what it promises, it wasted my time and money. I got Groups to try to resolve iPhone’s absurd problems with duplicate contacts. Groups alleges to have a feature that will address this. It searches for dups in your contacts, 2500ish on my phone, then has you review them and decide which to merge. You do this duplicate by duplicate so it’s not easy. You can do it fairly quickly if you’re just keeping all of them and merging rather than editing. But still, one by one takes some time. Well I started that process — you HAVE to resolve ALL the dups before you begin a merge, can’t do some and come back. So I get to the end finally, merge button ungrays and I click it “that’s a premium feature”. Ugh, I bite the bullet and pay 9.99 because the dups so irritate me. Go back and hit merge again. Lock. Freeze. Crash. All that time wasted. I went back multiple times to try again and it crashes every time it tries to identify all the dups in my contacts, doesn’t even get back to the point of going dup by dup. So unless you like wasting time and money, only to have the same problems you started with, I would not recommend Groups.

by Medic 68

When I first went into Groups it seemed to be exactly what I was looking for. I wanted to delete a lot of old contacts without having to do each one separately. I made a group of those contacts but when I deleted those all of my contacts were wiped out. I could not find anything in Groups that restore the contacts. I tried to restore them through my Apple account and Groups apparently wiped that out as well. I sent a message to the developer but that was never answered. Fortunately I had an old iPad that still had the contact list. After over an hour the Apple support person was able to help me restore my contacts from the old iPad. Without that device I would have had to find a way to contact everyone in my contact list in order to rebuild the list. I can’t believe an app that allows you to delete information does not have something to allow you to restore information if you make a mistake. If you use Groups - and I recommend ditching it - save your contact list to a separate device.

by Joes120j

I am hurting us up because I read an article it would be useful to delete duplicate phone numbers when you have large numbers of contacts you want to delete and have to do it individually with an iPhone. Groups supposed to make it easy well that was completely wrong. I don’t know if it’s just me or if anyone else agrees that it’s a very confusing to use and after playing around with it for a little bit and getting no results I somehow thought I was deleting the duplicates and deleted my entire phonebook permanently. I went from having 1000 contacts to having none and no way to restore them that I could find anyway. Now I will be spending multiple hours trying to go through and pick peoples phone numbers out of text messages just to get some of the contacts I have back. Not user-friendly not clear or explanatory. I guess it got rid of those duplicate numbers and every other phone number that I wanted to keep. beware before using

by Rtwolfe

I have over 1300 contacts. Tons tons!! of duplicates. Was looking for something that would help me efficiently find and merge duplicates.

Groups had good reviews. So i downloaded it. Played around with it. You could manually work your duplicates.

Then I noticed it had an automated duplicates function. The function was really nicely designed. It grouped all the possible contacts that it thought you’d want to merge into one, but it let you uncheck any contact you didn’t want merged (bad match) then would merge the rest.

You can guess where this is going. So i spent an hour and a half going through my potentially mergeable contacts. Everything looked great UNTIL I clicked the Merge button. Groups pops up a message that ACTUALLY MERGING is an advanced feature and it costs 9.99 (don’t you love it when they do the 99 cents thing).

Beyond frustrating. As a retired ex-IT guy, this is intentional. If it was version 1.0, I’d cut them some slack. If they popped up the message when you tried to first open the merge function, fine. You’re treating me like an adult. But nope, this is holding the potential customer up for ransom. Give us your $9.99 or kiss those hours you spent goodbye

Avoid these guys. Also, if you google. This is april 2021. There is another app store app that has recently reduced it’s price to zero that fixed my contacts. Much better way to go.

by Bsdunbar1

How can it even be 1 Star if it simply does not work??
The thought behind Groups is good and it works in general but I have experienced several bugs that almost make me just dump it and find something different.
When you import your contacts it duplicates all of them. There is actually a menu choice to address duplicates but you have to address them 1 at a time which is absurd. If it is supposed to do them in larger this app then that just doesn’t work either. Even after resolving some duplicates I come back to Groups weeks later and my contacts are duplicates again. I don’t know how many times I have went through and “resolved” them.
It also duplicated my this app created and changes the individuals in those this app. I start with 1 group to keep it simple, add 10 contacts and it is all good. I come back days later and the group is duplicates and the contact are all jumbled to the point you have to edit the group again. I have also done this multiple times. I have emailed about these issues and have never heard anything from anyone.
It also randomly deletes this app I have saved. I purposely started with 1 small group once I noticed all the bugs and just today when I open Groups I have zero this app saved. I had used the group several times before and now poof it is gone.
Groups is pretty much worthless

by Rob Thankful

The this app app is a wonderful extension to Apple's MAIL app on iPhone! this app enables me to create/manage email distribution lists on my phone. It is easy to use and I've never had a problem with it!
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I wrote that review years ago... unfortunately, I’m having some problems with it now and though I’ve tried several times to work through the problem myself, I can’t seem to get it to work. Thus the low rating (2 stars). I checked the BUILT IN help (and verified that this app has access to Contacts).

