Repeat a timer or chain several with Risetime on Android

A sequence of timers

Risetime is a clock app for Android: alarms at a fixed time or following the sun, and timers that repeat and chain. No ads ever and completely offline.

Add a second timer to a timer and the two become a sequence: when the first reaches zero, the next one starts on its own. Twenty-five minutes, then five. Ten minutes to brown, twenty to simmer. Forty seconds, then twenty. A sequence holds as many timers as you like.

You build a sequence while it is stopped: timers are added and removed only when nothing in it is running, so it never changes shape under your hands.

The bar under the row has one segment per timer, sized to its duration, with a dot where each one will ring. Folded, the row shows only the timer that is running, and where it stands: 1:12 / 10:00 [1/2] is the first of two timers, one minute twelve into ten.

Next, or done: an intermediate ring and the full ring

This is the part your phone’s clock app does not do. A timer that hands over to another one gives an intermediate ring: once, quietly, as a notification. No ringing screen in the middle of what you are doing. Only the end gives the full ring, with the ringing screen, like an alarm: the end of a single timer, or of the last timer of a sequence.

Each sequence decides how it ends. Leave Ring as it is, or tick Intermediate ring at the end and the sequence closes as quietly as it went: the end gives an intermediate ring instead of the ringing screen. Tick Add a ring at the start and it gives one more intermediate ring the moment you press play, so you hear it begin.

And the arithmetic holds. Skip a ringing timer and the next one counts from when the previous one was due, not from when you tapped: twenty-five plus five is thirty minutes, never thirty and a few seconds.

Skip, go back, add time

A sequence carries previous and next buttons, even when it is stopped: there they only choose where it will start. While a timer rings, previous starts it over and next moves straight on. You can also jump to any timer by touching its duration.

Need a few more minutes? The add-time button extends the timer that is running or ringing, without stopping it. The added time shows as a dotted stretch at the end of its segment.

A single timer never shows previous and next: they belong to sequences.

How do I make a timer repeat?

Loop says how many times the sequence runs: 1, the default, plays it once; a number from 2 to 99 plays that many rounds; ∞ starts it over until you stop it. A single timer can loop too, and becomes a bell at a steady interval that never needs a tap.

Folded, a looping row starts with its round: [↻5] 4:00 / 10:00 [1/2] is round five, in the first timer. A sequence that loops for good shows [↻] alone. While it runs you can add rounds, never remove the one you are in.

Rounds stay anchored to when each timer was due, so the rhythm never drifts. Going from one round to the next is a handover like any other: one intermediate ring, never two. A loop ends on Stop, on the notification that rings at each handover.

And the ordinary countdowns

The rest is what a clock app’s timer already does. Tap the plus and you get a full-screen keypad rather than a dial: type the digits and they fill from the right, the way a microwave does. Four, zero, zero gives you four minutes, and six digits take you up to 99 hours. Start it right away, or add it without starting.

Timers run in parallel: several sequences at once, looping or not. The list is sorted by duration, or newest first, as you choose in Settings. A row counts up or counts down, as you prefer; a countdown reads -3:00 / 12:00, three minutes left of twelve, and the running Pomodoro above counts up instead.

The app reopens on the tab you left, Alarms or Timers.

The notification counts on its own

The countdown in your notification shade is drawn by Android itself rather than repainted by the app. It keeps ticking with no Risetime process alive at all, and it shows the same timer as the row, with the same buttons.

Swiping that card away stops nothing: it comes straight back from live state, and a ringing timer keeps ringing. Stopping is always a deliberate button.

Its own sounds

Timers do not borrow your alarms’ settings. Settings › Timers holds two profiles, Ring and Intermediate ring, each with its own sound, volume and ring length. The ring lasts 1, 5, 10, 15, 20 or 25 minutes, or until you stop it, with an optional fade-in; an intermediate ring lasts 5 to 120 seconds, five by default.

A sequence can pick its own sounds, one for its intermediate ring and one for its ring, the way an alarm picks its own: a soft bell for one, something louder for another. Or it follows Settings. If a sound you picked goes missing, the timer falls back to the one in Settings, then to the phone’s: it never rings silent.

No audio ships with the app: the sounds are your system’s, or a file of your own.

What people set up

• Work and focus with Pomodoro: twenty-five minutes, five minutes, looped. The Pomodoro technique, without an app built around it
• Interval training: forty seconds on, twenty off, eight rounds. Work, rest and rounds, set once
• Meditation bells: a bell to settle in, to begin, to ease off and to close the sit. Bells for a sitting practice
• Cooking in stages: ten minutes to brown, twenty to simmer, one full ring when it’s done. Three dishes at once are three timers, side by side.
• A bell at a steady interval: a single timer set to ∞, with an intermediate ring every fifteen minutes, with nothing to dismiss.

Works offline, on your phone

Risetime runs entirely on your phone. It has no account, no cloud, no ads and no analytics, and it has no internet permission at all, so the operating system itself keeps it offline. Privacy policy

Setting one up

Open the Timers tab, tap the plus, type the duration. To make a sequence, open the row and add a timer to it. Loop, the ring options and the sounds sit in the same opened row. The alarms guide covers the alarms, which share the same reliability settings.

What it costs

Risetime is free for up to three alarms and three timers – for good. Need more? Use those three first, and see if it's worth your support: supporters get unlimited alarms and timers, yearly or once. If not, I'll be happy to hear you out.