Top Hat - Better Learning App Reviews

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Embarrassment. This app should be taken off the App Store because it is absolutely false advertising and a complete SCAM. $50 to register for 4 years? App is unresponsive and has text overlapping. Doesn’t work in lectures as it sporadically won’t let you click answers. If you’re a professor looking at these apps, Turning Point would be my suggestion. Used both and Turning Point does what it needs to and does it well. Top Hat won’t be a company that lasts too long I have a feeling. Embarrassing product.

waste of money. teacher had us buy it instead of just posting the powerpoint on canvas just so he can take attendance. half the time it won’t stop loading and you have to restart your computer and if you reload the page again you have to restart again. and the customer support isn’t even available on computer they tell you to go to the app. they say students feel more motivated to work with this it’s JUST a powerpoint application for 30$ extra it is such a waste of money

Money Scam. I would always use the website on my Mac in class so I could split the screen and take notes. it would never load, I would always be three-four slides behind, and my quiz questions would hardly ever load in time for me to answer them. I figured I’d just start using the app, but I have the same issues on the app that I have on my Mac. the connection is always “poor”, and my professor can’t ever use it either - and will insist that the students are taking up the bandwidth and are causing the app to crash and lag (?? don’t know where he got that from), costing us our attendance points. and I know I’m not the only one, whether it be in my class or across everyone who has bought the app, that has these issues daily. if I have to pay this much for an app that simply takes *attendance* and gives mini class quizzes, I expect it to work 100% of the time, flawlessly. the rest of my university uses a free attendance app and I have never had an issue with it - ever. drop your prices, and fix your interface. this app is a whole mess, a money scam, and absolutely ridiculous. if they have to charge for the app to keep it running and whatnot, why not $.99, $2.99, $4.99?? where did the $27 and $50 come from? the people buying it are college students with little income who are forced to by their professors. incredibly pathetic for something that never works.

Everything this app does can be done for free and with software that works better. This software and app are a waste of money. Much easier to just use a clicker and your schools course management system and save you students some cash. You can even use Plickers which is completely free if you don’t want them to have to buy a clicker. The material in their MarketPlace is mostly available for free on the web. There customer service is also lacking, good luck getting them to actually show up for an appointment.

Simple to Navigate. Little differences between the online version and the app. I appreciate the app saving my location from where I left off. Its never really cause too much of an issue. Well, except that the answers don’t vary too much unless the teacher allows (inputs the variation of answers lol, but normally the written answers are given so the teacher knows if your actually reading the text lol).. Its good for tho

Top Hat. The app is very smooth and fluent and have not experienced any issues with it at all whatsoever. I highly recommend teachers and professors to use this application. Attendance is tracked and small quizzes can be created. I’m a student and I honestly wish more professors used this and involved more of their work and quizzes in them.

A scam.. Tophat is a scam. I don't care what you say, I don't see how it's fair taking money from already broke college students like this. Because I have to pay for this app, I went weeks without food. The worst part is that you don't even know what classes are going to need it so you don't know how much you should pay for. I hate this capitalist piece of crap so much if I ever take another class that requires that I'm eating the professor 1 star as well. It doesn't even work sometimes or it crashes in the middle of a question. We already have clickers I don't understand why we need to pay for this too. If this costed less maybe I'd understand but at this price are you kidding me??? Stop making education cost more than it should I'm already starving.🤬🤬🤬

Not worth it. Professors- please don’t use Top Hat. I don’t know how this app is a 4.7 Stars. Every review I’ve read is 2 and below. I don’t even leave reviews for apps, but I felt this was necessary. I downloaded Top Hat because it is a requirement for my Organic Chemistry course. The textbook, homework, and assignments are all online. So far, it is awful. I spent over $100 for the subscription. Every note that I’ve highlighted and question I’ve answered on my computer does not sync to the app on my phone. This is a major issue because I need to access these notes during class, but they don’t show up in my phone app! Not only will they not sync on the app, but if I close the chapter or leave the page, the same thing happens. Everything disappears. For this much money, Top Hat really needs to fix their sync issues and add a save progress feature. I’ve even contacted support through Live Chat. They were unhelpful. The agent repeated that I was experiencing an issue, then the app crashed and I lost contact. For an app whose subscription is so expensive for college students who are financially struggling, you’d think it would have better accessibility and functionality. I hope this doesn’t affect my class grade.

Been nothing but a frustration. I hate that my teacher has decided to use this app. Most of the class was unable to get in before class because we couldn’t find the information needed to enter his class. The app is almost pointless to me since it crashes whenever I try to answer a quiz. I can read my textbook but at this point I would prefer a real textbook and online quizzes rather then this.

Sketchy. The app itself and its mediocre design and execution is not what bothers me. At the end of the day we all download this app because some professor thought a $30-dollar-per-semester was somehow going to improve our learning. What really bothers me is not knowing why am I forced to always say share my location with this app. Marking attendance with location makes sense, right? Except that the app does no allow you to be marked as present if the app location setting is on “while using the app”. If that wasn’t enough, I got a notification telling me how many times a week this app was using my location; guess what? The little map showed me that it was using it even when I was not in class (and therefore not even using the app). I am already paying for this service and I would like to know what exactly are they doing with my location. Also, toggling the location setting is not a solution; FIX YOUR APP!

I wish my professors would drop this app already. I’ve had to use this app for 2 different classes now and every time, I run into bugs. It says my bluetooth is off, when it’s not. It will fail to connect. Often, it glitches when the professor is switching slides, or doing a quiz with too many pop-ups, or when I tap to answer a question it just won’t answer it. When I was trying to view/ join the slideshow, often, it just won’t work. Usually the only way to work around the issues is to close and re-open the app until it works. It is so difficult to keep up in class with so many bugs and glitches I’m spending way too much time just trying to get it to work. At one point I got added to a class I had the previous semester, after I had left it, and I couldn’t leave it again, it just has so many bugs. This app, in no way is useful as a reliable classroom tool.

