MyShake Earthquake Alerts App Reviews

I like this app, but I have a VERY important suggestion PLEASE READ. I really like the fact that this app can notify users before an earthquake, which is very useful for earthquake prone areas like California. Although, I would like you to at least consider the following suggestion. I think you should have 2 alert variants. 1 is for the magnitude 4.5 to 6.5 and let out an alert that is the same volume as the current one, but it sounds a little less urgent. The other would be for magnitude 6.6+ and would be the same volume but sound very alarming to signal to users to watch out.

I felt like a prophet!. I downloaded this app after the last earthquake in my area. 20 min ago I got a very clear alert with graphics “EARTHQUAKE WARNING: DROP! COVER! HOLD!” Had time to read it, hesitate (thinking “these don’t actually work, do they?”), then get out of bed and yell across the house to my kids BEFORE the chandelier started to SWING from the quake. The epicenter was a 5.5 and we are 60 miles away but I actually hesitated before reacting and still had that much time. Getting everyone in my family on this app and I will NOT hesitate to react next time!

Great app for early earthquake warnings!. I’ve had the app for awhile and was unsure of its value until the recent earthquake. Centered near Bakersfield, CA. It was 5.2 mag. My phone was set to silent so no sounds during evening. The app over rode that and started alerting/talking to me to get to safe location and take cover. About 10 seconds later, the earthquake hit us and the whole house rolled with the quake. And we are 100 miles away from epicenter!! The app display earthquakes all over the world or nearby you depending on your personal preference. It has a wealth of info and I find it invaluable now that I experienced the early warning for the first time. Kudos to the team that created this great app!

It worked!. We just experienced an earthquake in Eureka, California. The warning came about 4 seconds before the shaking started. It was enough time to take cover. Recommending to all, I just wish the warning was a bit louder but this app worked as designed. A++ two thumbs up. EDIT: December 20, 2021 M6.2 Cape Mendocino quake - app worked flawlessly again. I was in a restaurant in Eureka with maybe 25 customers in it. My phone is the only one that went off before the quake. MyShake gave 4 or 5 seconds advance warning. Other customer’s phone alerts went off after the shaking had already started.

Borderline Useless. How can it be called MyShake when it wouldn’t let me report an earthquake felt a minute prior? Why is there a search field which finds my location if I type part of it but doesn’t autofill that into the search field and / or then direct me to that location on the map? How can the functionality be there months ago, but not now in light of the fact my app is current and same version as then? Why do the filter pages not change based on criteria selected, e.g., Recent vs Distance? Budget cuts? Apathy? Blissful ignorance? AGAIN, WHY DOES AN APP NAMED MYSHAKE NOT LET ME REPORT A QUAKE I FELT? I hit refresh and all of a sudden there are 108 reports!!! How were others able to report and I could not? Need a different app.

Worked as intended. The app actually worked. I had forgotten that I installed the app. Tonight it sent me notification that there is an earthquake. Less than a minute later there was actually an earthquake. It sent another warning a few minutes later and about a minute after there was an after shock. Although 45-60 seconds doesn’t seem like much time but it provided enough information to quickly decide if I need to take cover or not.

Must have app in California. So far this app has alerted me successfully for 3 different earthquakes 1st one was the 7.1 quake in ridge crest. Even though I was 80 miles away it gave me a good 10-15 seconds before the shaking even got to me it was surreal I almost thought it was wrong and then the shaking began! Alerted me to a 5.4 20 miles away gave me about 7 seconds warning before and the most recent one was a 4.6 only 7 miles away but the alert got to me JUST as the shaking arrive because I was so close.

Amazing. It’s baffling that people are complaining about not getting warnings. I believe this is because you have to enable location services for this to work properly. This may require some battery life but it’s worth it for the warning. This app is amazing especially now of days with apps requiring a weekly or monthly subscription for disappointing performance. I’ve been warned before every earthquake without fail, giving me and my family about 5 seconds to prepare. This app works really well

This app really does work. I installed My Shake a little over a year ago. Approximately two weeks ago, a very loud voice stated “EARTHQUAKE”, then something to the effect of “TAKE COVER” (the exact words used after EARTHQUAKE escape me, but it was telling me, basically, to prepare). This jarring message repeated a few times. I immediately jumped to a safer place. Fortunately, the quake, in Tulare County, California, was far enough away that it didn’t do too much where I live. I must say though, that I am now a super fan of this app. The split second it takes to jump to a safer spot could make the difference between life and death, especially for us in California. Thank you, sincerely, to those who created and run My Shake!

Switched to this app = better!. Switched to this app from another earthquake app and this is better since it allows a home base to be set. Yes there is a sw bug that the app doesn’t seem to do anything after setting the home base, but if you go back through the settings the home base has indeed been set. Home base is essential to me since I run with location tracking off to save battery capacity. I run with a VPN so we’ll see if the app works with that. It would be great if there was a test mode that would allow a user to verify notification and trigger off any earthquake of any magnitude 3.5 or greater in California, Oregon or Washington. I would also like a notification of ANY deep earthquake on the Cascadia subduction zone in case there are any precursor earthquakes providing early warning.

Works for me. Everyone in here complaining about little bugs as if they never experienced something like that in another app. This is a free earthquake warning app that could potentially save your life, stop complaining and grow up. I just downloaded the app and had no issues with using it, but it’s an early warning app not a game, so whatever people are complaining about is pointless because the main function of the app is to send you a push notification. One thing I did really like is how I can look at the seismograph of past earthquakes to see the pattern of shaking. I was six during the ‘89 quake and still remember how the shaking felt like it was yesterday. Any kind of advance warning will be helpful.

