Pocket Points: Student Rewards Reviews

When PocketPoints first came out I loved the idea, it’s great for students, it’s incentive to stay off your phone during class and you can use the rewards to save money because as a college student you are really on a budget. I really liked the system, the only thing I felt was lacking was the rewards but I figured that would get better with time. I stopped using it when I couldn’t spend my points on anything. I picked it back up after the update and I absolutely hate the goal change, it’s just a way to cheat you out of points. It also doesn’t really make sense because now you have to check your phone and tell it to keep going occasionally which defeats the purpose of getting you off your phone. The rewards increased in the number of places but they still haven’t gotten better. It’s just not worth spending a crap ton of points on 5% off someplace I wasn’t planning on going in the first place. This was originally targeted for students but now they are trying to broaden the spectrum of users, which is fine, but if you are catering to students and people of low income maybe have rewards that actually make sense to your demographic and are monetarily worth it. 5% a clothing store I can’t afford anyway isn’t really great.

I was loving PocketPoints and would have given it a 4-5 star rating if you would have asked me about it a few days ago. However, all of the sudden PocketPoints is no longer rewarding me points for the longer periods of time that I am off my phone. For example, yesterday I was off my phone for about 5 hours in total: 1 early in the day during a class, 2 at work, and another 2 in the evening. During all of those times when I locked me phone I had the notification that I was earning points. When I unlocked my phone, it was to my surprise that I actually had earned no points, though I had been off of my phone. I even tried setting a goal later in the evening and I got the notification on my screen that I finished my goal, but when I unlocked my phone there were no points. Very frustrated at PocketPoints. Great in concept, and it was great for a while, but very lacking in delivery. I’m tempted to give it a 2 star rating, but because I had a good experience at first I’m giving it a 3 star rating.

I would’ve given this five stars before but now it gets one star. The new update cheats you out of potential points with the fifty minute goal. I have two classes nearly three hours long and I don’t get rewarded for it like I would’ve before for having my phone locked for three hours consecutively because the fifty minute goal is so limiting in terms of points and you have to remember to reset it. I feel like the update was to appeal to businesses and in the end, capitalism, but the whole point is to help the student be less distracted so screw the update. I’m still going to use it because discounts are cool, but the new system doesn’t actually reward your actual effort anymore. If you haven’t gotten PocketPoints yet, I would reconsider and not do it, especially if you have longer classes or if you wouldn’t remember to reset it. Maybe try to find other ways for deals, and a lot of places gives you discounts right off the bat if they’re near your campus or if you have a student ID. It actually defeats the purpose because you’ll be distracted by the phone waiting for fifty minutes to pass rather than just locking it and forgetting it.

The original way to gain Pocket Points was more unique than other apps on the market. You’d have to be on campus and in PocketPoints , and based on how long you were in PocketPoints you got more points. That was great because no other app on the market was approaching it in that way. If you were to get out of class early, you’d only get a few points, but you’d still get something. Now, you have to set a specific time for how long you want to be off your phone. What if you have a 3 hour long night class and you get out an hour early? You can either lose the points you’ve been earning for the past two hours completely, or wait another hour not using your phone at all. It’s just like every other “stay off your phone” productivity app nowadays, and is nothing special. Also, PocketPoints won’t recognize when it’s being used. An example, I left my phone in PocketPoints for hours in the campus library working on a paper, only to find out it awarded me no points despite giving me the “congrats on earning points” notification. RIP Pocket Points, you are not what you once were.

I used to love PocketPoints to no end. I use it multiple times per week, and I used to always have the pocket points I needed when I needed them. Lately with this latest update, or perhaps a glitch in my version, the free points prizes are few and far between, I no longer get them for claiming my 10 unclaimed points, also sometimes I’ll get home and check my points after driving and there’s none. I don’t know what’s going on, but this week I had to pay for Chips and. Drink at subway, with money instead of points and I just don’t know why. I talked with some friends of mine at a dinner last night, and they’re still getting tons of points. I’m not sure if their version is different. I’m a full time student and work part time at the school and should be getting lots of points, but it’s gotten to where they’re super rare. Please bring the points back!

I don’t think I have earned points since any of the new updates (since PocketPoints started creating goals and adding ads at the beginning). I set a goal and when I pick up my phone after the allotted time it tells me I failed. Alternatively, when I’m on campus, open and lock PocketPoints , I have yet to see any points even after keeping it locked through an entire class period.

