OurHome is gone. Your chore chart does not have to be.
OurHome was a genuinely good free app, and for years it was the answer to this question. It is no longer installable. Here is what replaced it, and how to move in an evening.
Last checked September 2026.
What we could verify
We checked this ourselves in September 2026 rather than repeating what other sites say:
- OurHome's own App Store link — the one still printed on their website — returns no app, in the US or the Australian store.
- The Google Play listing their website links to returns a 404.
- ourhomeapp.com does not answer on HTTPS at all. The marketing site is still reachable over plain HTTP, unchanged, which is what an abandoned site looks like rather than a closed one.
There has been no shutdown notice. The team went quiet, users have reported sign-in failures since 2023, and nobody turned the website off. If you are still logged in on an old phone, that is luck, not a supported product — and it will end the next time that phone is wiped.
It is worth being fair about why. OurHome charged nothing and showed no ads. There was no money in it, so eventually there were no developers. That is a real risk with free family software, and it is the reason Nido has a paid tier at all.
Side by side
| OurHome | Nido | |
|---|---|---|
| Available now | No. Delisted from both app stores. | iPhone, Android and any browser. |
| Price | Free, with no revenue model — which is how it ended. | Free for 2 kids and 10 chores; $4.99 / month for Premium. |
| Chores | Assigned, repeating, rotating, with adult approval. | Assigned and repeating, carried over when missed, skippable, with a parent view of what actually got done. |
| Rewards | Points towards allowance, screen time or goals. | Eggs banked per chore, spent on a rewards shelf you stock. No money handling. |
| Wall screen | None. A phone app only. | A kiosk link that opens on an old tablet and never logs out. |
| Calendar | Shared family calendar and events. | Its own family calendar, with 15 events a month on the free plan. Google Calendar can be merged in on top, colour-coded and read-only, but is not required. |
| Groceries and meals | Shared grocery lists. | Shopping lists, a recipe book, a weekly meal plan, and a cooking mode with tickable ingredients, doubling and timers that keeps the screen awake. |
OurHome details describe the app as it was, from its own site — which is still online. Checked September 2026.
Moving across in an evening
There is no import, because there is nothing left to import from. That sounds worse than it is — a chore list is twenty lines of text and most families are overdue a cull anyway.
- If you can still open OurHome anywhere, screenshot the chore list and the rewards list first.
- Create your household in Nido and add the children. Each one gets a name, a colour and an avatar.
- Add only the chores you actually enforce. Ten is plenty; the free plan allows that many active at once.
- Set what each chore is worth in eggs, then stock the rewards shelf with four or five things your children genuinely want.
- Open the kiosk link on a spare tablet and stand it in the kitchen. That step is the one that makes the rest stick.
Where Nido is not the answer
If what you liked about OurHome was that it paid a real allowance, Nido will disappoint you — it does not touch money at all. Eggs buy privileges you decide on, not dollars. A card-based app is a better fit for that. We say the same thing on our Greenlight comparison.
If your household runs on iCloud or Outlook, know what you are getting: Nido has its own calendar, so you can add events directly and never connect anything — but Google is the only outside service it syncs from today, so an iCloud family will be typing events in twice.
And if you want to see the whole category before committing again, that is the sensible instinct after being burned once. We reviewed eight of them, including ours.
Questions people ask
- Is OurHome shut down?
- The company has never announced a shutdown, but as of September 2026 the app is not listed on the US or Australian App Store, its Google Play page returns a 404, and ourhomeapp.com no longer answers over HTTPS. Families have been reporting sign-in failures since 2023. Whatever the official status, it is not a product you should start a family on now.
- Can I export my data out of OurHome?
- We could not find a working export, and we cannot sign in to check. If you still have a device with the app installed and logged in, screenshot your chore lists and reward lists before you change anything — that is realistically the only copy you are going to get.
- Is Nido free like OurHome was?
- There is a free plan — 2 kids and 10 active chores, no ads, no card — and it includes the chore board, the rewards, the calendar and the kitchen screen. Nido Premium is $4.99 / month for unlimited kids and chores. OurHome was free with no revenue at all, which is part of why it is gone.
- Does Nido do points and rewards the way OurHome did?
- Close. Chores pay eggs, children bank them, and they spend them on a rewards shelf you stock yourself — screen time, choosing the film, a later bedtime. OurHome's points often paid a cash allowance; Nido does not handle money at all.
- How long does it take to set up?
- About twenty minutes for a family of four: add the kids, add the chores you actually enforce, put four or five rewards on the shelf. The chores repeat on their own after that.
Try it on the tablet in your drawer.
Free for 2 kids and 10 chores, no credit card, nothing to deliver.
Build your nest — free