Useless app…. Wow. A developer response that completely ignores everything I brought up. I never said I didn’t want global notifications. Global notifications are informative but not necessarily useful. I said I wasn’t getting notifications of local (significant) quakes. And I was pointing out the irony of getting notifications from quakes thousands of miles away that don’t affect me directly. But not getting any notifications of local quakes that could affect me. And the (local) quake that I was referring to occurred hours before I checked the app. (Because, you know, I didn’t get any notifications?) So the whole “map doesn’t update right away” excuse is not really valid. Bottoms line - you did not address my concerns or critique. It gives notifications of quakes thousands of miles away but doesn’t notify you of quakes nearby. I still say this app is only useful for draining my phone battery. tl;dr Useless notifications of quakes thousands of miles away. No notifications of significant quake 100mi away. I get notifications (not shake alerts, just standard iOS notifications) of earthquakes in the sandwich islands which are thousands of miles away from me. But I didn’t get any notification (again, not shake alerts, just standard iOS notifications) of a M6.2 quake that’s about 100mi from me. And people in the area have reported feeling the shaking. When I go into the app, the M6.2 quake didn’t even show up. I had to kill the app and restart it for the quake to show up. All of this just makes the app useless other than for draining my battery.

Phenomenal!. I was, unfortunately, at the epicenter of yesterday’s 4.5 earthquake. I want to take this opportunity to thank the creators of this app. I could swear my phone warned me before the actual earthquake hit, at least that’s how it felt like. The app told me to seek shelter and so I knew it was an actual earthquake going on, the app snapped me of the initial shock and I got me and my kids ready to exit the building. A lot of my neighbors didn’t know what was happening. I advised them all to get the app.

Need geography settings. Update: Thanks for response and helpful. So if I turn the global push notification off, I will still receive a push notification if an earthquake of 4.5+ hits in California? To confirm, it is a push notification? I live in California and get continual alerts for Indonesia or other places. I am becoming numb to the alerts given the frequency of alerts, which would make this app useless. Need the ability to set location: E.g. “only alert me if within 200 mile radius.” In the meantime, If the real one hits, I would ignore the alert because I would think it’s for another location far from me.

Worked 15-20sec before news alert. So today in Los Angeles we had our 1st hurricane (or less) in a century. So I expected so see a weather alert… nope, it was a alert that & actually spoke that said something to the effect of “earthquake detected, seek shelter.” So I did, but felt nothing. About 20 seconds as I was watching the news, they interrupted their story & said reported a earthquake alert. I got the alert (it seems) before they did. Then the newscaster reported that some lights in the studio were shaking. So even though I personally did not feel it, people I know did & I am grateful that I got the earthquake warning. This app gave me time to seek shelter. I highly recommend this app for anyone who lives in earthquake areas, and wants to be safe. Thank you.

Appalled at the lack of star-age!. This app is great and comes from a public University. I am very happy to see good tax payer money being used to fund education in seismology. The app works seamlessly and feels like a “normal” integrated iPhone application. Anecdotally, the app gave up to date information on an earthquake, in real time. Simultaneously connecting other reports in real time as well, giving a clear refresh option. I’m amazed that a University could produce such a sophisticated app and hope there is more to come along that front from Berkeley. Our best minds at work, in real time! Thank you!

Invaluable app, but not perfect. The app doesn’t have the most slick user interface, but it works well. I don’t generally encounter any glitches. And when I get an earthquake alert it is usually very fast and very loud. That’s actually a good thing. However, it’s probably human error that caused my biggest issue with the app. One night this week I was woken up at around 3:20 AM for an accidental test alarm. It’s such a loud, jarring alert that it really caused me to panic for a moment. Then it took me a very long time to get back to sleep, making getting up on time the next morning miserable. I think there needs to be much better processes and layers of checks in place for whoever has access to send test alarms.

App has potential. Suggestions: Allow users to change warning notification based on shaking intensity expected at their location. Example: User only wants to be notified if there’s moderate shaking expected at their location. Maybe people aren’t ready for this though and perhaps keeping it at MMI III works. Include option for submitting information/reports past 2 weeks, as well as viewing earthquakes/reports over 2 weeks old. I’m not sure why this is the cut off. I wanted to put in information about the shaking I experienced during the Pleasant Hill earthquake, but 2 weeks had already elapsed. Will the phone produce an audible alert if the phone is on silent? Will the phone vibrate if the phone is on vibrate? It’d be nice to hear what the warning sounds like or how your phone will respond when receiving a warning. I think think should be described better within the app and/or there should be an example of what the warning sounds like.

10 second heads up. I don’t know why the rating is so low. I have 5 apps downloaded to test which one I want to keep and this one is the only one that gave me a heads up before the earthquake hit 10 mins ago. I actually thought for a second I didn’t feel anything and then my house shook from a 4.5 quake. The other apps didn’t alert me until 10-30 seconds after it hit so it looks like I’ll be keeping this one and dumping the others.

It warned me in advance,. There was an earthquake about 20 miles from where I live. I got a warning about a minute before I felt the quake. Admittedly, I'm far enough away that I just felt shaking. But it told me about it before I felt anything. I'm sure the tech is going to improve and look forward to seeing its evolution. I could also report my experience of the quake. You need to allow access to location, and you generally want to set it to only warn you of close earthquakes and not tell you about the ones thousands of miles away.

Accurate. Wanted to note for anyone who doesn’t understand how the app works…there are sensors placed for MyShake once that sensor senses a wave, it quickly alerts the users. The issue is if you live right next to the fault, you won’t get much of a heads up, so stop putting negative reviews. The San Andreas for instance can definitely give Los Angeles City residents a few seconds of a warning since the San Andreas is not under LA city. There is no way the app can predict earthquakes so please understand the science before you give a review. It’s an app to save lives. It works well. I’ve never had any issues with it, warned each time, thank you.