A lot of bugs!!!. I really don’t write negative reviews on any app but this top hat software has made me so frustrated. I’m subscribed to TopHat(paid a huge amount), and I have this app. But, sometimes when I am trying to review the answers after getting the answers, it doesn’t completely show me the answers. And, it doesn’t completely show some questions which has a lot of math or figures. If I try to load top hat on safari, google chrome, or google on my IPad, it takes about an hour to open up and show me something as “steeping tea”. It might work on good laptops or chrome books, but why can’t u fix the problems on handy devices. I am a student and I use my iPad to complete the homework problems on top hat. One time it took so long to load, I kept it beside me and slept and when I woke up, it was still loading.

University Scam. This is about on the same level as professors who write the textbook for their own classes. You have to pay for an app every semester in order to be marked present for class even though your sitting right in front of the professor and there’s a million other ways they could take attendance. I guarantee the school gets some kind of kickback from Top Hat. I’m not sure if the app is capable of doing anything else but Liberty University only uses it for attendance.

Creepy Stuff. Why does this app require me to set location services permission to “Always” and claims that it doesn’t use it outside of class and can be toggled off after my attendance is recorded? It seems like this is the perfect use for the While Using location access setting. This used to work but now whenever I try to submit my attendance it prompts me to change it to Always and will not allow me to submit my attendance until I set it to Always, whether I had previously set it to Off or to While Using. It also seems that their claim of only using my location during attendance is a complete lie, because twice I have left its location access on and got a notification from my phone saying that TopHat had been using my location in the background over the past 3 days.

Makes you get questions wrong. This app is only good for reading the textbook. If you get a question wrong and then try to fix it, the app is glitched somehow so that it won’t actually put the answer you changed it to. I made this mistake twice and got questions “wrong” when I actually got them right! Always answer questions on the top hat website, because this app is NOT reliable. I used to use this app, but after dealing with these glitches, I deleted the app and will NEVER use it again. Fix your app, because you are making people lose points on assignments for NO REASON. I WANT MY POINTS BACK.

Inconsistent- atrocious customer service. The app is poorly designed and makes content impractical to access at best. You can’t download slide shows off the app. Content availability is inconsistent across the different portals (browser vs phone vs tablet). The browser isn’t made to be compatible with safari, completely ignoring the fact that Apple makes up much of the computer market. Customer service is slow and rude. I filed for help over a week and a half ago. The first email response took over two days; the next was quicker, but offered no assistance and completely ignored the information I had given them earlier, instead treating me like I just didn’t understand how to use the app. The third response showed up SEVEN DAYS after I replied to the impotent email “support” in the second email. IF YOU WANT TO BE IN ACADEMIA, BE RELIABLE. Homework due dates are typically less than 10 days out. Don’t sell a service you don’t have the ability to adequately provide.

Unnecessary. I am currently using tophat and I would say it’s annoying as can be. Yea the reps would reply to you and they are helpful and try their best to help you but how the answer key is set up, is extremely stupid. Many times I submit my answers, it kept telling me it’s wrong and I was right the whole time. This platform allows you to waste time and energy. This platform is stupid. I hate it and I would tell anyone if their professor is using tophat not to take the class at all. I have been stuck on one question for 3 days and I gave up. I would never recommend to anyone.

Due dates taken off. Pretty aggravated they did away with due dates. I could see the due dates on my phone up until about a week, maybe 2 weeks ago. I thought my professor took the due dates off since we were so behind. Had no clue that Tophat took them down. 2 late assignments later and I figure out what the problem is. Not real happy about this at all! What’s the point of paying for this app if it’s only going to be halfassed?? The point of the app is so you don’t have to log in online every time. Sure would be nice if this was fixed and due dates were put back on there.

Terrible app for students TOTAL SCAM!. I have a lot of professors who buy into tophat and force us to use it for in class quizzes. It seems easy enough on the professors’ end but for the students using their phones it is total garbage. It works like an endless string of popup windows and notification banners every time the professor opens a quiz. The lag is terrible and the submit button doesn’t always work. It won’t stop opening a banner letting me know I’ve been marked present every other question. I have to exit out just to get to the next question. There is not anyway for the student to turn off the constant pop ups. Piazza is a much better app for students. Further more they like to lock up your account and charge hidden fees mid semester! That is the definition of extortion!

Good. I mean it’s required by my professor but I had no problem with the app. I don’t like I had to pay for it even if it’s something just used for attendance and answer a few questions throughout the lecture. Btw if you have trouble answering the question Socratic is a amazing app to help quickly even if the questions are timed.

Location. Tophat does not work if location services are on “only while using” however it works if location services are on “Always”. There is no reason for location to be on permanently unless using during class. I have noticed the location symbol on and it is concerning. I have been marked absent for not having location on my laptop. Apart that it is using battery, the breech in privacy is not worth it. This is an application to help students and teachers, not a hindrance that gives students a disadvantage. I completely understand the reason to have location on while on tophat. But to mark a student absent because location services are not set to always is not unacceptable. Attendance codes are available to ensure students are in the classroom.

Crappy App Fake Reviews. It’s pretty clear just from scrolling through the list of reviews that tophat has paid to have favorable reviews written about their app. All the genuine reviews written by actually students are all one star ratings, which is understandable considering from my first hand experience this is just another educational cash grab. This app is entirely designed to be marketed for teachers to save time and create a literal hell for students with a UI/UX experience that seems like it was designed by your parents who can’t figure out how their iPhone works.

Refund. I tried to get a refund for an unused subscription and was denied because it was after the 2 week refund period. My professor had a hard time trying to figure how to use it but insisted she would figure it out. COVID-19 started and she abandoned it for the easier to use school site we have. I’ve used the program for another class before and it worked well but the company policy and customer care is lacking. I had another peer who submitted the same complaint same time I did and received a refund.

Well done, chef. It’s not like canvas, but I’m grateful for the mobile accessibility and ease. Sure, not all my classes are on here but, for the ones that are, the assignments, textbook, and grades are all easy to see and with little to no technical issues, I can read and do all of my assignments from anywhere.