I will happily change my rating back to 5 stars when this problem is resolved...

My problem: I can’t add a new contact (or an existing contact) to a group. The group that I want to update with a new member has 9 members and I want to add a 10th member. Is there a limit on the number of members I can add to a group? I had 10 members working before, then I deleted one. I tried to add a different contact into the same Group. this app reports that the new account was added, but Contacts is not aware of the update.

I am running iOS 13.3.1 and Group 3.11.8

Please fix this because the management of this app is VERY important to me, and as it stands now, I can’t use the group feature (reliably).

by LecterTV

Really buggy and a very unattractive UI. I found myself struggling to read white text on a light gray background as well as frequently getting stuck by Groups just freezing/refusing to back out of menus. Would not recommend as a substitute for traditional contacts app.

What it is useful for, however, is mass-deleting contacts. I wanted to delete about 100 old contacts from over the years and going through the multi-step process in the built in contacts app to delete each individually wasn't an option. Groups made it easy to delete them all in one go.

The ability to merge duplicate contacts into one was also really handy the one time I was allowed to do so. Any further uses are apparently behind a pay wall as attempting to merge just brought up a an empty white box that said "unlock all features!" at the bottom. As is becoming a common occurrence with Groups, I can't tell if it's just another instance of poorly designed graphics or more white text on white background. Either way, following the prompt leads you to the "unlock all features" for $9.99.

Ultimately, Groups is helpful for deleting contacts en masse while hurting your eyes and not much else.

by "Xtremely" Satisfied!

I have been a long time user of this app. Groups started out really great, so I purchased the ad-free version along with enhancements. It was working exceptionally well for the longest time, but then I started noticing different little “quirks” when sending group texts. If some of the recipients had iPhones they would get the text, but those with androids never got them. Recently there have been iPhone users who are no longer receiving my messages. The highest number in any group is 30 persons. But the most disappointing thing is that in spite of several attempts to get any kind of support feedback to resolve this, I have yet to hear from the developer(s). An app will always be dependent upon the amount of support its developer(s) can give, no matter how forward thinking or innovative it is. I will gladly change the rating if only I can receive the support but as of now I am sad to say this has gone from 5 stars to 2 stars. Hopefully the down slide can be reversed before I have to find another, more dependable solution.

by MarkSan26

Groups is wonderful in concept. I purchased Groups so that I can create a group of phone #s for work so that I can have access to it in my fingertips instead of looking for a # on a list or in a book. The design is fine but it is very painfully slow to use. There is a a huge delay when adding contacts (2-3 seconds per letter/number pressed) and a 3-5 second delay when I choose a contact to pull up. In that amount of time I could’ve found the # off a list on paper and found it using my regular contact list on my iPhone. I made sure Groups is updated, closed other apps, and even restarted my phone to see if it would improve. Unfortunately, it did not make a difference. At this point, I may as well use my regular contact list. Please update and improve. Thank you.

by JOYFully, G

I am grateful to have an app that allows me to send group texts to my art students from my iPhone. I would appreciate a little better tutorial about using Groups as it has been a bit of trial and error. I purchased the full app so I could send to a larger group but when I combined all my smaller this app into one it fails. In fact, if I try to send a text message to more than17 members it fails. I have to select my group, select all names, select text messaging format, compose my message, override names with multiple phone numbers listed, wait for composed message to be pasted into text message and click send. Repeat. THREE times. Every week! Tedious. Over all, it does what I need it to do and until I find a better option, it is what it is.

by L Cohen 71

I have the upgraded version and Groups helps to get the job done (when it doesn’t crash), but it is by no means perfect and not always intuitive. I have over 300 contacts in many this app. I would like to be able to see my this app listed in alphabetical order rather than the order in which they were created. I have contacts synced with both Gmail and iCloud and was having problems with members synced with Gmail not being displayed in Contacts when placed in this app and those this app selected in Contacts, if that makes sense, even though I could see them in this app and in All Contacts in Apple’s Contacts app. The fix was to import all my Gmail contacts into iCloud via my PC. All in all, it was easiest to organize my this app in iCloud on my PC first, delete all the duplicates, and use this app as a supplemental app.