Freezing Needs To Be Fixed ASAP, But Looks Promising If All Bugs Are Fixed. The App freezes after you enter your location & then choose the earthquake you experienced. When the next screen pops up, it does not respond when you press the _Experienced This Earthquake_ button on the screen , or any other area of that screen. We just had an earthquake in our location, and the news on TV noted your app, and it downloaded quickly onto the phone. The features it has in its design look promising, but obviously the bugs need to be fixed ASAP to get the data for your studies and to provide useful information to the public. Hope you can get it fixed soon. Thanks

Dont misuse this app. I don’t think users should be receiving any type of notification other than a real actual earthquake alert. It’s irritating getting an alert only for it to be a reminder for an earthquake drill. Give users the option to opt out of this type of notification or stop doing it, it’s like crying wolf. This app is suppose to give users a few extra seconds to take cover, so I think by sending out these messages it waters down how people will react when they get notified. Just my opinion.

Amazing technology. It’s really incredible to get warnings, giving time to duck and cover. Many times I get an alert, I don’t feel shaking in my area, which is to be expected! It’s a prediction, not a guarantee. The times when it has alerted me so I can get to safety and I DO feel shaking remind me how incredible this is. Everyone on the West Coast should have this app, with the expectation that many alerts will not end up being relevant to you. But someday one of them likely will be.

Promising but slow/ laggy. Seems like it could be a great app, I personally don’t understand the point of using and or showing the user the x y and z axis change of the phone. But that’s not really the issue here, might just be me but running iPhone X and it seems to freeze for a while whenever I click on a specific earthquake to see more info about it. Edit: seems to only be freezing on ones that happens around a day or so ago, when I clicked on one that happens 20 mins ago it worked fine but the one that happens in pleasant hill a day or so ago (aswell as others ) it freezes. Edit 2: the app now shows an earth quake in the pinnacles, CA as 3.5 however yesterday it showed as a 3.6 and when I click on the 3.5 it then shows 3.6 at the bottom.

Promising but Pointless. I have downloaded and had the MyShake app on my phone for a over a year now. My biggest issue with the app is that you cannot be one of the initial people to experience an earthquake and record it on the app. Pressing the "I felt shaking" button always prompts a "No earthquakes found", despite having personally felt the quake (above a 3.5). Other than simply being able to see where past quakes were on a map, the app doesn't seem like it has much of a purpose. If I cannot record a quake as an initial "feeler", I may as well have not had the app. Google can tell me more information, frankly. The app is neat but definitely could be better.

Good earthquake app, maybe some iOS 13 issues. I’ve been using the University’s excellent MyQuake app for years to study earthquakes both in CA and worldwide, so when I heard about this app and it planning to have alerts in CA (not yet available as of this review but expected in a day or two) I got it to prepare. Outside of that it’s a nice app that lets you track earthquakes by magnitude and report if you felt it, which brings up a possible issue-on my iPhone SE running the latest iOS (13.1.3), if I go to the page to report if I felt it or see similar options the app locks up and I have to force close to get out. Otherwise it works well and I plan to continue using the app but hopefully this can be fixed.

It completely stopped working years ago. This is an incredibly frustrating app. When I first downloaded it it worked great…then crickets. So, after yesterday’s 4.4 in Santa Rosa which did not even show up until late today, I deleted the app and reloaded it. Great, right? Wrong. I filled all the info, including my address, and no matter how many times I hit the “submit” button it would NOT submit. What a great idea but what a LOSER APP. Get your act together if you portray yourself as a help for earthquakes. A couple years ago I wrote the developers and was told that “it should be working just fine”. That was the “help” that I received for reaching out. How ridiculous. It is NOT working and hasn’t worked for 2-3 years.

Potential to Become a Main Stay App in Cal; but needs work. Great app, though true value will be tested when an early warning event occurs, so need a negative to prove a positive. That alone will earn 5 stars. But for the parts that can be tested now--could use the ability to customize notifications? I don't really need alert notifications for earthquakes 3000 miles away. But Global is the only option? I would love to be able to limit within 250 miles? Or California? But again--the point is early notification. And if it works for those areas far enough away from the epicenter, no more work be done on this app now matter what my or other comments say.

Recent update drains battery. Hello there! I really like the idea of this app and appreciate its potential. The UI is great all around but I have some comments on the most recent update. This app uses your phone’s location A LOT if you set location sharing to “always” as the app recommends. I’m talking about 21+ hours of the last 24 hours of background use while my phone has been in exactly one location. Is this really necessary? Also clicking on the help button in settings causes the app the immediately crash which is why I’m reporting this bug through an app review.

Wow! It works,for me at least.. Been using this for awhile now. Trying to help report felt shaking, assuming that helps someone. Got a shock this morning when the alert for the 5.1 San Jose earthquake happened. Had a few seconds of warning. Just enough time to be alarmed as I read the alert info, that a 4.9 was about to hit. Then sat wondering if I would feel it, then felt the tiny shaking. Nice to see it working. Would be nice if the map opened zoomed into maybe a 50 mile radius of my location, instead of showing the Western Hemisphere.

Works to alert you about earthquakes. This is the only Earthquake App on my phone that warned me and gave me an alert to ‘Duck and Cover’ before the earthquake hit last night at 12:30AM. (There was only a 5 second warning, but since the earthquake was 10 miles away, perhaps that’s all the time that was allowed. Quakes move at the speed of sound while alerts are over radio waves—speed of light.) The App definitely woke me up, but better safe and groggy than dead…

Unusable due to constant freezing. I just downloaded the app (minutes after feeling an earthquake in LA), and there is an alert listing the earthquake I just felt. I clicked on the button to share that I’d felt the shaking, and it kept freezing, requiring me to force quit. I see another review stating the same issue, and the developer commented that the app was overloaded due to a quake earlier in the day. Why else would people be using this app except to be notified of earthquakes? If it freezes every time there’s a quake, it’s a useless app. I hope the developers can fix these issues soon. I downloaded the app on the recommendation from a local newspaper with quotes from city officials saying what a great app it is. Maybe they were paid to say that?

