Choosing between FamilyDash and Cozi.

Yes — FamilyDash covers the same core ground as Cozi (shared calendar, shopping list, meal planner, recipes, family-wide visibility) but adds a real chore-tracking system with rotation and streaks, allowance tied to chores, kid PIN logins, recipe scanning from photos, and one-tap Instacart grocery checkout. It's also designed for fridge-mounted tablets first.

Cozi has two paid tiers. Gold is $39/year and removes ads while adding calendar search, month view on mobile, a birthday tracker, and up to three reminders per appointment. Max is $79/year and adds AI Event Import (emails into events), an AI recipe creator, and an AI meal planner. FamilyDash Pro is $34.99/year (or $4.99/month) — one tier, no ads at any level — and unlocks unlimited calendar connections, up to three reminders per event sent to everyone assigned, AI email-to-calendar, schedule-photo scanning, recipe scanning from photos and TikTok, the auto-fill meal planner, and the allowance ledger. The FamilyDash free tier includes unlimited kids, push notifications with one reminder per event, chores, the meal planner, one-tap Instacart checkout, one connected calendar, calendar search, and a shareable family calendar link.

Yes, and it's free. FamilyDash searches event titles, descriptions and locations across every calendar you've connected — events you typed in, events from a subscribed Apple/Google/Outlook or school ICS feed, events imported from a forwarded email, and events pulled off a photo of a schedule. Results are split into upcoming and earlier, so 'dentist' answers both when the next one is and when the last one was. Cozi also has calendar search, but only on Cozi Gold ($39.99/year).

No. Cozi Max ($79/year) can import events from an email, but no Cozi tier reads a photo, flyer or PDF. FamilyDash Pro does: photograph a season roster, a school calendar or a practice sheet, and it extracts every date into a list you confirm before anything is added.

Cozi has a generic to-do list that some families repurpose for chores, but no dedicated chore engine — no rotation between kids, no streak tracking, and no allowance integration. FamilyDash was built around chores from day one.

Cozi doesn't offer a direct export, but you can re-add a calendar feed (Apple/Google/Outlook ICS — your first one's free, unlimited on Pro) in seconds, and the chore/grocery tools take a few minutes to set up. Most families who switch end up cleaner after the move because the new setup matches their current routine, not last year's.

FamilyDash is designed for it: full-screen kiosk layout, big touch targets, and a kid view that works without a parent's account. Cozi runs as an app on a tablet but isn't optimized for always-on fridge use.

Cozi has chore lists and premade checklists you can adapt for a school-day routine, but not a time-of-day routine board — no icon-first checklist that switches itself from morning to after school to bedtime, and no streaks. FamilyDash routine charts are a picture checklist per person for morning, after school, and bedtime: big icons instead of words so they work before a child can read, tapped one step at a time, with a progress ring and a streak for consecutive days finished. Open the board full-screen and a tablet on the fridge becomes the routine board. They're free on every plan, grown-ups can have one too, and no money is attached — the streak is the reward, while chores are where allowance lives.