Terrible. This app is literally so bad it’s just a cash grab for the dumbest corporation ever. There are plenty of other ways to achieve what this app does by not using it. I will forever hat this app and the fact I was forced to spend $75 on it. The mobile version is an absolute horror never in my life have I seen such terrible connection issues and bad user interface. If I didn’t need this for a grade for my class and was essentially forced to purchase it, you better believe I would have saved that money without a second thought.

It could be better. The app is still terrible at hosting large numbers of students at the same time and I don’t like how when a professor is presenting slides you have to always exit out of the current slide to go to the next instead of the more logical style of staying in the expanded version and just swipe to the next slide when they’re ready.

Overall great app. Great app. Just an idea... I think when you open the app it should have the class that you’re in at the top of the list. I think if the instructors had to input the days of the week the class meets and the time their class is it would be an easy feature to add. I gave it 4 stars because I don’t like that to Mark attendance you have to allow the app to always use your location. I think in using your location while using the app would be sufficient.

I hate this app already & my instructor is useless. I hate when professors only find a product that is useful for them and don’t care about the struggles of their students. I like cengage better. Why am I doing too much to not pay for this until I try it on a trial? In on day 2 and I still can’t get the app to work on the free trial period. The app and the website keep trying to make me pay. I’m like pay for what? The instructor even said in the syllabus that the textbook may not be featured right away on this platform, so what is the rush to pay for access b4 experience? I don’t like it....

The iPad app is not supported, and will not be updated. If you are a professor wanting to use this for presenting slides in class, be aware then virtually none of the features they tell you exist are available reliably on the IPad app. The rep finally admitted they weren’t designed to work with the new OS, and they have no plans to ever make it compatible. The only way you can annotate slides reliably is using a mouse, which they for some reason think is functional. The content they claim is so great is riddled with errors and has serious gaps that render it useless. Another sad tale of a tech company that thought scaling quickly was more important than doing something well.

Location symbol wont go away because of this app. I always had my tophat locations settings”always on”. However, in the past couple days, its been collecting my location even when I'm not using the app which is why I was having the location symbol all the time. I had to disable the location for every app I had to find which one was causing the location symbol to appear and tophat was the cause. I changed the location preference to “while using” and that made the location symbol go away. I wonder why your app is collecting my location even though I wasn't using the app?

Excellent if the professor knows how to use it. I am lucky when I have professors who know how to properly use this app in a way that facilitates learning and retention of material. When the professor doesn’t know how to utilize the app, and uses it in a distracting way or cannot use the interface, that takes time out of the class and frustrates me and other learners. This app is pretty solid for students as it provides a good learning platform to assess learned facts as well as a source of review questions. I can’t imagine what it must be like to be a professor and write hundreds of questions per semester for this app, though. Thankfully, I’m not a professor!

Definitely got better. The way that the professor utilizes this app is definitely important. Since you can't receive notifications for due dates, your professor will hopefully be diligent about that. Other than that, I think this is a really nice tool for classrooms. It's interactive, and has some cool question types (heat maps, clicking on images, matching, etc) although some of them are either difficult to use or don't work because my professors struggled. What's cool is you can go back and forward in the slides your professor has up so if you're a slow writer you can still get all the notes. Overall, this is a really nice idea and needs a little work but I enjoyed having it in my class. Definitely could do with more organization in the content, it's a little overwhelming when all the slides are posted and you're trying to study.

Best Learning App.. Very useful app. I am able to do my homework where ever and it looks fine when I’m reading. Only issue is when answering questions, it will mark them as unanswered when they have been answered. If I click on the question, it will show my answer. I just didn’t like how it would take a while to change to answered. Other then that, great app.

Options. I have the app and find it useful, but is there a way to put an option tab under account for more purchases that Top Hat has to offer? No one could find the option, and went through the website. Since most of us in my class bought the year subscription we thought it came with proctored exams, and it doesn’t. So id also like to see an update with the status of our subscriptions, like how many days we have left, which services are available with that subscription, and a purchase tab to see what is available.

Missing some helpful functionality. Some of my professors choose to store documents in old top hat classes, which isn’t a strength of tophat. I wish there was a way to reorder the class list, as some classes will use it often and others I can basically ignore. Or an option to favorite certain classes. Not the worst app ever but not perfect either

Location abuse. This app requires that you have location services set to always when a teacher has the setting on to verify that your physically in the classroom when taking attendance. “While using” should suffice but it doesn’t.

A hip class structure with no functionality.. If you have a crippling case of FOMO then this is for you, however If you don’t then you will ultimately find this application/service pointless. Schools and universities without an integrated web platform may get some use out of this, but for those who already have one, this is just another worthless service to add on top of your schools online platform. Almost no functionality on any mobile devices; the interface is less inspiring than MS DOS. File previews don’t exist. The instructors and TAs are either technologically illiterate (unlikely), or this program is about as user friendly as an etch-a-sketch. This product is not ready to be something a student is required to pay for. It’s basically in the pre alpha development stage. I would be willing to pay another 28 dollars to not have to use this for the rest of the semester. I wish I could have rated it one star, but Tophat isn’t even inspiring enough to warrant that much rage or disgust. Mediocre garbage.

Awful user interface. My professors use this app during lecture scrolling through PowerPoints but if you’re trying to take notes from slides, the app keeps switching slides automatically. Also, the PowerPoints are a third of your screen which makes it impossible to try and read of it, it’s super small and if you zoom in it won’t let you change slides unless you need to leave the lecture and enter it again. Just really awful app if you’re trying to follow the professors lecture and take the quizzes. It would be nice if you could have the whole PowerPoint already open for you to scroll around and make it the whole screen. Even on a computer I have to zoom in, it makes my eyes hurt!

Professor Review. This product vastly overpromises and under-delivers. Other than the attendance feature, which works fine, the rest of the platform has serious flaws. There is no weekend support, when support is around, they seem unknowledgeable beyond the basics. Further, TopHat test isn’t viable for distance / online / hybrid programs, the Test feature won’t work for all platforms, there is no way to adjust the gradebook to accommodate exam changes, students can’t use their electronic notes on the same device as their test, etc etc. Worst of all, students have to pay for this product. I won’t use it next semester.