Completely missed the mark on Hollister 4.5 EQ. I’m really surprised that even though I’ve set MyShake to log 3.5 & higher, it entirely missed the 4.5 EQ near Hollister 2 days ago… the logging functionality seems to be getting worse and worse as time goes on… additionally, the notification feature appears to be very hit-or-miss; we received notification of an EQ in the Sierras more than 150 miles from here yet, closer EQs in the North Bay Area never seem to trigger the alert notification, even though I’ve correctly configured the app and allowed location/notification…

Notification before it happen. I really love this app. Since I installed it I have been notified of an earthquake like 5 times in the radius of 5O miles from me. I have been notified while driving, at work and while watching TV at home. I feel a little more in control when I hear “Earthquake, drop, cover and hold on. shaking expected”. At least I’m given the opportunity to react a few seconds before it happen. I hope we never have “the big one” but having this app makes me feel a little ahead even if it’s just seconds!

Feature Request: Ability to subscribe to location. I like the idea of this app but I think it can be greatly improved by offering the ability to subscribe to a location for alerts/reports. While it is interesting that there was an earthquake in Indonesia, I don’t want to receive alerts and pop-up’s for it. I mainly care if there is an earthquake happening EAE real-time in San Francisco and would like the feature to only get alerts for this area. It would be great if I can subscribe to alerts by selecting a city or be able to draw the boundary on a map. Thanks again for building this app and sharing the data. Keep up the awesome work!

Heart attacks for no reason. I live in earthquake country and I do not recommend this app unless you're a surgeon, dentist or perform some other such task. It sends heart-attack alerts, either moments before, during or after an earthquake depending how close you are to the epicenter, and on how well it's working at that time. It delivers alerts that will wake you up in the middle of the night, for minor earthquakes that are not worthy of an alert to someone not close enough to be affected. It also has sent a false alert for an earthquake far away that didn't actually occur. If the developers can tweak it so it is more finely tuned perhaps it will be of use to the public but at this time it only causes loss of sleep and stress therefore I am deleting the app.

Great app!. I downloaded this app on a whim hoping to never have to use it. Living in California it’s just a good idea to be prepared. Fast forward to last night, there was an earthquake and my phone let us know before we felt a small amount of shaking (it was a 4.9 pretty far away, this time). The alert was LOUD and said EARTHQUAKE and mentioned ducking for cover/find a safe place. It freaked me out but hearing this announcement but I was so happy to have the alert!! The My Shake app notified us before the news, etc. I recommend this app to everyone.

Amazing App. This app has taken a lot of earthquake anxiety away from me. Being from the east coast I had never feeling an earthquake until I moved to California. The first earthquakes I ever felt were the Big Bear/Landers quakes and it scared me so much and I have bad anxiety anytime I feel a quake. This app takes that element of surprise away and gives me time to find a good place to go before it hits. I’d say a good 5-10 seconds, which doesn’t sound like a lot, but it’s enough to move to a safer place and takes that “surprise-the ground is shaking” away. It makes me so much less scared when the quake actually hits. We’ve had two bigger quakes since I installed it and both times, the early warning informed me before hand. Very thankful for this app!

Promising, but critically flawed. An earthquake early warning system? Sounds great! The promotional materials at launch indicated it might provide a precious few seconds before an earthquake strikes. Unfortunately all of those seconds will be wasted because the notification provides practically zero information about the quake’s epicenter, and it is extremely difficult to view the relevant info on the map. If you tap the notification, you get an unsorted map of the globe and are left to yourself to infer which dot was the one that generated the notification. On top of that, you’ll be getting plenty of notifications for earthquakes thousands of miles away, so it’s more likely the notification is relevant to someone on the other side of the globe than it is to you. All that added up, and it’s hard to see any value here in its current form. Even if we assume the detection mechanism is cutting edge, the warning delivery is so completely flawed it negates its function. It would be very helpful to only notify for nearby events, and to give actual location and approximate distance from current location in the notification text so you know right away.

Useful but a huge battery hog. About a week ago I received my first earthquake warning, a second or two before the moderate quake hit. That was impressive given that the quake epicenter was about 15 miles from my location. Not enough of a warning for me to act in time in the middle of the night, but if a bigger quake hit further away, I can see how the app can save lives or prevent serious injuries. The bad news is that the app is an incredible battery hog. I tried configuring it to allow background updates, and my phone went from 97% charged around 11:00 PM to 51% at 8:30 AM. Checking the battery usage showed that 76% of the power was consumed by MyShake. As much as I’d like to keep background updates enabled, it’s not practical at this point.

App freezes up. Same issue as precious reviewer - try to fill out a report but app constantly freezes up. Have done several forced app shutdowns and retried to enter info, same result - can't file a report. Other than that, it looks like it is simple to use and has a nice look to it UPDATE: I upped my rating as I'm now able to make reports without issues after the app update. Very easy to use app. Would like to see if you can get alerts for certain areas only; as another person indicated, you get alerts for quakes all around the world. But this isn't affecting my rating since the purpose of the app is being accomplished :)

It works. I got a 30 seconds heads up. Make sure to enable location. I got alerted 30 seconds before the actual earthquake actually happened. My whole office heard the alert. Then the earthquake happened and then everyone else got the amber alert type alert on their cellphone. It only alerts you if the shake is 4.5 or higher and in your area. I am going under my desk next time I get this alert. I’m in Southern California.

Works fine…but. I think that some of my issues are with how I’ve set up my home location and when I want to be notified. Last night we had a 6.4 quake about 300 miles to our north. The app woke me up out of a dead sleep so that part works just fine, but 300 miles away is a bit too far away for me to take cover etc. I’ve finally adjusted some settings so I’ll see how this work out. This is a great concept but maybe some more detailed instructions for many people that need that.