I keep PocketPoints only because I got a lot of points at the beginning so it’s worth my while to use the points but when they are gone they app serves no purpose.

It’s a great app for local businesses; I’ve returned to a number of restaurants I discovered only through pocket points. I tried the JcPenny deal and nothing in my cart was eligible for the discount and it doesn’t tell you what is eligible. The Target points were practically useless as well

As a university student, I thought the whole concept of PocketPoints was amazing and I was really excited to try out PocketPoints . However, most of the stores and restaurants PocketPoints gives rewards for aren't in my area or just aren't places I often go to so basically I'm currently just saving points for no reason because I have nothing to spend them on. I wish PocketPoints had a lot more places to spend your points for like common restaurants at campuses, for example. Us university students live on food. We study with snacks right next to us, we try to eat in campus to not waste gas or lose our good parking spot, and we're always hungry. Stress makes us hungry. I have nothing to spend the points on because the restaurants at my campus aren't included in PocketPoints like Panda Express, McDonalds, Burger King, Sushi Maki, etc.

I first downloaded pocket points when I was going to college and it was a great way to keep you engaged in class and stay off your phone. The rewards were pretty good and you could get discounts you couldn’t find else where. I stopped using it after I graduated but then I saw they’ve made it for everyone, not just students. While the concept behind everything is positive (reducing phone time), in my opinion, the rewards are wack! They’re not even unique to pocket points. You spend your points on discounts that you can find by easily googling for coupons. Or they’ll even make you spend points on deals that exist alone without using pocket points. For example, they had a Stila Cosmetics bogo for eye liner but when you go to the Stila website, they have the same deal and I don’t have to trade pocket points for it. Idk maybe the food discounts are better, but the retail store discounts aren’t that great.

PocketPoints is great! The concept is very helpful for students. I learned about this through a teacher who wanted us all to do it. I thought it was a great idea, because I have no problem with staying off my phone in class, and now I get rewarded for it. The problem is, once you earn a bunch of points, like I have, there is not enough places to spend it. I go to/use only one of all of these place (Moe’s), and I would definitely like to see that change. This game definitely targets stereotypical teenagers, because I haven’t even heard of half the stuff on there. In the end, they need to expand there quantity of stores by a bunch. If someone from development actually reads this, please try to add more free stuff and less discounts to things. Don’t add any more clothing stores. PLEASE!

PocketPoints could be great if it worked well at ALL TIMES and not certain circumstances. It only works well if you continuously use the 30 min goal. If you try to go higher, for example - 60 min, it will cut off on you and you don’t earn points. It sends a reminder to come back to PocketPoints only for the 30 min or less. It also doesn’t give you time to come back to PocketPoints if you go over 30 min. I don’t know if it’s their way of cheating people out of points or not, but I have lost like 20-30 points because PocketPoints wouldn’t stay active for the 60 min goal. I haven’t tried the class option yet. We’ll see how that works! This is really helpful for focusing, but they HAVE to fix this! It’s annoying to keep putting in 30 min goals when you want to focus for an hour or more. Excited for the new features coming!

I’ve been a frequent user of pocket points for the past few years and made a lot of use out of it. However, the new points earning system makes it extremely difficult to earn points now. Not only it’s gathering less points than before, when you set up the goal time, PocketPoints often refreshes and exits by itself, and when it happens PocketPoints indicates it as me exiting PocketPoints and therefore I end up losing the time I spent away from the phone. And there are no indications that this happened, so it takes me a while to realize I’ve lost all that time and points 🙄. This happened so many times now that theres no point and I’ve almost given up. If there’s any ways to fix this problem, please do, because otherwise it’s a great app.

I absolutely LOVE pocket points! I recommend it to all my peers. Multiple professors requested that we use it in their class at the start of the semester. I thought, “If the professors are requesting it then it has to be good.” It is. You earn points towards coupons for purchases such as restaurants or website purchases. I used PocketPoints almost every day up until these past few days where it automatically shuts off as soon as I open PocketPoints . Hopefully the developers will fix this glitch soon so I can used my earned points. Thank you for the great app.

