Feeling Great
Feeling Great is a US-only mobile app for mental wellness pairing an AI chatbot with interactive video lessons built on psychiatrist David Burns's T.E.A.M. cognitive behavioral method. It is self-help, not clinical care, and is restricted to adults.
What is Feeling Great?
Feeling Great is a mental wellness app published by Feeling Great Corporation, a San Francisco company co-founded by David Burns, MD, the psychiatrist behind Feeling Good, a book the site describes as the one most recommended by therapists, with seven million copies sold, and behind the Feeling Good podcast credited with more than nine million downloads. The app is built on his T.E.A.M. method, a variant of cognitive behavioral therapy he developed over forty years of practice and more than fifty scientific publications.
The product has two halves. The first is a conversational AI chatbot: the user brings up something that is upsetting them, the chatbot takes time to understand why it hurts, then helps challenge the thought feeding the distress. The second is a course of interactive lessons and exercises, video included, that teach the underlying techniques rather than simply applying them. A settings screen completes the three-part navigation. A CBT self-help chatbot also runs over SMS, described in the terms and the privacy policy, though no number is published on the site.
The positioning is unusually explicit, and it cuts against the marketing. The homepage promises a marked reduction in depression, anxiety and hopelessness in around two hours, while the terms of use state in capitals that the service provides no medical, psychological or clinical advice, creates no patient-practitioner relationship and is not designed for emergencies. Every page carries a footer directing users to 911, to 988 for suicidal thoughts, and to a qualified health provider.
Distribution is narrow: iOS and Android only, no web or desktop version, no API, English only, and the United States only. Users must be 18. The first iOS release dates from 14 May 2024 and version 1.57.5 shipped on 4 June 2026, so the app is actively maintained. It rates 4.52 out of 5 across 206 App Store reviews and 4.3 across 76 Play Store reviews. The chatbot relies on third-party AI providers, with OpenAI named in the terms and Anthropic named for the SMS service.
What it does
- Talk through a specific upsetting thought with an AI chatbot that questions it and helps reframe it
- Work through interactive lessons and exercises teaching David Burns's T.E.A.M. techniques
- Target the feelings the publisher names: depression, anxiety, guilt, shame, inadequacy, loneliness, hopelessness and anger
- Continue the same CBT self-help conversation over SMS text messaging
- Set the audio and video playback speed to your own learning pace
- Delete your account and every associated record yourself from the settings screen
- Manage, upgrade or cancel the subscription through the App Store or Google Play
When to use Feeling Great / When not to
A quick filter to help you decide if Feeling Great is the right fit.
When to use Feeling Great
- Adults in the United States who want to work on negative thoughts, anxiety or low mood on their own
- Readers of David Burns's Feeling Good or listeners of the Feeling Good podcast who want a guided way to practice the techniques
- Therapists, counselors and social workers looking for a structured CBT homework tool to suggest to adult clients
- People who prefer short, repeatable sessions on a phone over scheduled appointments
- Users comfortable with an English-only, smartphone-only product bought through an app store
When not to use Feeling Great
- Anyone outside the United States, where the app is simply not distributed
- Anyone under 18, barred by both the terms of use and the privacy policy
- People in crisis or having suicidal thoughts, whom the publisher redirects to 911 and 988
- Anyone seeking medical, psychological or clinical advice, which the terms explicitly exclude
- Users who need their conversations kept out of model training, or who want a web app, an API or a team deployment
How to use Feeling Great
A typical end-to-end flow, from setup to results.