Thank you for the early warning!!!. Wow, had what seemed like lots of time on earthquake warning tonight! My phone made a very distinct sound and said something to the effect Earthquake alert, drop, cover, 5.7 Kern County. I was at first a little unsure, as I hadn’t felt anything, then I knew I better get out of laying on the electric lounge chair so I can at least sitting up so I can be ready to move, then I opened Maps to see where Kern County was, it said 111 miles away. I moved to a better area in my house, then started feeling and hearing slight shaking. Then I took a video of our pendant light swaying slightly. Exciting, thankfully not too exciting. Next time I’ll be less unsure and just act much quicker, it could be less time, closer and bigger I know! Important and so so helpful! Thank you!!!!! Very cool!!! That’s what I wrote previously, back here again to say thank you, had new early warnings today of quakes, thank you!!!! You are amazing, love this important precious app!!!!

Great app so far!. People need to stop complaining. We are talking about an early warning system for the most populated state in the nation. It’s not going to be perfect and they’re going to have some things to work out. We should be grateful for what we have so far and use the app to help them make it better. If you think you can do better, then do it, otherwise stop being negative and be appreciative for the work that went into this. I live near Ridgecrest and this would have been very useful.

Early alert works!. Today I was hanging out with the family watching movies as hurricane Hillary was passing by OC with heavy rain and winds, when all of a sudden I got an alert in my apple watch from an app I’ve never heard/seen before, so it caught my attention right away and it was something like “brace yourself, earthquake with Ventura epicenter” type of alert, and as I was telling my fam about it we then started to feel the ground moving! That was an amazing to experience, having a heads up could make a big difference in the outcome of an earthquake. Thank you!

Finally... Living in Mexico city we had something like this for a while . But now I live in Los Angeles California and I don't know how people in the US are gonna react when they get the warning a strong earthquake is coming because people In Mexico are already use to getting them alerts that say "Strong earthquake is coming " since they have so many strong earthquakes and an early warning on their phone and they had them for a while . So since this is gonna be new to people in the US who knows how they gonna react ! Also I think we need the Alarm. I know that they have them were they have tornadoes in the US .But in Mexico city when u get the notification on your phone the Air raid siren also goes on really loud all over the city the first time I had no idea what was happening I tought a war was happening when I heard the alarm all over the city till I saw everyone running outside and they were screaming earthquake and sure enough 30 seconds later BAM strong earthquake hit . They should have those in California not only in places were they have tornadoes so people can have time to go hide ! I saw it helps they had about 30 seconds to get outside .

Very helpful but slow. Just got this app today after there was an earthquake that was over 300km away and felt minor rattling(no damage) and wanted to get an app that would be helpful with learning more about it, right as it’s happening or minutes after it happened which I think is awesome. I’m excited to see where this app goes in the future with further updates. Only issue for me and others is that when I went to submit my report of the experience I had with the earthquake, zooming into the map to pin point the location, it was slow loading the cities and surrounding areas.

Better than the govt alert. This thing is crazy fast. Recently we’ve been getting alot of quakes in Malibu. We only live about 10 miles away. Which relatively speaking in earthquake terms is not far at all. The alert literally pops up seconds before we actually feel the quake. Yeah seconds doesn’t really make a difference when your super close to the epicenter. But trust me this thing comes in handy when the earthquake is just far enough. Like the earthquakes in Bakersfield, and ojai. Plenty of alert time for those. The government alerts on the other hand are trash. Don’t trust those. Why even have an alert at all if your gonna be buried under rubble by the time it arrives. Get this app and set your location.

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Very useful, highly recommended 👍. It is very interesting to see the seismic activity around the world. I find the notifications and the world map useful. Using this application you get notified of earthquakes before they appear on CNN! The only thing it's really missing is support for iPad screen sizes and rotation. It currently only displays as an iPhone application on the iPad.

Great idea, need to adjust testing times. It's a great idea for an app, good looking interface. My issue is that I've received two audio earthquake tests in less than 12 hours, one of which was shortly after 3am. It's very loud and therefore very disturbing in the middle of the night. I've deleted it, hopefully these issues will get resolved with time.

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Earthquake Warning. Today this app worked great and warned me that an earthquake was coming my way. I’m in Modesto and we normally don’t have to worry about earthquake warnings. However this quake hit in an area about 20 miles away (Farmington 4.8) With the warning, I had enough time to call out to my kids before the house started shaking. I love this app!

LA Resident over 12yrs & this is THE app. I’ve lived in LA for a long time and have experienced too many earthquakes to count. I downloaded this app in November 2023. It’s currently 8/6/24 and about 20 minutes ago the app alerted me that an earthquake was coming. This is the fourth successful earthquake alert from this app. You literally cannot have any better odds for receiving an advantageous warning.

Great app for geologists!. As a professional geologist, I’m having a lot of fun seeing the global tectonic activity. But knowing that a major earthquake can trigger an alarm hundreds of miles away is great. I understand that this app would have given the Bay Area a 20 second heads up from the Loma Prieta event. That’s amazing. Just think about having a 20 second warning, it’s not a lot but it really is!

This app works!. I was sitting in my living room last night when a loud audio warning came from my phone which something like “Earthquake. Duck cover and hold”. I had never heard that before so I was a bit shocked and didn’t move. But about 15 seconds later, the 4.4 Carson area earthquake hit and I felt the rocking. Congratulations. I was in the Northridge earthquake. This could really save lives.

Blank. I’d had My shake APP for months! With the resent series of earthquakes we experienced in California a couple of months ago I didn’t receive notifications from MY SHAKE. Instead the APP FROZE! Since then I don’t trust it. I feel it’s deceiving. A false sense of security. Please improve it! I have seen in the news how Mexico has had the early warning Public Alarms for years! As other countries do. Why can’t you simply asked them how they came about with that invention? I’ll wait to download the My Shake APP. When it becomes I bit more reliable. Thank you for trying!