by Beverly Ortiz

Easy to use. The first time I used it I was able to name my conversations on my phone, iPhone 8 plus has a no such feature, but I think it was a glitch because I never got to do it again. The other prob is removing people. You must do it from Groups ...HOWEVER, in this latest version Groups doesn’t work at all now. It breaks the people down into this app of 9. I have this app that have upwards to 300 people...I can never get a message through because it gets hung up. I didn’t realize it was doing this either, would’ve been nice to have been warned. I used to love it otherwise but now...it doesn’t work. Our iPhones already does this app of 9...more now actually. If you can go back to this app of 90 that would be GREAT...make this app great again, please.

by Stellar68

Lots to love about Groups. I run a restaurant with many different departments. The easy ability to create this app & add a person to multiple this app is excellent. And I can just as easily remove them from individual this app or from all this app. I also like that I can easily "Mail merge" each recipient's first name into a mass text -- makes it feel all that more personal. In the recent version, they fixed the autocorrect bugaboo that actually didn't autocorrect your text -- now it does!

They've really come a long way in its reliability. It used to crash frequently but that has almost completely stopped. YAY!

by Vejacks

Groups has been a time saver for me concerning email and text message addresses to my this app. If you are sending out group emails and text messages in a small group environment in church, community, military organizations, clubs, etc., I recommend using Groups. You can add addresses or phone numbers one time and choose each message or text who you want to include or who you want to leave out. You can also add and delete people as you desire. I highly recommend Groups, and that’s without knowing what else it can do... Looking forward to the rest of you telling me what else I may be missing in Groups. I also recommend you investing in the different upgrades that you need or if for no other reason, to support this company for this awesome App. Thanks. Be blessed and be safe. 20April2020 P.S. ‼️Ready to give it less than a five, if it keeps asking me each month to review it again after I’ve already reviewed it... Please fix that. Thank you. 26July2020

by Bpjw64

Why Apple does not have Group Distribution options for text messaging in 2019 is sad. Groups fits the bill nicely though. Easy to use, functional, and fast. Simple interface to customize this app. Adding or subtracting names from your Group lists is a breeze. Start inside Groups choose your group, type your text into the apps own messaging box, once you complete your text you can choose your messaging sending type. It will automatically push it to Apples messaging app where you can check it out and customize further if desired or just send the message. A pleasure to use. Keep up the great development on this project.

by Stony_l

I have used this app for years to send Messages to my clients as well as my choir members. You may need to make several lists (9 people per list or fewer) BUT it is a great way to get information to a large group of people, especially like my situation when I was contacting over 100 people at a time. I would type 1 text message, copy & paste it to 12 lists and that’s it! I’ve sent info to over 100 people in less than 5 minutes for free!!! It’s a little time consuming compiling & saving the lists, but after you do it 1 time you have it forever. If you constantly need to get info to a large group, it’s well worth the time!!!

by Ablest Gabble

UGH! I finally figured out why I couldn’t get my this app App to work - like something was keeping it from accessing my phone Contacts! -> Must’ve been something in the latest iOS update that changed my Restrictions.
Not only did I have a hell of a time even FINDING where my Restrictions were in this iOS version, but it took me over 3 weeks to finally find it! I had Contact Restrictions on & the this app App kept giving me an error message upon opening that it needed access to my Contacts. No matter where it took me to, or where I looked, in my phone Settings, I could NOT find the issue!
But I FINALLY did tonight - under Screen Time, of all things! Good grief! If I wouldn’t have Googled where Restrictions where, I’d STILL be looking! Ugh! Grrr!

But my this app App is finally back to working correctly! Geez, what a hell the last 3+ weeks have been without it!
I’m changing my 1star rating to a 5 star rating, now!

But seriously, QBix DOES still need better customer service support! It’s extremely frustrating to have an issue, and have no where to turn to help figure it out!

by PsychicSoul

“this app” App Review

I’ve always and often use this well-designed and simple contact app , for making control this app. My favorite element is that this app allows the user to create their own this app, which, for me, is a fantastic way to categorize and sort Contacts by a specific type.

I love that the “this app” app is very easy to use, with very basic functionalities and options. This aspect helps users manage Contacts without having to research a tutorial or user guide. I’m sure there are many similar apps with much more options, functionalities and design specifications, but these definitely would require the burden of needing to research the tutorial/user guide and the internet to understand how to use it, as well as the time spent by learning it’s options and internal and/or external “help” features.