I use to love PocketPoints but now I just feel like I’m getting cheated out of points and not earning what I deserve. The only way I earn points if through the goal setting and if I need to access my phone sooner for an emergency, I just wasted an hour of staying off it and no points rewarded. There’s not a lot of options for food places which I’m more interested in being a college student and all. The clothing brands on there being offered, way to expensive even after the discount. If you guys could offer more food places and deals for Walmart, target, hobby lobby, Ross, Kohl’s, tjmaxx, and other things like these. Imagine the great deal of more downloads you guys would get. I know I would definitely refer PocketPoints to more people and use it a lot more. I love PocketPoints because of the discounts on food, but it hasn’t been worth it lately. Thanks..

The new timer point system is the worst, it’s almost impossible to get any sort of reward now and isn’t even worth using anymore.
Edit: yeah.... it’s still the worst. They haven’t fixed anything.
Edit 2.0: re-download PocketPoints for the new semester hoping it would be better. They said they added a non timer version which they did, but it’s awful. If you’re by yourself trying to earn the max you can get per hour is 4.8 points which is absolutely useless. Most things on PocketPoints cost an absurd amount of points and would require me to be off my phone for a solid two weeks while on campus to get 2 dollars off an ice cream cone..... and when my phone is used for homework it kind of defeats the purpose of even trying. 1 Star is far to high of a rating for PocketPoints. Don’t waste your time using it.

When I first downloaded, it worked like a charm. I’d get the little notification telling me I was earning points and I’d be good to go. Now whenever I’m on campus or just trying to set a timer, I’ll open pocket points to the correct screen and press start or whatever. The green bar at the top appears telling me to lock my phone. Yet when I do, I get a notification to go back to PocketPoints so I don’t lose my points. When I open the back back up, it’ll always say I was locked for ___ seconds and earned like .02 points. What is the point of staying off your phone if I have to leave it on and tap it every minute or so to make sure it doesn’t stop giving me points? Right now my primary earner is the distracted driving. But I’d really like to know how to fix this?

As a college student I’m looking to try to get as many deals on as many things as I can get, it would be amazing if PocketPoints also had deals with places like bookstores and such that I can use to benefit my education in the long run and not just to get things that I like or don’t really need. Some more popular food places or grocery stores would be nice also. Students don’t really have much money to buy a whole lot of groceries so it would definitely be beneficial to your consumers if this feature was added. Other than that I think PocketPoints works great!

PocketPoints is great. Perfect for students or really anyone who feels they spend too much time on their phones. I would like to see it become easier to add people though. Using it in a class of over 100 and wish I could add them without having to get their phone number first. Would love to see connection established through accounts instead. Like if I could just click on their profile and send a friend invite or something. Other than that it’s absolutely fantastic.

I am very disappointed on this new update. I liked when we could just open PocketPoints and close it and get considered points without a set time to receive points. I think it’s super inconvenient because when I do set it; I would set it for the class but then class would get it early and so I would have to give up all the points. In addition, every time I do set, the application wouldn’t realize and I would check after hours of not using my phone and I wouldn’t be able to receive any points. That is super frustrating! However, what I do like is the driving setting as well as we can earn points being off campus too. I think if we could bring back those aspects it would make PocketPoints a lot better than it is now.

Overall, my experience with PocketPoints has been fairly good. It is a cool concept and actually works, allowing me to stay off my phone while competing with friends. However, two big complaints I have (hence only four stars) is the fact that PocketPoints logs my “distracted driving time” while I am just a passenger and reduces my total points. There also is little incentive as there are few rewards which are actually relevant to me (more food and trendier clothing shops would be nice) and it is difficult to find any rewards local to my area or while I’m out of town. Besides that, I think PocketPoints is based on a cool concept and executes it well.

I love the overall concept of PocketPoints and was super thrilled about it first, but when I looked at the rewards section I no longer wanted it. The rewards are mostly just discounts for stores I have never even heard of and there’s no way to earn actual money back, so I feel like I’m not really getting rewarded for being off my phone. What I thought was going to be a perfect app for me turned into one that I’m now deleting because I see no reason for it. If the rewards got better and I could actually earn points to use towards gift cards or some way to get money back (like in other apps similar to this), I’d get it in a heartbeat. Even if the rewards were discounts for popular restaurants or stores that I could actually shop at I’d be happier.