How to use Hamdam
Every feature in the app, what it is for, and where to turn it on. Written for the moment you are looking at a screen and cannot find the switch.
Checked against Hamdam 2.1, 3 October 2026.
Start here
What Hamdam is, and the first few minutes with it.
- What Hamdam is, and how it is laid outA tour of the five tabs, so you know where everything lives before you go looking for it.
- Setting Hamdam up the first timeWhat the opening questions are for, which ones you can skip, and how to change any answer later.
- Your first week of PlusEvery new install has all of Hamdam Plus for seven days, given by the app, with nothing to start and nothing to cancel.
Ask Hamdam
New in Hamdam 2.1: ask about your own reflections, family and week, and get an answer made on your device.
- Ask HamdamHamdam PlusA bar above the tabs for questions about your own reflections, family stories and week, answered on your device, and how to use it.
- Ask Hamdam on your device: the model and its downloadHamdam PlusHow Ask answers in English and in Farsi, when it offers the on-device model download, and the Gemma terms.
- How Ask Hamdam knows what it saysHamdam PlusThe labels on each sentence, numbered sources, the How I know this panel, and why a number in an answer can be trusted.
- What Hamdam knows about youHamdam PlusThe lines Ask Hamdam remembers, how to edit or forget any of them, and whether they go into your iCloud backup.
The daily ritual
The verse, the reflection, and everything you write.
- Today, and your reflection each dayWhat Today shows you, how Hamdam chooses it, and why a reader raised on the Persian poets sees something different from one who was not.
- Writing a reflectionFree and PlusThe two ways to write in Hamdam, what the monthly limit on the free tier counts, and what happens to what you write.
- Finding what you have writtenFree and PlusThe four segments of Reflections, what Recent, Favourites and Archive hold inside Journal, and what the free tier opens.
- Reading the whole poem, and hearing it readHow to open a verse into its full poem, what it shows in Farsi and in English, and which poems have a recording behind them.
- Daily remindersTurning the morning, afternoon and evening reminders on or off, the other alerts on the same screen, and what to do when none arrive.
- Your streakWhat the streak counts, why missing a day does not break it, and where to see it.
- Surprise meA small button on Today that opens one thing drawn only from what you are allowed to see.
- A memory on TodayFree and PlusOnce in a while Today brings back your own words from a past date, or a family story, and how to turn it off.
- Family on TodayOne small line from Roots on Today each day, drawn only from your own family, and how to turn it on or off.
- YaldaA Yalda card on Today in the week of the longest night, with a Faal, a family gathering link and a greeting card to share.
- Letters to your future self: delete and deliveryDelete one letter, and get a notification on the morning a sealed letter is ready.
Signals you choose to share
Health, weather, calendar and music. All optional, all off until you turn them on.
- Apple HealthFree and PlusThe separate Health permissions in Hamdam, which of them are Hamdam Plus, and where to change your mind.
- Cycle awarenessHamdam PlusA separate opt-in that softens reflections on period days, read from Apple Health and never displayed.
- Weather and locationWhat the weather changes in Hamdam, why it asks for location, and how to have one without the other.
- CalendarTwo separate switches: letting Hamdam see your day, and letting it write reflection blocks into a calendar of its own.
- Apple MusicHamdam PlusA calm playlist that plays on Today, with Today taking its colour from the artwork.
- The Mental and Fitness companionsTwo switches that let Hamdam form observations about your inner weather and about movement in your day. Both are off until you ask.
- What Hamdam learns, and how to clear itFree and PlusHamdam can notice which verses you share and lean that way. Turning it on, turning it off, and erasing what it already learned.
- Where you live nowA city you pick by hand, separate from where you come from, for weather, time, sunrise and local moments.
The Garden
Hamdam Health, habits, games and the faal. The part of Hamdam you come back to during the day.
- Hamdam Health: the Body, Spirit and Mind coachesFree and PlusHow the one line on Today becomes a plan for the day, what each of the three coaches holds, and where they get what they know.
- Planting a habitFree and PlusThe habit bed grows as you tend it, and rests rather than dies when you miss a day. Three plants are free; Hamdam Plus grows eight.
- The games and the daily riddleFree and PlusThe games in the Garden, how to play alone or with other people, and what the free plan includes.
- Today's picksFree and PlusA meal for the next few hours, and a book, a podcast and something to watch that change once a day. Where each comes from, and what is free.
- Asking Hafez: the faalFree and PlusThe traditional faal now lives in the Garden's Mind coach. Hold a question, open the Divan, and read what Hafez answers.
- Heart and sleep readings in Hamdam HealthHamdam PlusHow Hamdam reads your heart and sleep signals against your own last 30 days. Wellness, not diagnosis.