- Check that you are in the United States, are 18 or over, and have an iPhone on iOS 15.1 or later or an Android phone
- Download the app from the App Store or Google Play, or scan the QR code shown on the site
- Create an account with your email address and a password, then confirm the password and tap Create account
- Note that your account ID is the email address you signed up with; use Get a reset link on the login screen if you forget your password
- From the home screen, tap Let's chat to open the AI chatbot and bring up whatever is bothering you
- Close a chatbot session with the cross in the top right corner when you are done
- From the home screen, tap Start learning, Next lesson or See all to open the interactive lessons
- Open the gear icon in the top right corner to edit your profile or change media playback speed
- Start the 7-day free trial of the annual subscription when you want full access to the lessons and the chatbot
- Cancel or request a refund through your App Store or Google Play account, or delete the account entirely from the settings screen
Pros & Cons
Pros
- Method tied to a named author and a public body of work rather than an anonymous wellness recipe
- Safety warnings are prominent and repeated: an emergency banner on every page and detailed medical disclaimers in the terms
- Real free access before paying: part of the chatbot and several lessons are free with no time limit, plus a 7-day trial
- Account and data deletion can be done alone from the settings, without emailing support
- Name and email address are encrypted in the database according to the FAQ
- Low paid entry point for the category, at USD 9.99 per month
- High and substantial store ratings, and an app still actively updated in mid-2026
Cons
- Available in the United States only, in English only, on mobile only, with no API and no web version
- The terms grant a perpetual, irrevocable license to use inputs and outputs for model training, with no opt-out documented
- Data is shared with third-party advertising partners and Do Not Track signals are ignored
- No price is published on the site: you have to open the App Store or Play Store listing to learn what it costs
- No data processing agreement, no subprocessor list, no GDPR or HIPAA mention of any kind
- The terms and the privacy policy are both dated 29 March 2024 yet contain a later SMS section, so the stated date is unreliable
- The public site is thin and partly broken: the footer Blog link returns 401 and the blog posts listed in the sitemap are lorem ipsum placeholders
Pricing & Plans
A permanent free tier is available and gives partial access to the AI chatbot and to several interactive lessons, with no time limit. Full access requires a paid subscription, preceded by a 7-day free trial on the annual plan. The lowest paid entry point is USD 9.99 per month, and the annual plan is USD 99.99. No amount is published on feelinggreat.com: these figures come from the publisher's own App Store and Google Play listings. Subscriptions renew automatically at the then-current rate, and fees are stated to be non-refundable except through the app store procedures.
- partial access to the AI chatbot and to several interactive lessons
- no time limit
- USD 9.99 per month
- full access
- automatic renewal
- USD 99.99 per year
- full access
- 7-day free trial
- automatic renewal
Data, GDPR & hosting
A consolidated view of how Feeling Great handles your data.
GDPR overview
There is no GDPR implementation to report. Across every page collected, from the homepage and FAQ to the terms of use, the privacy policy and the contact page, the words GDPR, EEA, European Union and Article 27 representative never appear, and neither does HIPAA. The framework is entirely American: California law governs the terms, disputes go to JAMS arbitration, and the privacy policy cites section 1789.3 of the California Civil Code. No data processing agreement is published, no subprocessor list is maintained and no data protection officer is named. The rights actually described are profile access and update, marketing unsubscribe, cookie and advertising controls, and full account deletion from the app settings. This is consistent with a product sold in the United States only, but readers should treat the silence as an absence of commitment, not as an implicit claim of compliance.
Who owns the data?
Feeling Great Corporation does not claim ownership of what users write, nor of the chatbot's replies: sections 3.2 and 4.3 of the terms say so plainly. Ownership, however, is not the operative question here. Users grant the company a non-exclusive, irrevocable, perpetual, worldwide, royalty-free, transferable and multi-tier sublicensable license over their inputs and outputs, covering the training, development and improvement of its models and those of its affiliates, as well as marketing and promotional use. Everything else, meaning the app, the lessons, the videos and the interface, belongs outright to Feeling Great and its suppliers, and users acquire no title to any of it.
Reuse rights
The user receives a limited, non-exclusive, non-transferable, revocable license to install and run the app on a single device for personal or internal business purposes, and nothing beyond that. Chatbot outputs can be reused freely for personal purposes, since the publisher claims no ownership over them, but the app's own material, lessons and videos may not be copied, redistributed, resold, adapted or used to build a competing service. On the vendor's side, personal information is used to operate and personalize the service, for research and development including building and running algorithms and models, for direct marketing and for third-party interest-based advertising, and to create aggregated or de-identified data that may be shared with third parties. The privacy policy names OpenAI for the chatbot, Anthropic and Twilio for the SMS service, Stripe for payments and Google Analytics for measurement. Do Not Track signals are not honored, and testimonials may be reused in marketing material.