Why does it glitch so much, the app doesn’t even load content. I am extremely disappointed with this app, it really delays me getting the work done. The app doesn’t even open certain pdf documents and in the beginning of the semester the videos weren’t even playing, I only use the website now but it continues to glitch, the letters on the answer choices get smaller and smaller. I don’t understand how such a program can have so many defects. I used it a year ago for a different class and I never had a problem with it but now it’s extremely disruptive and annoying. The letters won’t stop glitching so it’s hard to read and I have to continue to reload to look at the answers normal size before they get extremely small. Very sad and frustrating, this is taking a lot of time.

Location services make me feel unsafe. For attendance, it requires location, which makes sense. However, the service ONLY works if location is set to “Always”. Selecting “Only While Using App” doesn’t work. I have to change my location services back and forth between “never” and “always”. It’s annoying and invasive. I just want it to only take my location when I’m having my attendance accounted for, not while I’m outside the classroom. It’s bad enough I have to pay for this service when there are better free alternatives, but having my location tracked is just annoying.

Trash, utter trash. Beyond terribly designed app. It’s by far the worst thing I’ve ever used. Who designed this? Who is in charge? Top hat please fire everyone at this forsaken company because you clearly do not know how to make an app. I cannot even type anything out without there being a myriad of issues. I cannot see the screen if I don’t scroll at some arbitrary speed. How was this allowed to be used by universities? Professors, if you’re thinking about using this app for your class, just don’t. Your students will thank you.

Love it for school but. I use this app nearly everyday for professional school and its layout is clean and easy to use; however, it desperately needs Apple Watch compatibility. It would save me login time and fumbling with multiple devices, especially when I need to login in a clinical setting.

Your grade will suffer due to bugs. What a terribly written application. The fact that I’m forced to use this for class is ridiculous. The privacy policy also allows them to collect data on you as a student and there is no way to opt out of this. I guarantee they’re selling email addresses and other marketability data from your time using this. Terrible company, terrible app, terrible service. Avoid at all costs. There are abundant FREE open source alternatives that work far better without the invasive data collection/selling.

Unusable. I was roped into top hat based on the promise that I could deliver interactive lectures from my iPad (iPad Pro 12.9”). This was and remains a lie. I cannot even view my own courses content on this app. Instead I get the error: this specific type of item is not available on mobile. Restated, the digital book isn’t viewable on an iPad. Every other publisher with an ebook has this feature except top-hat. The content of some of the books are inaccurate as there doesn’t appear to be a peer review process for verifying content.

Great in theory, terrible in execution. Not like I had a say in my purchase anyways.... Yes, I agree that teachers need to hold their students accountable for attending class. But when you end up getting questions wrong because the app won’t allow you to submit answers, there’s a clear problem there. It has happened to me numerous times and I consider myself a good student in class, but constantly end up missing “clicker questions”. (Especially when your professor only gives you 20-30 seconds to answer a question and you can’t even answer in time). My chemistry class at my university is centered around this app, and to have to pay for a subscription service with so many bugs to play a role in determining my grade is entirely unfair. If you are a professor reading this considering using Top Hat for your lecture, please look elsewhere, and avoid placing unnecessary stress on your students!

Never loads and impossible to study with. I had to use top hat for a chemistry course and it would never load. Halfway through me trying to use it to study it would always stop loading. I’ve used the app and the website and it doesn’t matter, it doesn’t work. I’ve wasted hours of my life cumulatively by waiting for the app/website to load. I’m not exactly using this in my free time and it’s very inconvenient when it takes me twice as long to study because it won’t load. The concept of the app is nice and could’ve been a great tool, but it’s not because of how slow/glitchy it is.

Mobile App Flaws. I love TopHat for my lectures and I think it’s a wonderful way to absorb new material. It has a really clean and user-friendly interface. However, it is virtually unusable on the mobile app. Maybe it’s just the iPhone, but I’ve used TopHat on several different iPhone models and it is extremely frustrating. The videos will time out and end unexpectedly, the app frequently crashes, attempting to do my homework questions on the mobile app is completely out of the question (as it will continuously freeze or divert you to the top of the page without notice). Overall, a great app to use on a non-mobile device, but I don’t recommend relying on this app if a mobile device is all you have access too. And since today many of us students are always on the go and like to absorb new material in a variety of ways, I have to say this app is just not it. Nothing more frustrating than paying exorbitant prices for tuition and then you can’t even have the content delivered effectively! I wish my school would abandon TopHat and use something more functional all around!

They updated and didn’t fix it. They had it right 3 updates ago where you clicked on a chapter and you had a menu on the top right corner where you were able to jump to a specific section, or you saw the questions without having to click on a button that opened into a new page just to see it...utter nonsense! Thank goodness that the semester is almost over and I hope my next classes won’t use this platform!

Top Hat review. Top Hat is a pretty good app. It is the app my chemistry teacher at college uses to track attendance, and I think it is pretty amazing that the app is able to see people in the class who are around you and how far you are from them, so it can mark you present in the class. My teacher also uses the app to give us points for attending class, and to give us our quizzes in the class that also get graded and give us points for the class.

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Needs highlighting ability on iPhone and iPad. Great app and a pleasure to use but would really be beneficial if you could highlight whilst reading on iPhone and iPad! Otherwise laptop is the only option. Please please include in next update.

Top hat. Stopped working once downloaded new update. Now can't access or use at all.