Works well for me in LA, No battery issues.. Had successfully alerted me to two quakes recently, alert came before the shaking on one, the other quake was too close to me and the app sounded a few seconds after shaking started. No battery issues for me - I think that has been fixed.

Amazing and potentially lifesaving. This morning, this app on my phone made an alarming noise that got my attention right away and said out loud that shaking was imminent, in enough time for me to get to the doorway before the earthquake started. It was only a 5.1, but if it had been The Big One, it might have saved my life. I'm so grateful for this app.

Works well to give you a few extra seconds to prepare. The alarm sounded last night at 3am and really wakes you up immediately! We didn’t end up feeling the 6.4 in Ferndale but something so big only a few hours away makes me think this will at least give us a few seconds to prepare when we actually feel it.

It works!!. Just had an earthquake shake 2 hours away (drive time but could’ve easily felt it) and it was around a 5.0 and the app alerted me - it was pretty fantastic as I was standing in Target near glassware and I was able to get to another softer aisle! Be aware that the voice is loud (handy) and very surprising - now that I’ve heard it, I’ll realize it’s not a joke or someone else’s phone next time...

Awful experience. 3:20 AM and my phone loudly starts blaring audio of a male voice announcing “THIS IS AN EMERGENCY EARTHQUAKE TEST” At 3…in the morning. Absolutely terrifying hearing something like this at that hour. Jolted awake in a panic thinking a real earthquake was taking place. I always keep my phone on silent mode, especially when I’m trying to sleep. My heart is still beating out of my chest. Unbelievable that they would issue an alert at 3:20 AM. Wildly unprofessional. I have since removed the app and would much rather be crushed by an earthquake than keep this nightmare inducer on my phone.

This app warmed me 5-10 sec before an earthquake hit. When I received a warning message from this app telling me that an earthquake was about to happen and that i should take cover, i didn’t believe it… seconds later i felt the earthquake! This app warned me before the earthquake happened! Not only that but it also gave me instant information about the magnitude and location of the earthquake!

Works fortunately. The app seems to work good, maybe a little too well. Todays earthquake near Sacramento triggered an alert (despite me being over 50 miles away), the quake was reported as a 5.7 but was later revised to be a 4.1 (HUGE difference between the two.) The alert did work, didn’t feel anything but better safe than sorry I guess…

I usually don’t do reviews. It didn't work for me. There was a 3.4 earthquake here in San Leandro California at 11:43 am but the app didn’t even alert and it didn’t even register the movement I had to go and check on google plus on top of that I tried to check that I felt a shake and it said there were none register in my area. It’s kind of weird that it actually gives you an update of other places but not the one is close to you 🤔 hope it can really work for someone else when it’s needed .

Hope this gets better...no localized option. I cannot believe they released this app as buggy as it seems to be. The biggest problem is there’s no way to localize earthquakes so I just got notifications but the earthquakes were for Tonga, not Southern California where I live which makes this kinda useless and I can see folks getting very acclimated to earthquakes being somewhere else from hearing this app deliver the news and ultimately stop paying attention and the big one hits when you think it’s the usual “app that cries wolf all the time”. We desperately need this tool but we need a working version not a prototype.

Got Alerted. It absolutely works!. My iPhone and iPad both woke me up with the alert, “Duck and Cover!” The quake epicenter was so close to my home that there was only a second or so before the actual shaking started in this case. But that made a difference since I was sleeping. This app will forever be on my devices.

A must for Californians. This works! I’ve got my settings at 3.5+ and was woken up twice with the loud alarm warning. My sister felt them more, 20 miles away. Wish I had this app during the back-to-back 6+ & 7+ quake up in Ridgecrest Ca. I almost broke my leg while trying to get out of my friends double wide (bucking bronco) with a narrow hallway. I’ve always depended on my local neighbors at Cal Tech for everything earthquake related since a kid. I’d love it if you had an app that would let us know when your going, “live” like when we see you on the news? It would be great to not have to find an available streaming news station to see everything. My Roku doesnt always have live breaking news stations available. Thanks for the heads up

Never works. I have had this app on my phone since it originally came out. Never not once has it sent me an alert, despite having other earthquake apps on my phone that do send alerts. This seems to be an isolated case because I haven’t seen others complain about the issue. But I have deleted and redownloaded the app several times, confirmed my notification and location settings and still just can’t get this app to work. Very disappointing especially with all the state support around it now.

Solid app. Two complaints.. Works as promised. Could be better. Two complaints, though… The “I FELT SHAKING” button should actually do something. Like, preferably, report the shaking to the USGS “I felt something” database. And the USER should set the lower limit for reported earthquakes. Right now, it looks like it only cares about 3.5 and higher… but I can feel trembling as low as 2.5, and I want this app to clue me into those as well.

No way to filter notifications by location. If you want to be notified of 6.5 mag earthquakes in the middle of the ocean, this app is for you. Unfortunately, the promise of the app is ruined by an inability to add any new notification areas. Your only option is global, which you can set to whatever magnitude you want. You can filter old data by location, but not the earthquake alerts. So every time a larger earthquake happens, you'll be reading the screen trying to determine the location to see if you need to take action. Please let us add a custom notification area so we can turn off global alerts and be given precious extra seconds of warning for LOCAL earthquakes.

Truly Awesome. Thanks for your work building this app. It’s really great to be using our mobile devices to contribute to (and be alerted by) an early warning system while also having access to quake info. I did report higher than normal battery usage on my iPhone Xr during iOS 14 beta, but that seems resolved. Keep up the great work!

This is a must have if you live in Earthquake Country. Having this is a nice safe blanket. You can get several seconds warning depending how far the quake is. Additionally once the quake starts app gives you an estimate of how big and where. Gives you a little confidence on what to do and expect.