- The Move coach: questions and exercisesFour skippable questions and 38 bodyweight exercises, picked for your goal, your pain and your level.
- Mind and Sleep practicesEleven short practices for the Mind and Sleep coaches, picked from the day the coaches already read.
Roots
The poets, the symbols and the cultural calendar.
- The poets and the Persian symbolsFree and PlusSeven poets and six Persian symbols in Roots, who sees them, where their words come from, and what the free tier opens.
- The cultural calendar and its momentsA free calendar at the top of Roots with no limits, the next moment from where you come from, and the holidays where you live.
- Ferdowsi and NezamiFree and PlusThe two poets added in 2.1, 100 couplets each, and where they appear.
- The Shahnameh storiesFourteen Shahnameh stories in Roots, each a short retelling with Ferdowsi's own couplets.
- Hearing Ferdowsi and Nezami read aloudSome of their verses now have a recording, one voice for each poet, like the other five.
Your family
New in Hamdam 2.0: the people in your life, their voices, and a private way to talk.
- Roots, rebuilt around peopleAdd the people in your family to Roots, and see them as a universe of faces by generation, with a page for every person.
- Ask an ElderHand your iPhone or iPad to your grandmother and keep her answer in her own voice. The voice is saved first, and the words follow.
- Your family, from their own iCloudFree and PlusInvite someone and they join the same family from their own Apple ID. Your reflections, moods and health readings stay yours.
- Private messages inside the familyHamdam PlusWrite to one person in your family at a time, sealed end to end. No address book, and nobody to add.
- Inviting someone to your familyWhat an invited relative can and cannot see, said before you send, and what they find when they join.
- Confirming who is whoHamdam PlusThe person who started the family confirms who each joiner says they are, before messages are sealed to them.
- Replying to a messageHamdam PlusPress and hold a family message to reply to it, with the quote shown above your answer.
- Keeping a reflection with someoneFree and PlusWhen a reflection mentions someone in Roots, Hamdam offers to keep it with them, privately, on their page.
- When Hamdam suggests an invitationAt a moment that matters, Hamdam may ask whether to invite someone to your family. At most once a week, and nothing is sent unless you send it.
- Your year with familyHamdam PlusA page that counts your year in Roots, and a card to share with only the lines you choose.
Around the app
Widgets, Siri, the Watch, the Kiosk, sync, your plan and your privacy.
- The KioskHeadlines from papers you choose, in the Garden. Nothing bundled, nothing on Today, and every story opens on the paper's own site.
- Widgets, Siri and the Apple WatchFree and PlusHamdam outside the app: six widgets on one night sky card, Siri phrases that need no setup, and the Watch app on the iPhone it is paired with.
- Sharing a verse or a reflectionFree and PlusSending a reflection through the ordinary iOS share sheet, and a verse as a card you can share or save to Photos.
- iCloud syncFree and PlusYour journal on your other Apple devices through your own iCloud, and the settings that come back after a reinstall.
- Free and Hamdam PlusFree and PlusWhat the free tier includes, what a subscription opens, and where to manage or cancel it.
- What stays on your deviceNo account, no tracking, no Hamdam server. What stays yours, what your family can see, and the short list of what Hamdam contacts.
- When something is not workingThe problems people write in about most, what actually fixes them, and how to reach a person.
- How Hamdam looksFree and PlusThe sky over Today, whether it moves, the app icon on your Home Screen, the Persian reading face, and the opening sound.
- Finding a reflection from system searchYour reflections can be found from the search field on your iPhone or iPad, and the switch that stops it.
- Sharing Hamdam with your familyHamdam PlusThe one-time Founding Companion purchase can be shared through Apple Family Sharing. What that shares, and how it differs from the family in Roots.
- Deleting your dataHow to erase your reflections and favourites, how to remove your family from iCloud, and what deleting the app does on its own.
- Searching HamdamFree and PlusSearch across your reflections, people, family stories, places, traditions and dates, in Persian and English together.
- The Privacy and your data page, and exportWhere Hamdam keeps things, who in your family can see what, and how to export or delete your data.
- Clearing the cards Hamdam puts on your Lock ScreenHow to clear Hamdam's Lock Screen cards, and what that does for the Yalda and Nowruz season.
- Carrying on between Watch and iPhoneFree and PlusContinue an interrupted recording, hand a Watch reflection to the phone, and read the Watch status line.
- Siri and Spotlight in 2.1Free and PlusAsk Siri to open a reflection, add to your journal, search it, or ask Hamdam. English only.
Still stuck
If the answer is not here, the support desk reads everything that arrives and a person answers it.