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Dark mode. Dark mode looks really bad. It’s a combination of white and black and the grey on blue makes the words hard to see

Crashes. Was in a lecture doing graded in class problems and would’ve gotten an 80 or higher if the app didn’t crash every time I put in an answer

Intentionally limits access to info offline. So im a student living on barely anything while trying to support my family. I used a list provided to me by my college to access the books i needed directly. When i purchased my books i found out afterwards that after handing over $280 of money i really cant replace, for 4 separate books, that i cant access them offline… smh! How am i supposed to do my work??? I have to go to a library just to use their internet! Now i cant even do my homework or assignments outside class time because i need to be near wifi to access my paid for content. So so useless! Thanks for scathing the students and withholding needed info for a premium !!! It is sickening actually and will tell everyone i meet. I did not know the link provided to me did not include a pdf copy. Now i need to find money i dont have to buy a more expensive copy that includes the pdf…. Edit: lol half my class has the pdf and they shared it with everyone that doesn’t have one.. so i guess your system to stifle academic student progression is horribly flawed and i will also share that with everyone i meet in up coming classes. Its hard to have a study group over the phone when i cant see the info everyone else is talking about!

Not worth paying for. I have to use this app for my class right now...so many technical problems. Right now, PDFs from my prof aren’t appearing in the mobile app. The grading function is inaccurate/misleading for students. Also, if during class you have to toggle between lecture material and some other area of the app, the app won’t return you to the lecture slide you last flipped to—it sends you back to the beginning of the lecture slides, and you have to quickly scroll through and try to find the last slide you were on. In a lecture with 20+ slides, flipping through is really frustrating and time-consuming. The lecture slideshow on the mobile app doesn’t allow you to download the lecture. Can’t believe I had to pay for this. The app can’t do such basic, intuitive things. It’s not made to function in a university setting. Never again.

Amazing teaching tool. As helpful as it is it still has lots of usability problems so not a 5 star

Always Require location. It has to be set to always using location to use the app , so frustrating

Useless Text Book. We have three different digital textbook providers in my program and Top Hat doesn’t even compare to the other two. There are no page numbers in the e-book on this platform so citations are impossible. There is also no search function, so finding a certain piece of information is very difficult (especially with no page numbers!) Do not recommend at all. This is a very frustrating e-text platform.

Could be better. Love everything about it - however, I wish it could send lecture question notifications so I didn’t have to keep the screen open and or pay attention constantly.

It’s okay. It’s okay but my biggest issue is that you have to have location services to always on. For attendance. Why can’t it be while using the app? I feel this is not needed and changing the setting everytime is annoying. If they can explain why they need locations services all the time instead of only while using it would be appreciated

Screen split. It is great app, but it is not possible to split the screen in iPad Pro like other apps.

would be perfect if you could split screen multitask on ipad pro. please fix this man

Great teaching tool. I am am instructor and I’ve used Top Hat in my classes for the past two years. It has radically changed the teaching experience for me and the learning experience for my students. It makes the class interactive and it motivates students to engage with the material. I get lots of positive feedback about it on student evaluations each semester. Highly recommend it to students and professors.

I have no idea why it is so highly rated!. Why there is no book in normal format where you can just easily move through pages?

4 stars ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ app, but can't reply to discussion on iPhone. Can't reply to discussion on iPhone

Super unbearable. This app keeps crashing after every question. So i’ll open a question, then answer it and then when i go to open another question it keeps freaking crashing . Super annoying and it sucks because i actually need to use this app.

Not Accessible. This app does not work with Apple iPhone text to speech.

Feedback. awesome !!

Horrible. The worst conceivable textbook access tool. I’m convinced the company holds weekly meetings on how to make the process harder for students. Genuinely thought about dropping out while attempting to get access to a single textbook I'd already paid for. Company should be dissolved immediately and all high-ranking staff should be jailed indefinitely

Avoid if you can. Membership costs way too much for what it is. Feels almost like a scam when other websites offer the same for free. Also buggy sometimes.

notifications. How on earth do I turn on notifications so I don’t constantly have to check the app when a question is being asked!!!!???? Please this is so tedious and annoying.

Terrible for students. Makes information more difficult to understand for the students for no reason. For a professor this is a great cop out!

Notifications. Unfortunately they removed the feature where you received notifications when new questions were posted. I wish this feature would be re-added, but otherwise the app usually works well.

Notification option. Having a notification option for when questions appear on screen, would be quite useful to the users

Life changing!. I love this app, has completely changed college.

Please. Useless app, I subscribed for 1 term and this app told me my account expired in less than a month. Now I can't even take my attendance, SMS doesn't find my phone number either. I don't care about that $30 but 10% attendance weights too much!!

Poor tablet support. Fumbles tablet support. Doesn’t handle presenting content well on tablets and it was recently changed to be worse. Doesn’t support Apple Pencil. No reading offline for a textbook I’ve paid for, not even in the app. Even digital editions lets me do that. Also this is not necessarily a reflection of the app but it’s pretty poor practice to be letting professors upload what seem like literal first drafts with typos in every chapter. Reflects poorly on them as a legitimate publisher and makes them seem more like way to exploit students whose professors get to assign their own textbook on here at a relatively low cost and profit. Decently slick UI.

student account only？. Lost my TA status after login in on ipad！ Stupid Bot support, no online chat agent, technical support response very slow.

Worst app, horrible for someone trying to study. It freezes every couple of mins. And it’s so bugged that I can’t even hit the send button when trying to report a problem on the iPad Pro app. I have the latest updated version and it’s buggier than ever. It previously already had a problem where occasionally when I try to highlight something it’ll freeze. After the March.30th update it’s now more frequent than every! I hate this and it slows my studying tremendously. As a student I wish my prof didn’t use this!

crashes. likes crashing a lot whenever i have it open to the gradebook. also doesn’t update in real time so i miss some questions sometimes. could use some work

scamming poor students. I cant believe i have to pay extra costs for this terrible program. Ive only used it for 2 courses and they were both my lowest grades. I feel ripped off and wish I wasnt forced by my professor to have to pay an extra cost I cant even afford. This should be illegal, students have no negotiation power and no rights. I had to delay getting a textbook so I could pay for this and get attendance marks. This program is so elitist, I am not suprised theyre logo and company name is associated with classist symbolism. Absolutely outrageous. I also saw other comments mentioning location tracking all the time— which I didnt even know! So theyre also making money off of our privacy too. This should is WRONG!

