Natural Cycles vs Periodical: catalog facts
 Natural Cycles |  Periodical |
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Best for: People looking for hormone-free birth control or fertility tracking |
Best for: Android users who want a private, open-source period calendar |
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Paid Subscription service; prices are not listed on the homepage. |
Free Free and open source under the GPL-3.0-or-later licence. |
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Android, iOS |
Android |
- FDA-cleared as a birth control app
- Covers contraception, pregnancy planning, postpartum and perimenopause
All 3 strengths for Natural Cycles- FDA-cleared as a birth control app
- Covers contraception, pregnancy planning, postpartum and perimenopause
- Works with an overnight band and other compatible devices
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- Calculates fertile days and tracks symptoms and notes
- Backup to a single compressed file on local storage
All 4 strengths for Periodical- Calculates fertile days and tracks symptoms and notes
- Backup to a single compressed file on local storage
- Available from F-Droid, Google Play or as an APK
- Translated through a community Crowdin project
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- Less effective than an IUD, with 93% typical-use effectiveness
- Requires regular temperature or biomarker measurements
All 3 limitations for Natural Cycles- Less effective than an IUD, with 93% typical-use effectiveness
- Requires regular temperature or biomarker measurements
- Pricing not listed on the homepage
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- Calendar method is not reliable for contraception
- Simple feature set compared with commercial cycle trackers
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Downloadable app |
Downloadable app |
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Not open source |
Open source |
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License not stated |
License: GPL-3.0-or-later |
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Account needed |
Not stated if an account is needed |
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Not stated if it works offline |
Not stated if it works offline |
Sources for Natural CyclesCatalog checked September 24, 2026 |
Sources for PeriodicalCatalog checked October 2, 2026 |
“Not stated” means we have not confirmed it. Features can vary by device and plan.
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