NixringTruecaller alternative for iPhone that never asks for contacts
These two apps are not competing for the same job. One identifies callers from a shared database. The other refuses to build one. This page says where each of them wins.
Nixring is free to download. iOS 17.0 or later.
Side by side
What each app is built to do
| Truecaller | Nixring | |
|---|---|---|
| Names an unknown caller | Yes, from its database | No, and it never will |
| Size of the spam database | Very large, crowdsourced | 80 numbers plus your own |
| Search a number you were called from | Yes | No |
| Needs a server lookup | Yes, that is the product | No, matching is on the phone |
| App Store rating | 4.4 from 252,000 ratings | 5.0 from 2 ratings |
| Privacy label lists contacts | Yes, contact info linked to you | No |
| Privacy label lists location | Yes | No |
| Privacy label lists tracking | Yes | Yes in the free version, none in Pro |
| Paid tier | 9.99 USD per month or 74.99 USD per year | 4.99 USD per week or 29.99 USD per year |
Two ratings is two ratings. Nixring's 5.0 comes from 2 people. It carries no statistical weight next to a quarter of a million ratings, and it is listed above only so the row is complete. Judge the app on what it does, not on that number.
Where Truecaller is the better tool
If you need to know who called, use Truecaller
A recruiter, a courier, a clinic calling from a number you have never seen. Truecaller puts a name on the screen. That single feature is worth more to a lot of people than anything on this site, and Nixring has no answer to it.
Truecaller also has the far larger spam database, so it will catch numbers Nixring has never heard of. Its rating and review count reflect years of that working for a very large number of people.
The mechanism that makes it possible is also the trade. To name a caller, the number has to travel to a server that holds the database. To have a database, the service needs a supply of reported numbers and identities. Both of those are visible on its App Store privacy label, which lists contact info, location, search history and usage data collected and linked to you.
Where Nixring is the better tool
If you would rather not be part of a database
Nixring hands iOS a list of numbers and stops there. The extension is started to publish the list, gets no callback when a call arrives, and has nothing to report to anybody. It never asks for access to your contacts, and the app contains no code that reads the address book.
Its own privacy label is not blank, and pretending otherwise would be dishonest: the free version carries Google advertising, so identifiers and usage data are listed as used for tracking. Nixring Pro removes the advertising. What is absent from the label in both cases is contacts, location and message content, because none of it is ever requested.
You pay for that with coverage. Read what the free tier actually blocks before you switch anything over.
A smaller list, and nothing about you leaves the phone.
Questions
Frequently asked
Is Nixring a good Truecaller alternative?
Only if you want a different thing. Truecaller answers the question who is calling me. Nixring answers the question stop this number from ringing. If naming an unknown caller matters to you, Truecaller does that and Nixring cannot.
Does Truecaller upload my contacts?
Truecaller states that your phonebook is never made searchable or public. Separately, its App Store privacy label lists contact info, location, search history and usage data as collected and linked to you, for purposes including analytics, advertising and personalisation. Read the label on the App Store page and the current privacy policy and decide for yourself.
What does Nixring collect?
The free version loads advertising from Google, and its App Store privacy label lists identifiers and usage data used to track you across other apps as a result. Nixring Pro removes the advertising. In both versions the label lists no contacts, no location and no user content, because the app never asks for any of it.
Which one blocks more spam calls?
Truecaller, by a wide margin, because it works from a database built from a very large user base. Nixring ships with 80 numbers and grows from what you add. If raw coverage is the only thing you care about, Nixring is the weaker choice.
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