Mostly works. Got a notification and audible tone on my Apple Watch several seconds before the 4.5 earthquake in San Benito County today. It wasn't that strong by the time it travelled up to my location in Silicon Valley, but my coworkers were impressed and decided to download the app themselves. I say it "mostly works" because my watch just gave a generic alarm sound and I didn't know what it was at first. It took a few seconds for me to glance at my watch and process it. That's a few seconds when I could have been taking cover if it was the "Big One." My phone was on silent, but isn't there a way for an emergency alert like this to override it? The guy in the app that says "Earthquake!" and gives instructions would have been more helpful. I like this app overall! Just a suggestion from a human factors engineering standpoint.

Worked today in San Diego!. I got a 10 seconds before heads up. Seeing that it was going to be 4.8 (estimated) completely changed the experience. I was able to sit comfortably and listen, and I heard it coming! If it showed a much larger number like 6.5 or higher, I probably would have tried to go outside, since I was right next to the door.

Buggy, intermittent reliability. Earthquakes from Africa randomly show up in my log that I have recollection of interacting with but not the 5.2 that hit 100 miles from me in SoCal. Earthquake log is also always days or even weeks out of date and will not update with a data refresh. This has all been a recurring issue with the app over the last 5 months and I have tried updating. It also fails to notify or warn of a close quake sometimes and the map data is very very slow to update after a new quake. So much potential and yet you squandered it

Works great. I live in San Francisco so I have this app for obvious reasons. It’s worked great for my wife and I. Since the most recent quakes have been further away from us, we’ve received the warning about 20-30 seconds before we feel the quake. That’s given us enough time to get under the dining room table and wait it out. This is definitely worth the download!

Need it for the Apple iWatch please?. Got my Test alert today - but I didn’t notice it until a couple of hours later (phone was charging in the bedroom, I was in the yard). An iWatch alert would have notified me right away. Also- I turn the phone’s Do Not Disrurb on during the week at night - concerned I’d miss those too. I really like this alert, I figure a couple of seconds would be a great heads up!

Essential Feature Request: Customizable Alerts for Relevant Earthquake Notifications. I’ve been using the MyShake app, developed by the talented scientists at UC Berkeley, with high hopes of staying informed about local earthquake activities. However, my recent experience has highlighted a significant oversight in the app’s alert system that I believe needs urgent attention. Last night, the app’s alerts woke me up twice for earthquakes occurring in El Centro, about 100 miles away from my location in Solana Beach. These disturbances were relatively minor, with magnitudes around 4.5, far from what I’d consider an immediate concern. This situation led me to disable the app altogether, which is unfortunate because I genuinely value having real-time earthquake alerts when I’m awake and for events that are genuinely relevant to my immediate vicinity. To enhance the app’s utility and user experience, I strongly suggest the developers integrate two crucial settings: 1. Alert Radius Customization: Allow users to specify a radius within which they wish to receive earthquake notifications. This feature would ensure that alerts are meaningful and pertinent to the user’s actual location, reducing unnecessary disturbances from distant events. 2. Magnitude Threshold Setting: Users should have the option to set a minimum earthquake magnitude for which they want to be alerted. This adjustment would prevent the app from sending notifications about minor quakes that users might deem irrelevant. Implementing these suggestions would significantly improve the app’s functionality, making it a truly indispensable tool for residents in earthquake-prone regions. Until such features are available, I find myself compelled to keep the app disabled, as the risk of being unnecessarily woken up outweighs the current benefits. I hope the developers will consider this feedback and introduce these essential enhancements to better serve the community’s needs and improve our preparedness for significant seismic events.

Brings phone to an absolute crawl. I’ve had this app for about a year — have never been alerted and have had no utility. My phone had been acting up — I couldn’t switch between applications without a noticeable lack of responsiveness. I was so furious and thought it was the latest iOS update. Then I decided a moment ago to check whether an application could be the culprit. This app was near the top — I noticed a near 24 hour consumption in the background standing near the top. I removed it and immediately the responsiveness of my phone was restored. My guess is this was built using JavaScript technologies and not native

Nice app. Happy to see this app but does it work for iPads? I downloaded it to both my iPhone and iPad. I have the notification settings the same on both devices, to always allow, yet I am getting notifications on my iPhone but not my iPad. **response from the developer is app is not yet set for iPads as initial focus is on phones at this time. iPads to come in the future. Makes sense - Thanks for the info!

Works as planned…. Just warned me of a 4.5 coming out of San Diego thirty seconds before it was felt. Announced it in loud clear terms. Others at my daughter’s stable immediately inquired about the app after the shaking stopped and were shocked to know that California has an early warning system in place. Maybe publicize this more?

Lovely, easy interface — and it worked for my friend!. We just had an earthquake here in California (on top of our first Hurricane Alert since 1930’s) and your app enabled my friend a few second’s notice. My Shake Alert LA app sent me a text several seconds AFTER the fact and it took minutes to refresh and show me the epicenter. Needless to say, I’ve added your App to all our phones

Got my alerts promptly but nothing there. Yesterday I got my first alert for a 5.7 earthquake in Rio Vista. But when I went to look, it was not shown on the map. In fact it still wasn’t there hours later. Finally saw it about 8 hours later and it been revised down to 4.2. News says it was lowered to 4.2 in 10 seconds but it didn’t show up at all in my app, so all had to go on all day was the alert.

It works. We had an earthquake yesterday and I got the notification before the system notification through our cell phone service came out. I knew at least two minutes before the earthquake hit.

GPS drains battery. Had to turn off location services for this app because it was killing my battery. Battery life is back, but now of course the app’s primary function is gone. 😔 Seems like a location call every ten minutes would be sufficient. Clicking “help” in the menu crashes the app every time. Doh! (iPhone 11, iOS 13.6.1). Gonna try iOS 13.7 soon… Oh, this app needs a serious alert sound! If I’m supposed to take immediate action because of an earthquake, it needs a siren, then to shout “EARTHQUAKE! EARTHQUAKE!” for at least 15 seconds.