I highly recommend Groups if all that’s need is to sort/categorize Contacts. “this app” only negative element is that the this app a user creates does not DO anything with them; it only sorts or categorizes specific info for the users’ benefit.

by Libby's Lady

Sending out the same message to a group of people is much less invasive with Groups. By using the merge fields you're able to send the same message to a lot of people without having everyone need to hear each other's responses with incessant notifications! You can easily add and remove members to specific this app and quickly get information out to a large number of people. The only drawback I see is that as Groups is populating each text message to each person, it requires that you hit send to each person. This means you potentially have people answering as you are still sending which is a bit distracting. With my iPhone I'm able to just swipe those responses away until I'm finished sending them all. But all in all the pros far outweigh the cons.

by Bachcello

I was excited to see Groups as I needed an app to help me manage the different this app of contacts I have. I’m running into a couple of issues. 1. The function to consolidate duplicates is great, the bug here is I can only successfully merge one set of duplicates, when I repeat the process to merge the next set of duplicates I get kicked out of Groups , Groups shuts down. So to merge the next set of duplicates I would have to go into Groups and start the process from the beginning. Each time it allows me to merge one set of duplicates then Groups shuts down.
2. The functionality that lists out all the contacts that have potential duplicates is great. However, the “merge” button is not enabled even after I have put a check mark next to each suggested contact that has duplicates, the result is I cannot do the group merge, even though intuitively I think this is the purpose of the list and the merge button.

Can you please address these issues? Thanks

by J_Frank

It started out great and I absolutely touted its attributes to all I knew. As time has went on, something changed and it is so unstable. That’s why after a couple years of using it I just now (8/1/18) have been trying to contact support only to find there is none.
Great features, love Groups but it’s unstable. I like it so much I even contributed toward the developers, but as it happens in life, it fails at the worst times. I’m looking elsewhere.
When it comes to customer service, Groups gets a “0”. This is the only app I’ve ever tried to resolve issue through the developer, but they have yet to reply. Do yourself a favor and look elsewhere until they stabilize Groups.
If they ever contact me and resolve this issue, I will however most likely go back to it (maybe).

by Divatooms

I am usually not so negative about an app but this one really failed to meet my expectations. First off I took advantage off your half off special on various options, and I have had to restore them every time I have attempted to use Groups 👎🏼. Second I tried sending a couple of test texts and after not receiving a reply I found out the texts were not received 👎🏼. So I sent two emails requesting assistance and never received a reply (not even a auto response)👎🏼👎🏼👎🏼. After reading about Groups and seeing a recommendation in Groups Store I couldn’t wait to download Groups. However i was disappointed. I will not tell others not to try Groups because their experiences might be different from mine. I just wanted to express my opinion here with the buyer beware caveat. 😟

by ArmyRunnner04

I love the idea of Groups . And it is supposed to do exactly what I was hoping for. An easy solution for grouping my contacts and then easily texting different this app.

The good:
1. Other people don’t have to have Groups for it to work

2. Easy to Setup

The problems:
1. It looks like it was designed on Windows 95, seriously its time for a facelift (to be fair, this is just looks).

2. A recent update made the text of my messages white font on a white background, now I can’t read my messages.

3. If people aren’t already in this app it’s difficult to include them in a group message.

4. The free version has adds and in app purchases, one of the options is a $9.99 fee to add all paid features and remove adds. I paid it and still get adds and don’t have all the features. Even after I hit the “restore purchases” button Groups says purchases were restored but they’re not. I got ripped of my $9.99.

Over all it’s a good idea, I want a way to group my contacts easily, but still use texts to communicate, Groups sounded promising but failed.

by Carolina Cop

Outstanding program! Easy to set up and use. The only issues I've had with it is that sometime it deletes group members for some unknown reason. The other is that my this app go by names and cell numbers. Communication within the is by text. However, the recipients see only the name of the other group members. There should be a simple way to do that from within the program. Right now I have to individually type the entire list when anyone new joins. I've reported both issues but have yet to get any recommendations as to how to fix either.

by DeraldS

I can’t believe apple and Microsoft still don’t have the this app feature working well in the mobile email apps. I use Groups very much as I need to communicate with staff of 35 teacher for Sunday School and also group of church leadership of 13 and having these this app prebuilt and being able to send either text or email saves me so much time. I have been using app for a few years now and it has gotten better over the years and is still needed and preferred over apples convoluted way of creating a group.