Review: Try Dry App

11 December, 2025 Prescribing Pharmacist 0 Comments 2 categories

The ‘Try Dry’ app is from the Alcohol Change UK team behind the concept of ‘Dry January’ but works all year round to help you to monitor and cut back on your drinking. It is rated highly 4.7/5 on the App Store, where comments emphasise the benefits of helping the user to focus. There are a number of users who report glitches with the app, although these have not appeared on our testing of the app so far.

Key Features

Track alcohol-free days with a visual calendar using “teacup” icons.
Planned drinking option: log days where you drink intentionally but moderately, avoiding the binary “dry vs drank” approach.
Custom goals & missions: set personal challenges beyond Dry January.
Savings tracker: calculates money, calories, and alcohol units saved compared to baseline drinking.
Charts & analytics: view long-term trends in drinking habits.
Daily motivation: reminders and nudges to keep you on track.
Badges & rewards: gamified achievements to celebrate progress.

The Set Up

As with similar apps, it is not possible to use the app without an account. This is easy to do and takes just five minutes.

An important step as far as we are concerned is the detail you can go into regarding your ‘base line drinking’. This means the amount that you consume in a typical week. We all know that weeks can vary with the seasons and your situation, but an honest starting point is a great way to demonstrate savings as you start to cut back.

For this reason, we recommend that you start using the app well before January to obtain a pattern of existing alcohol consumption. Starting in December is not ideal, as this tends to be a month with more drinking opportunities than others.

Try Dry Dashboard — The easy to use Try Dry dashboard

The Dashboard

The at a glance view of the dashboard is highly motivational as it leads with the number of dry days achieved, the units of alcohol NOT drunk and the money/calories saved. The user can toggle this view to summarise the current week, month and year.

Calendar View

The calendar view page gives an excellent overview of progress made, highlighting drink free days compared to those what involved at least one drink. This view can be altered to show the number of units consumed on drinking days and even a wellbeing score, if entered. Clicking on any day will drill down into the detail of the number and type of drinks consumed plus the levels of alcohol that they contained.

Adding Data

Adding the information regarding the drinks consumed is straightforward and you can even mix your own drinks and save them under your own name in your favourites section.

The app distinguishes between drinks taken at home and those taken when out (so the pricing can be adjusted accordingly). This means that all it takes is a few clicks to record your drinking even if it was a big night out!