Easy to use. Easy to change parameters for alerts. Reasonably good UI. We weren’t disturbed by an error alert in the middle of the night because we don’t keep our phones in our bedroom. Better than several of the alternatives in the App Store. Experienced an short earthquake today and the app alerted within a second of feeling the jolt. Of course it would be better to get the alert a few seconds before.

Apple Watch Support. I have found this app really helpful. I have gotten a couple earthquake alerts with it and they both times I received a notification from MyShake before my phone’s notification. I would love if they could add support for the Apple Watch. I’m not always looking down at my phone to see the alert, so having that alert come onto my Apple Watch would be much more useful!

App crashes. I’ve been trying to use the app since it was published but when I go to set my “Home-base Location” the app just crashes. It closes completely and doesn’t save my location. It’s been months since I tried to set it up the first time and I just stopped using it thinking it would probably get fixed but it’s still happening so if nobody’s reported this issue then FYI, it’s happening 😊

Just gave an early warning. Haven’t had the chance to properly review this because there haven’t been any earthquakes, but we just had one and this went off with an audible alert several seconds before we felt the shaking. Truly amazing!

It works. Today we got a warning. We literally had one minute to collect ourselves, pick a safe place in the house, and brace ourselves. We didn’t feel it but my mom did and called us freaking out. So this app is the difference between being able to get through it calmly or being surprised with an earthquake. Great job guys!

Great! Improved!. I’m so happy that they can prove this and updated it it it can really save lives. Just got a warning about the earthquake in Ventura. California is about an hour drive from here but still I felt a little bit here where I’m living in Huntington Beach!! and just the morning was So amazing! So necessary if you live in California especially! thank you thank you thank you!! Please keep up the good work!

Great app but so laggy. I opened the app and it froze. I opened the app tapping on I felt a shake, it froze again. It kept freezing. Never got a chance to write about my experience of the shake. My iPhone is on its latest update and all. Not very useful when the app keeps crashing while trying to alert others. The freeze happens randomly on different places. Once I clicked on “I felt a shake” it freezes sometimes. Sometimes it froze on write my experience. It also froze once when I just opened the app. It doesn’t work after the froze. I’ll have to close the app and reopen it. I can never know what’s next because I’m not able to get to it.

The app is great!. This app is very good, it alerted me about 12 seconds before shaking over here in El Centro in February of 2025. Overall, great app for alerts but there is a suggestion I want to make, there should be an option that lets you adjust the option at what minimum magnitude you get alerts from. And another optimization, is that you should be able to change the alert sound to a custom sound.

AWESOME APP!!!. I Love how you can see earthquakes around the world, it gives you GLOBAL view, but...I live in California, woke up this morning to a bunch of earthquakes in the Middle East. Can this be changed in the settings to narrow the view to just CA? Please help, otherwise GREAT APP and I look forward to those “seconds” warning to if and when the “BIG ONE” (earthquake) strikes. And Lastly, when I go to notifications and want to edit the location, “GLOBAL” does not highlight or edit, I’m ONLY able to toggle around the itself meter, that’s all. I would like to see under CA.

Worked perfectly yesterday!. I recently downloaded this app when prepping an earthquake kit. Yesterday was tropical storm Hilary in SoCal and this app notified me a good 10 seconds before the earthquake hit and gave me enough time to get to safety and text a friend before I felt it. I received the “amber alert” on my phone from the city basically as the earthquake hit. This app gave me valuable time, and much sooner than the city/state was able to.

💗 5 Stars. Ensure the settings on your phone and the settings within the MyShake app are configured correctly. Also, keep the app updated to the newest version! This really is a great app! While at work in a busy office/warehouse all of a sudden my MyShake app alerted to an earthquake about 7 seconds prior to the tremor that shook the whole building. After that event MyShake gained a handful of subscribes. Also, it's a free app made right here in Bay Area. Thank you to the makers of MyShake 💖🙌 YALL ARE ROCK STARS ;)

In CA? Get this app. Finally experienced two separate earthquake alerts. The value is the split seconds to begin thinking about how to react. In Loma Prieta it took me 5 seconds to realize it was a quake and figure out what to do, seems silly but 5 seconds is meaningful. With an alert my brain can go straight to “where am i safe?” mode.

So Far No Good. Well so far this app is a complete failure. My apartment literally just hard-core shake. I did a quick Google search and found that Redondo Beach had a 3.6 earthquake at the time I felt that big shake. Downloaded myshake app because I thought “well I guess I should’ve done that already so I had a warning.” I then tried to register that I felt an earthquake. It said no earthquakes were felt. Legitimately, I just had an earthquake that has already registered in the geological survey and myshake won’t even acknowledge its’ presence nevertheless have warned me about it. This app is getting deleted.

It worked!. We just had a 5.1 quake. A few moments before the quake I received a warning notice on my phone from this App. It gave enough notice to take cover before the quake hit. Not enough to get out of a high rise building, but enough to exit a standard home. We were able to take cover under our desks. It really worked!!

Consumed battery - but why?. In the past 24 hours, this app has consumed 25% of my phones battery life on background activity! What are you processing in the background? Meanwhile, the similar functionality of ShakeAlertLA, also configured to allow location access and background processing, has consumed zero percent battery life in the same 24 hour period. Something is seriously wrong with this app. The trouble is that the apps website says it’s not supposed to use significant battery, so why the doublespeak?

Terrible test planning. The app seems functional enough but the test alert at 3am PST was a terrible idea. Bypassing the phone silent setting for an earthquake warning is reasonable but the alert itself has no other indication that it’s coming from a phone besides just a male voice saying some stuff. Imagine being jolted a wake by a serious male voice right next to you without realizing it’s coming from your phone. I freaked out and I can’t imagine someone with PTSD dealing with this. A lot of people will uninstall for this reason and it defeats the purpose of the app.