Ritualio
Everything you need about Ritualio.
Images, figures, quotes and the story behind the app — put together so you can use it straight away. If something is missing, just drop us a line.
“A child who dawdles is rarely being defiant. Usually they simply do not know what comes next, or how much time is left.”
Tino Volbracht, founder
How Ritualio came about
Tino Volbracht is an IT project manager. In software development there are two ways to get a team through the week. You can ask every day what everyone is working on. Or you agree once on what needs to be done by when, get everyone to sign up to it — and the team organises itself. The second way works better. It has just one prerequisite: everyone has to be able to see what is still open and how much time is left.
What struck him was that at home the first pattern is the norm — remind, ask, remind again. The prerequisite for the second way is simply missing there. Children cannot see which tasks are still open; and the whole morning is explained to them in clock times that many of them cannot yet read.
Ritualio makes both visible. The child sees their own steps and checks them off; a ring shows the remaining time as a picture rather than a number. That reverses the direction: instead of parents announcing every task, the child picks up the next one. Not so children function faster — so they can be more independent.
Short description in three lengths
Ready to use — whichever fits the space you have.
One sentence
Ritualio is an app in which children see and check off their own morning and bedtime routines — with a timer that even children who cannot yet read a clock understand.
One paragraph
Ritualio is a family app for fixed routines. Parents set up once what the morning or bedtime routine involves; the child sees their own steps in a child-friendly view, checks them off themselves, and can tell from a ring how much time is left. For completed routines they can collect coins and spend them in a shop the parents stock in advance — deliberately built around experiences rather than sweets. Coins are an option, not an obligation. Alongside the routines, the app includes a diary with its own PIN for the child, plus notes and a history view for parents. Ritualio contains no advertising and no analytics SDK, works offline, and stores data on servers in Germany. The app is free to use; an optional subscription lifts the limits.
What else the app does
One principle — making visible what is still open — applied at several points in the day.
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Routines for any time of day
Morning, evening, homework. Mornings are the most common entry point, not the limit.
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A digital reinforcement plan
The target behaviour becomes a routine; parents set what it is worth and can lower that later. The reward tiers sit in the shop they fill in advance, and individual coins can also be awarded by hand. It replaces the sticker chart on the fridge — with no therapeutic claim: Ritualio is not a medical device and makes no diagnoses.
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A diary that belongs to the child
With its own PIN and one mood per entry. The text is encrypted on the device before it reaches the server. Parents read along when the child reads out loud — not because the app lets them.
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Parent notes and history
Record what got in the way on a given day, and see later where things tend to break down. Patterns rather than grades; siblings are never compared.
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Trophies, streaks and photo puzzles
Progress becomes visible, and your own photos can be set as a reward.
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Several children, every device
Works offline and syncs automatically across a family’s devices.
Fact sheet
- Publisher
- Leobalo GmbH, Bensheim, Germany — Darmstadt District Court, HRB 97939
- Responsible
- Tino Volbracht, Managing Director
- Platforms
- iOS and Android, phone and tablet
- App languages
- German, English, Spanish, Danish
- Age range
- roughly 4 to 11 years
- Available since
- 7 June 2026
- Price
- Free to use. Optional premium subscription; the App Store and Google Play show the current price.
- Advertising and tracking
- No advertising. No analytics SDK in the app.
- Data storage
- Servers in Germany (Hetzner). Text from the children’s journal and daily notes is encrypted on the device before it reaches the server.
- Contact
- www.ritualio.de/en/support/
- Stores
- App Store Google Play
We do not currently publish user or revenue figures.
Images
Six screenshots at full resolution (1320 × 2868 px, without marketing text), plus app icon, wordmark and a portrait of the founder — all in the press kit.
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The child’s Today view
What is due today, how many coins there are, how long the streak has held.
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The countdown ring
Time remaining as a picture — readable without being able to tell the time.
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Coins with parental approval
Parents decide when something counts as done.
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The shop
Stocked by the parents in advance — experiences and having a say, not sweets.
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The parent area
Create routines, set schedules, manage several children.
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History and patterns
What it hangs on when certain days do not go well.
Free of charge for editorial coverage of Ritualio. Picture credit: Ritualio / Leobalo GmbH.
Quotes
Cleared for quotation, each from Tino Volbracht, founder of Ritualio.
“ A child who dawdles is rarely being defiant. Usually they simply do not know what comes next, or how much time is left. ”
“ On a project you can ask several times a day — or you make it visible once what has to be done and by when, and people pick up the task themselves. It is the same at home. Except that a child who cannot yet read a clock needs time as a picture, not as a number. ”
“ The research does not support the claim that rewards motivate children. What it does support is that clear routines take the argument out of the morning. That is why coins are an option here and not an obligation — the app works entirely without them. ”
“ An app that children use has no business carrying an analytics SDK or advertising. And our servers are in Germany. That is a decision, not a technical footnote — it costs money and earns us no data. ”
“ The diary has its own PIN, and the text is encrypted on the device before it reaches the server. We could only decrypt it using a spare key that we keep offline and separate from the server — and we use it solely when a family asks us to restore their entries. We would rather write it down exactly like that than talk about end-to-end encryption. ”
What we hold ourselves to
Ritualio operates in a field where a great deal is claimed and little is evidenced. So for every substantive statement we have written down what it rests on — and what the source does not support.
One example that works against us and stands there anyway: the research does not support the claim that rewards motivate children. What is evidenced is something else — that structured parenting programmes mainly change the behaviour of the parents and thereby reduce conflict. That is exactly what the app is built around.
The sources, with that context, are public on Why it works (in German).
What Ritualio is not
Not a diagnosis, not a therapy, and no substitute for talking to a teacher, paediatrician or counselling service. Ritualio makes everyday life visible and structured — the judgement stays with you and with professionals. All data is held on servers in Germany, without advertising and without being passed on.
Testing and questions
The app is free to use — you need nothing else to try it. For a test of the premium features we are happy to send you a redemption code for the App Store or Google Play.
For further screenshots, an interview or questions about data processing, the shortest route is the contact form. We usually reply the same working day.