Cannot login with my correct password. I tried hundreds times resetting my password however never logged in although I have paid successfully

Needs Notifications. This needs notifications for when a new question, or mark, etc. is started in the app. Would make things good for when people are sick from school, late, etc.

Absolutely terrible.. Slow to respond, inordinate wait times, and it would be really great if I could exit out of a question without it going back two menus which I then have to go back through to answer the next question. This app is great at wasting your time. Now, a few weeks later, icons are broken and some questions won’t load at all. Some questions periodically reset while you’re in the middle of answering them. The goal is to get BETTER, TopHat. This is such absolute garbage it’s actually infuriating.

Not able to switch slides. The new video on does not let me switch slides and load them properly as well.

Please support iOS 11 and in-app pdf, ppt, word preview. Hi, I really would like you guys to provide an update to fully support iOS 11 multitasking features cuz normally I would have top hat open on one side and taking notes down on the other side. Also please add support to in-app pdf, word, ppt preview

Seems to work, but app constantly breaks down. I tried to set up a test professor and test student account. It seems to work to post a question to get results. The free trial of one week is way too short. However, the app constantly breaks down and I have to restart. Using iPad.

good app but goshdarn. good app i guess profs love seeing students give away more money for mandatory course material infuriating

Paywall Garbage. As if I didn’t already have to spend enough on university without paywall grades. In the way my professors are using it, it is not at all worth the money I am forced to spend for 10% of my grade. Quizzes could easily be offloaded to Canvas and lectures to BBCollaborate to get around making students pay for an unstable and unhelpful platform. Shame on the creators for forcing themselves in a place the needn’t be.

Student point of view. The platform and ebook are not as helpful as I thought. I bought the ebook version to have accessibility access, such as a read-aloud and search function and, in general, to have a better experience navigating online. I won’t recommend the app as you can’t access these functions. It’s more expensive than buying a printed book, and you will only have access to your ebook if you pay for the app. I only pay for two terms and would like to have access to the ebook forever. Keep in mind that you can’t have a refund. I’ll buy the printed book, so I’ll be paying more than $200 to have a better experience.

No support for iPhone X. Just saw the app has an update. Still no support for iPhone X

Location. Why does this app require my location when not using the app just for attendance? Seems like an unnessecary invasion of privacy. Please allow us to only provide location ‘while using app’.

It works well but its a pretty useless student tool. Ive been using tophat for three course now and its honestly just a glorified attendance sheet that costs 30$ a term. My prof set the location on for his attendance which is reasonable because its not hard to trick the system into thinking you are present in class when you are not. But this app insists i turn my location on at ALL TIMES even if im not in school or not in the app. Why does tophat need to have my location at all times when it only truly needs a location snapshot at the time of my attendance marking. Moving along to the glorified attendance sheet. For small classes i dont see why the prof would use this application. Two of the three classes ive taken with tophat have been small under 30 student classes and they use tophat for not only presence but also for a glorified powerpoint too! The projectors in classes are likely large enough to accommodate the students in the class. Sure with tophat you can have live powerpoints that change slides when the prof does, woopty doo i can do that myself if the prof posts his slides in advance. Lastly the quiz part of the app is likely the only feature thats worth integrating in classrooms. Its pretty neat ill admit. Unlike other websites ive seen you can set a timer limit for all of the questions together and not necessarily individually. But 30$ a term is steep for students just to get a smoother running attendance sheet, powerpoint and socrative quiz. Maybe the more my school starts to use it the better it will get if the profs talk amongst one another to better use the software. But right now until my profs actually use the textbook feature when for one price of 30$ you can have your textbook at ur fingertip. No matter how many classes. Until i see this happen in my school i find this a poor use of my money. Also either all my profs go all in or all out. It’s annoying to pay for a service only for one class. But i suppose due to the newness of tophat here its only normal.

Want a physical copy of textbook.. The ebook comes without a search feature and there are no page numbers, seriously? I end up wasting so much time looking for things. They don’t offer a physical textbook either.

Great but.... I’ve missed a few tophats, my prof paused the question and reopened it. My previous answer was lost and my tophat went unanswered. It’d be nice if it would’ve reread my previous answer and used that as an answer. I’d also LOVE out of app notifications every time a prof opens a question although I doubt that’s happening anytime soon 😂!

Useless. The app doesn’t save the progress of the reading, every time it opens the chapter in the first page. The slides I have to open and close one by one… really? Useless app. Does not worth the bites used in my device storage. Uninstalling…

Needs bug fix. For the last 2 weeks top hat has been crashing whenever I attempt to answer a lecture question. This needs to be fixed as students are loosing marks because of the app crashing.

Piece of trash wants way too much data. Insists you have to set location permissions to always instead of while using app.

no multitasking. this app is for students, it should really support multitasking on iPadOS.

Keeps freezing during login.. I purchased a 4-month membership using my laptop before downloading the app to use in class. I started typing in my password and the thing froze. I tried it again several times and it kept freezing. I'm a little annoyed now since I have to bring my laptop with me to class, but I guess this is the kind of thing I should've expected from a free app. 🙄

Customer service is terrible. After trying to reach customer support on an issue I am being left with automated responses and support staff who are not helpful at all. I am constantly asking to speak with management about this to no avail.

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A fix for crashes. This is me second review Apparently my first time installing this app it did not work but a quick fix was uninstalling the app and installing it again and now it works amazingly good.

Can’t complete work. As a college student who needs to work online daily to complete assignments, this is by far the worst app I have ever had to use. Everytime I click on the work that is assigned to me, the app freezes up and crashes. And when I can type, some inputs on the smartphone do not register as correct inputs, even though what I am typing is a correct answer. This app refuses to work when I need it the most.

Needs improvement. I usually have issues logging into class about once a week. My teachers just mark me absent and it effects my grade, so that gets annoying. Also, you cannot split the screen with this app on the iPad. It would be extremely beneficial to be able to take notes on another app while I’m reviewing the slideshow on Top Hat. Please make adjustments.

App Crashes. I just updated my phone to IOS 12 and it keeps crashing. I love top hat and everything about it but I wish this could be fixed soon so I get my attendance and participation points for my class.