Data retention & training
Hosting summary
No hosting country or region is declared anywhere. The privacy policy states only that the company is headquartered in the United States, that it may use service providers operating in other countries, and that personal information may be transferred to the United States or to other locations where privacy laws may be less protective. That is a transfer statement, not a hosting commitment, so no jurisdiction can be recorded with confidence. There is no trust or security page, no certification displayed, no SOC 2 or ISO claim, no data processing agreement and no subprocessor list. Security is described in general terms: technical, organizational and physical safeguards, with an explicit statement that security cannot be guaranteed. Two concrete elements do stand out: the FAQ states that the user's name and account email address are encrypted and unreadable in the database and in all its replications and reports, and the Google Play listing declares that data is encrypted in transit and that deletion can be requested.
Where Feeling Great works
Country-level availability.
Available in
Not available in
Things to keep in mind
Risks and trade-offs to weigh before adopting Feeling Great.
- Wellness product, not care: the terms exclude all medical, psychological and clinical advice, and the app is not designed for emergencies
- Everything typed into the chatbot is covered by a perpetual, irrevocable, sublicensable license that explicitly includes model training, with no opt-out
- The data involved is intimate by nature: moods, thoughts, feelings and health-related derived data, per the privacy policy's own categories
- Third-party AI providers sit in the loop, so private conversations transit systems the publisher does not own
- Personal data is shared with advertising partners for interest-based advertising, and Do Not Track signals are ignored
- Subscriptions renew automatically, fees are non-refundable outside app store procedures, and the publisher may change prices unilaterally
- Relying on a chatbot for emotional regulation can crowd out human support: the app is a supplement, and treating it as a replacement is the main misuse risk
Setup & Integrations
Technical difficulty
Minimal. There is nothing to configure, no API key, no integration and no web setup. You download the app from the App Store or Google Play, create an account with an email address and a password, and start using it. The real barriers are not technical but contractual and geographic: you need a US app store account, an iPhone running iOS 15.1 or later or an Android phone, and you must be 18 or over. The iOS build weighs 42.9 MB. Anyone able to install an app can be running the first chatbot session within a few minutes.
Deployment
Apps stores
Supported languages
Behind Feeling Great
Fundraising
Social
Resources
All the official URLs gathered for verification and reference.
Frequently asked questions
What exactly is the Feeling Great app?
Is it therapy, or a medical device?
Where can I use it?
What does it cost?
Are my conversations used to train AI models?
Who else sees my data?
How old do I have to be?
How do I delete my account and my data?
Is there a web version or an API?
How do I contact support?
Should you pick Feeling Great?
Feeling Great is a deliberately narrow product: one country, one language, one channel and one job. That focus is a strength. The method has a named author, a public bibliography and forty years of practice behind it, which is rare in a category crowded with anonymous wellness chatbots, and the publisher is unusually careful about what it is not. The emergency banner on every page and the blunt disclaimers in the terms show a company that has thought about the risk of being mistaken for care. The free tier is real rather than decorative, account deletion is self-service, and USD 9.99 per month is a modest entry point.
The counterpart is significant and deserves a clear head before signing up. The terms grant a perpetual, irrevocable, worldwide and sublicensable license over everything typed into the chatbot, explicitly including model training, with no opt-out documented anywhere. What gets typed into this particular app is intimate by design: moods, thoughts, private distress. Data is also shared with advertising partners, and Do Not Track is ignored.
The public site is the weakest part of the package. There is no pricing page, no product page and no company page; the footer blog link returns an error and the blog posts in the sitemap are placeholder text. Legal documents dated March 2024 contain a later SMS section, so their stated date cannot be trusted. Nothing here suggests bad faith, but a prospective user has to leave the site to find out what the app costs. For an American adult who already knows Burns's work and accepts the data bargain, it is a serious and well-maintained tool. For anyone else, the restrictions decide it.
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