where your list actually lives
A cleaning app that does not lose your list
short answer
Nudge keeps your rooms, tasks and completion history in your account on the server, not only on the phone. Delete the app, replace the phone, sign back in with the same account, and the list is there. A task ticked off without signal is stored and retried rather than dropped, and a Scan My Mess list waits on your phone for a day if you leave the app mid-clean. One thing clears your data, and it asks first: Delete account. Restarting setup from Settings keeps your rooms and tasks.
Setting up every room, every task and every due date — and then finding the app has reverted to its own default list — is the complaint that appears again and again across this whole category of app. It is worth knowing how any app you are considering handles this, including this one.
Built from the can't-start problem, not a perfect-home ideal
I build Nudge alone, and I live with executive dysfunction. I designed it around one tiny action, changing capacity, and restarting without a missed-day penalty—the cleaning support I wanted to use myself.
Why this happens to people so often
An app that stores everything on the device is simpler to build and does not need you to make an account, which feels like a courtesy right up until the moment the data is gone. Reinstall it, restore a phone from a backup that did not include app data, or get signed out by an update, and there is nothing anywhere to restore from.
The cost lands hardest in exactly this category, because the setup is the work. An hour of entering rooms, tasks, due dates and who does what is a real hour, spent by someone who found that hour difficult to start in the first place. Losing it does not just cost the data. It generally costs the habit too.
Five things to check in any app before you invest an hour in it
- Does it require an account? If the app never asked you to sign in, the data is almost certainly on the device alone, and a reinstall takes it with it.
- Can you sign in on a second device and see the same list? That is the only real proof the data lives somewhere other than the phone in your hand.
- What happens to a task you tick off with no signal — is it queued, or quietly dropped?
- Does anything in the app delete in bulk, and does it say so before it does it?
- Is there an export, or a way to see your history at all?
The second one is the only test that really settles it. An app can sync and still lose things, but an app that cannot show you the same list on a second device was never storing it anywhere but the phone.
How Nudge answers each of those
Nudge asks you to create an account during setup — with an email, or Sign in with Apple, or Google. That step is the reason the rest of this page can be true. Your rooms, your tasks and every completion are stored against that account, so signing in somewhere else brings them with you.
A completion that cannot reach the server is kept on the device and retried, rather than being dropped on the floor. This is not a full offline mode and Nudge does not pretend to be one: most of the app expects a connection. But finishing something and watching it vanish is a specific harm worth engineering against, so it has been.
Nothing in your rooms or tasks expires. There is no cleanup of old tasks, no archiving after a quiet month, and no penalty state that removes anything. The one thing with a clock is an unfinished Scan My Mess list: if you leave the app mid-clean, it waits on your phone for a day so you can pick it up again. One action clears your data, and it stops and asks first: Delete account, whose confirmation says it is permanent and cannot be undone.
Restart onboarding in Settings used to clear your rooms and tasks too. It no longer does. Its row now reads “walk through setup again; rooms & tasks stay”, and the new setup only adds the rooms and tasks that are missing.
The list is in your account, not on one phone
Nudge is a subscription for iPhone, billed only through the App Store. Weekly is $2.99 with no trial. Monthly is $6.99 and Annual is $49.99, and both include a 7-day free trial for eligible new subscribers.
If it already happened somewhere else
There is usually no way to recover a list from an app that only ever held it on the device, which is a miserable answer but the honest one. What is worth doing before you rebuild it anywhere is checking whether the new app passes the second test above.
If you are also leaving a subscription behind, the guides for cancelling Inflow and cancelling Tiimo cover where each of them actually bills you.
Questions
Where does Nudge store my rooms and tasks?
In your Nudge account, on the server, not only on the phone. Rooms, tasks and your completion history are all tied to the account you signed in with, which is why Nudge asks you to make one during setup.
If I delete the app and reinstall it, is my list still there?
Yes, as long as you sign back in with the same account — the same email, or the same Sign in with Apple or Google identity you used originally. The list is fetched from your account, not rebuilt from the device.
What if I get a new iPhone?
Install Nudge and sign in with the same account. Your rooms, tasks and history come with you. Nothing needs to be exported or transferred by hand.
What happens if I tick something off with no signal?
A completion that cannot reach the server is stored on the device and retried later rather than thrown away. Since version 1.3.5 a dropped connection also gets a quick second try straight away, so a short blip still counts the day. It is not a full offline mode — Nudge expects a connection for most things — but a finished task is not silently lost because the lift had no bars.
What if I leave the app halfway through Scan My Mess?
The list waits. Since version 1.3.5 a scan in progress, with its pins, ticks and photo, is kept on your phone; open Scan My Mess again within a day and it asks whether to pick up where you left off. After a day, or once you finish, close the scan or start a new one, that list is let go. Your rooms and tasks are not affected either way.
Is there anything that does clear my rooms and tasks?
One thing, and it asks you to confirm first: Delete account, which warns that it permanently deletes your account and all data and cannot be undone. Restart onboarding in Settings no longer clears your rooms or tasks: its row reads "walk through setup again; rooms & tasks stay", its confirmation says "Your rooms and tasks stay where they are", and the new setup only adds rooms and tasks that are missing and never deletes any. Nothing else removes them in bulk, and nothing expires on its own.
Does a bad week delete anything?
No. Nothing is deleted, nothing expires, and no task is removed for being old. The streak on the showing-up page may start again from one, but Mochi's Place keeps every room you have filled in, and a missed week takes none of them away.
How we checked, and when
Nudge's own storage behaviour, account requirement and the wording of both confirmation prompts was read on 2026-09-15 from the company's own website or its current App Store listing. Both confirmations, what happens with no signal or a half-finished scan, and what a missed week does to the streak were checked again against Nudge 1.3.5 on 2026-10-13. Apps change their prices, their billing providers and their cancellation flows. Confirm anything that matters to you before you subscribe or cancel, and tell us if something here is out of date: support.
Nudge organizes cleaning tasks; it does not diagnose or treat ADHD.