Great app that allows you to study on the go.. Great app, just would like if it were an audible so I can listen to the book as I am driving, esp driving long distance.

Top Hat. Sometimes the app wouldn’t let me highlight. When it did, sometimes I would go back and the highlights weren’t there anymore. Overall, I like the app and the questions. It’s easy to use and navigate.

This app is trash for students. My teacher assigned our material via the top hat site and there is a textbook I had to PAY FOR. I CANNOT download the book. I CANNOT access the textbook offline. I CANNOT highlight, bookmark, make notes or anything else that would be useful. I contacted support and they told me that’s correct; I cannot do those things. This app is even worse than their site. It’s trash for students.

Misled an entire class room. TopHat was contacted by our professor before use. After having all students in the class register for the app service, TopHat came back to say that taking tests required an extra fee. They locked the class out of the classroom group thus interrupting our professor’s class schedule. Thanks TopHat. I definitely didn’t want to learn today. There are also bugs with older devices and geo-location.

Videos or video transcripts don’t open. Whats the point of making us download an app if it won’t be able to open the contents? I need to view the videos or atleast study the video transcript because these videos are graded. Fix this please and fix the website itself as it won’t even open anything at all on my iPhone and my iOS is 12.1

Kinda Creepy. The app works great in class and is super efficient at taking attendance and giving quizzes, but the fact that it has to track your location at all times in order to record your attendance seems highly unnecessary and kind of creepy.

It’s a great.. I love the fact that this app allows you to be anywhere and your still able to see and participate with the class even if you’re not there. My only issue is that it glitches out and and won’t allow me to do my assignments. It’s extremely irritating.

Its Annoying that tophat always asks me to access my locations and Bluetooth. Whenever I want to use TopHat for class it won’t let me log in if I have my locational services on, “allow when using” mode. But wants me to keep my location always on to even log into the app. Not only that, it wants to access my Bluetooth always on as well.

Location. There’s a lot of good and helpful things about this program, but it’s frustrating and even somewhat creepy that location must always be on for location based attendance to work. If that changed to “only when using,” that would be really appreciated.

Perfect. I love this app. I prefer it over using the web browser on my laptop. I literally just lay in bed reading my textbook and doing my homework. It doesn’t freeze or lag and it’s nicely organized.

Wonderful. It was wonderful using the experience of top hat it gave a open variety of choices and let you see hands on what mistakes you and the class made

Top Hat. While the program is easy to use it is incredibly difficult to get customer support or a refund I dropped a class due to a scheduling conflict and would need this next semester. If you are a teacher there are much better ways to ensure attendance than this app questions, quizzes, flicker questions and many others. If you find your self using this rethink of how you can use technology to better your own and your student experience .

Always makes my answer wrong!. When my question is “select all apply” and I get my answers wrong and i have another attempt I fix them and click right answers and then submit it automatically saves the wrong answers!!! This always happens and it’s really becoming Titus.

Needs a bit of fixing, At least on the phone. This app is good and all, But sometimes my app freezes and doesn’t let me back into my lecture that I’m participating in, and it won’t unfreeze until the lecture is over. I’ve tried signing in and out and turned off my phone, didn’t help at all, fix this and it’s a stellar app

Frustrating. One of the most frustrating horrible apps I’ve been forced to use throughout my lifetime. If you have to leave the app for any reason and then come back to it, it will take you straight back to the homepage so you have to find the course again, then the chapter, then scroll down to the right spot, and THEN open the question back up.

Costs too much. Just hate that I had to spend 50 bucks for the different features. I don’t understand why it has to be so expensive. Most of us are truly struggling financially and if we have a job we hate to spend our $8-10/hour checks on something like this.

Okay, but glitchy. The app is decent, but glitchy. Would be nice if the app didn’t kick you out of the content/textbook reading section if the lecturer opens up a Top Hat question. A better idea would be a notification with the option to click on it to exit the content window. The computer version does this.

App freezes and closes. When you are doing assignments on iOS (newest version iPhone 12 Pro Max) the app will freeze and then close. This makes doing homework a pain when the app constantly forces itself to close. Other than that, it’s fine.

Please add split screen. Using this app on my iPad is helpful but since the app isn’t optimized for split screen it is very difficult to take notes and use top hat at the same time since i use my iPad to also take notes. Please add the capability to use split screen on iPads, I’m sure I’m not the only one with an iPad that also uses top hat.

Terrible App. This app is the most clunky and badly managed classroom app I’ve used. Simply selecting a right answer is a challenge as the Mobile version will leave questions as unanswered even after the correct answer is placed, leaving me confused about if my question was properly submitted or not. It constantly leaves my place and force quits, closing my progress. Terrible.

Gone downhill. The app was working perfectly fine all semester until the most recent update. Ever since the newest version of the app came out, it crashes within thirty seconds every time I open it. I used to enjoy doing homework and answering questions from my phone, but I no longer have that luxury and I am disappointed. Please debug this app!

Amazing App. If you have a course that uses Top Hat and you’re consider Ming the app, definitely get it. It works so well, never had any issues with it all semester, and it’s so convenient! Seriously great app!

frustrated. since the latest update the app won't stay open for longer than 5 mins before crashing, i can't leave a good review. i enjoyed the app. before the most recent update; for the most part, i had zero problems with it! very frustrating for me, as TopHat is used heavily in my college algebra class.

Keeps logging me out. We use this for attendance for one of my classes so we have to use it everyday. The app works decently while using it but it fully logs me out every time. It doesn’t make the app unbearable but it seems like a super easy fix that would make this app much less annoying to use.

Location services. I think top hat is a beneficial service, but why does the app need permission to track my location always? It should only need it while I’m using the app, invasion of privacy!

Works fine, permissions are weird. Tried to access my class today and needed to set my location permissions to Always, rather than just While Using. Strange that I would need to let Top Hat use my location even when I'm not in class marking my attendance.

New update is terrible. App is good considering I have to have it. However the new update is garbage compared to the last one. You can only see one slide at a time and have to exit each slide until you can go to the next one. Would be a 3/5 if the app had a better way to work and see slides.

No video on iPhone 😢. Even with the update from 7 hours ago, my instructor’s lessons (that are only uploaded here as videos) don’t play. This really ruins any chance to study or review when I can’t be stuck sitting in front of a screen. When this basic functionality is addressed, it would also be amazing for the video to continue to play as audio when the screen is locked. There’s also video playback issues on the other devices, but I don’t have time to go into all that. Please fix these things asap and stop charging us for stuff we can’t use.

Grades horribly. I hate this system so much. When they ask for answers I will put the units because it didn’t specify otherwise and count me wrong only for that reason. I would put the appropriate amount of sig gigs and it would count it wrong. My professor kinda told me it is what it is I mean they have fixed the problem since then but my points won’t come back.

Why am I paying money for a product that doesn't work?. Why am I paying money for a product that doesn't work? I'm pretty sure that's called false advertisement and it's an illegal practice. I paid for this stupid service as a struggling student and it doesn't even work. Before you take advantage of students that are already paying for books and tuition, make sure your product actually works!

Embarrassment. This app should be taken off the App Store because it is absolutely false advertising and a complete SCAM. $50 to register for 4 years? App is unresponsive and has text overlapping. Doesn’t work in lectures as it sporadically won’t let you click answers. If you’re a professor looking at these apps, Turning Point would be my suggestion. Used both and Turning Point does what it needs to and does it well. Top Hat won’t be a company that lasts too long I have a feeling. Embarrassing product.

Close, not quite there. The idea is awesome, and I prefer this over a lot of other engagement solutions in the classroom. The UI isn’t totally intuitive yet, though, and some features are missing. One in particular that bothers me is the lack of split screen mode on the iPad. Without it I can’t take notes and watch the lecture simultaneously.

Don’t make the same mistake as me. After using Top Hat in my class for two semesters, I can definitely say it created more problems than it solved. At least one student every class would have connection problems and the application quit out halfway through a midterm exam. Do not use this app in your school.

Please make this compatible to split screen!. It works great and looks very nice, but I wish i could split my iPad Pro screen to where I can take notes while having the powerpoint at my control in case I fall behind on notes without having to move the skinny screen (which I wish I could make half the screen size) out of the way constantly

Worst App and Company EVER!!. I had to use this app for one of my college classes, and it was causing me problems from the first day I used it. This app has so many glitches with the attendance, slides, and quizzes. Other people from my class also complained of issues. I contacted them about my issues and they weren’t any help. I really wish I could get my money back, because it was definitely wasted. I’d give -5 stars if I could.

Actually garbage. I’d appreciate if the software worked. However, all my professors use the software differently. The UI is Janky, and half-*ssed.. when we have a question, and submit a question, on mobile the “Submission Closed” cross-out sign in red shows up, blocking the answers we selected so we can’t read if we got it RIGHT or WRONG because we can’t read the text from the quiz. On the computer, you can’t zoom in to read anything being presented. The navigation panel has no search functionality, so if I knew what I was looking for and couldn’t find it, well I’m kind of screwed aren’t I?

Would like to know. Why is it in the laptop you can type notes and you can highlight and in the app you can’t? Also the app doesn’t show the percentage of questions that you have done? It would be so much better to be able to read and take notes at the same time, split screen support would be amazing with this app!

Unsatisfactory. I tried signing in for the first time but the password doesn’t work so I tried the forgot password link and followed the instructions on my phone but it asked for the silliest question which was to enter my old password ??? which obviously didn’t work the first time so now I have to cancel due to not having access and it’s making it worse with no technical support.

Works Great Sometimes. Works great when it actually authenticates your account. However, it’s been months since I have been able to access my account through the app on my phone or iPad because once I authenticate it never redirects me/let’s me go back to use the app. I’ve gone through multiple different resources, can’t find a way to use it other than on my computer.

Regularly Fails. Probably 2-3 times a month the app just quits working for one reason or another. I’ve been logged out and unable to log back in. The app regularly can’t submit answers for questions due to “bad connection” (I’m the only one in my class with the same tablet and internet connection). I also can’t follow a professor’s lecture because it won’t ever load the current slide -I’m always 2-3 slides behind. This app needs work.

UPDATE THE APP. I HATEEEEEE THIS APP!!! Every time I close the app it starts me all the over to the beginning of the chapter. EVERY TIME! There’s no bookmarking to start back where you left off. And then sometimes when you’ve scrolled back to where your spot is it’ll close out of the textbook again and then you’re back to scrolling and scrolling. Having an index helps none if I’m in the middle of 2 sections. UPDATE THIS APP!!! PLEASE!!

Log in/Payment. This site cost way too much. I’m in college and we already have to pay a lump some and don’t know if we will use it again (if we do but only pay for one semester that more money). Why is it always logging me out and says that my password is wrong. I’m so tired of this and it’s so freaking irritating. I hate that my teacher uses this app Fr!

Great experience. I use blackboard for bridgewater and thankfully one of my professor chose to use top hat and it’s so much better and much more organized!

Can’t Log Into Tophat. Although TopHat is a great resource for PC, the mobile app has a few bugs in it. I am putting in all the correct information, and yet it still won’t let me log on. This has been an issue for weeks and prohibits me from learning in class.

FAKE RATINGS and bad app. First of all, there is no WAY this app has 4.7 stars, since most reviews are negative. I’ve even seen some negative reviews with 4 or 5 stars, which definitely smells fishy. Aside from that, the app itself isn’t very good. The internet connection is bad, and the price is ridiculous for such a bad app. No one would get this if they weren’t forced to by colleges. Please, ask your professor to switch to a better quality software.

How is this scam so popular. Required by professor and had to pay $27 or something. Functionality is terrible. Cuts off the question half the time. No settings for notifications for questions. On top of that there appears to be fake reviews on iOS because the app has TERRIBLE rating on the Play Store. App would never be even close to 4 stars. P.S. I never write reviews so good job on inspiring me to be here top hat.