Description of App
Best money reading app for blind and visually impaired!
Point your phone's camera at almost any banknote in the world and hear the value instantly.
Notes are changing, but we keep an eye on more than a hundred currencies.
You will receive updates as new banknotes are issued, or taken out of circulation.
Below are some features loved by our users!
The app can transform banknote value into the series of vibrations. You can hear it but also feel it!
It works offline. Download your preferred currencies and use the app entirely without the Internet.
Are you partially sighted? Use even the largest font size and switch entirely to black and white for the best contrast.
Select particular currency for fast, precise identification even from the smallest portion of the banknote.
Are you travelling and have no idea what banknotes are in your wallet? Use our robust all at once identification and Cash Reader can tell you the value with currency out of thousand different banknotes!
Support for Siri Shortcuts. You can quickly open the app or switch identification to another currency.
We listen to your feedback and ideas and bring you new features continuously!
Download now the Free version of Cash Reader and learn how easy it is to identify banknotes.
The Free version will help you with low denomination banknotes.
For complete identification of almost every banknote worldwide, please upgrade to the Full version via the In-App Purchase.
We can't wait to welcome you into our growing Cash Reader community!
Follow us on social media or get in touch with us directly.
Thank you for helping us on our mission to make money accessible in every country in the world!
Privacy policy: https://cashreader.app/privacy-policy.html
Terms of use: https://cashreader.app/terms-of-use-ios.html
Comments
Cash Reader
There is no documentation about the vibration patterns. Having vibrations is nice, but one does need to know what pattern represents a $1 bill or a $5 or a %10 bill. Thanks.
vibration
Hello there.
Well It is so easy to recognize the vibration, all you have to do is to know Your currency number
For example If you have $1 the app will vibrate one time,
But If you have $20 the app will vibrate 4 times.
At the end I hope you got it.
Cash Reader
I do not understand the algorithm. How is it that $20 gives you four vibrations? What if I have a $2 bill? What about a $50 bill? How many vibrations would that generate?
Can I assume one vibration for $1, two for $5, three for $10, four for $20, and five for $50?
Cordially,
Curtis Chong
Yes
Hello dear.
Yesit is as you described before.
one vibration for $1, two for $5, three for $10, four for $20, and five for $50
U.S. 2 Dollar Bill?
What about the U. S. 2 Dollar Bill? I have several of them, just wondering. Dave
The 2 us$
Hello dear well I really do not know.
Tomorrow I will ask the developer and I will respond to you.
But you can simply try the two us$.
Its nice to see a new app
Its nice to see a new app aiming to help with identifying currencies seeing as money reader isn't really maintained anymore and hasn't had any new currencies added to it for years.
I don't get though why the app doesn't just build the currency database in from scratch so that we don't have to download them for individual currencies like money reader does.
I compared the two apps and for those who use money reader it supports some currencies that cash reader doesn't so its worth keeping both apps around.
I did find the inapp purchase wasn't entirely straight forward it was quite slow going through the purchase it said processing for several minutes on screen, then when I had made my itunes payment I was placed back on a screen that said processing purchase with an interrupt button. when I used the button I was invited to again purchase the app. But when I closed it entirely and reopened itthe purchase was picked up though I did have to go through the screen of granting camera access.
also, as regards the inapp purchase you are forced to agree that if you use the app within 14 days after making the purchase you are waving your right to a refund, given that once you make the purchase all features within the app become unlocked I read that as them trying to make people wave rights to a refund which apple do grant for accessibility issues and other problems.
Not that I have any intentions of asking for a refund but I do feel we shouldn't be asked to sign them away, and the process of making the inapp purchase needs work as I have never known a purchase as slow as this one I kind of wonder if during the purchase other stuff was going on in the background as it just took so long for me to be asked to pay.
Thank you
Hello alex,
Thanks a lot for your valuable feedback!
Well this is the first time that problem habit. I suppose there is a problem with your Internet connection that’s why it took a lot of time to complete the payment.
This application is new and the developer promise that he is working on adding more currencies soon.
And you can try the 14 days trial before you purchase the application I think it would be better from asking a refund.
Refunds
The automatically generated prompt that you are giving up your refund rights if you keep using this purchase after 14 days is part of any and all in-app purchases. It's built directly into Apple's in-app purchasing API, I've seen this in every app that offers in-app purchases I've tried so far, so it's clearly built into the system by Apple itself. If the app was not accessible, 14 days is more than enough to find out and ask for a refund in time in that case. This is also automated right from iOS, no need for direct input from the developer of the app in question. When new currencies get added, the core features of the app remain the same, so there is no reason to expect a new currency to have any effect on the app's overall accessibility whatsoever. I personally favor the current approach of adding the currencies as DLC as they become available instead of building them right into the app with app updates. I need just one currency right now, my local one, so no need for the app to download everything or include everything from scratch and grow larger in size, however neglectable that increment would be. If I need euros or US dollars or anything else, I can easily download them at the time of need.
Appreciating
Thanks a lot there.
yes you are so true I really appreciate it.
I don't think the prompt your
I don't think the prompt your giving up your rights to a refund comes with all inapp purchases, I know that apple enables it for some people when they have asked for a lot of refunds, but I have only ever scene this I think its once before.
But maybe apple has changed things on there end, I didn't think app trials were allowed on the appstore though, anyway I have no intention of asking for a refund just thought I would comment.
as to the completion of the inapp purchase once I was told it was successful then closed this screen the app still said it was processing and gave me an interrupt button, rather than a close or other screen, I mean it shouldn't have shown processing on screen even after the purchase was successful.
anyway its all working fine now.
I do have a question though, the databases for currencies is to avoid storing everything on the device sure, but I think when new currencies are added app updates will still be needed to tell the app that these currencies are available. if not, then the app needs to support notifications so that users can be told when new currencies are available.
Happy to answer your questions
Hello everyone,
I am the author of Cash Reader and I will be following up this discussion to answer any question you might have.
Thank you all for using the Cash Reader and I hope that it will be a useful tool in your everyday life.
Tomas
Answer regarding vibrations pattern
Hi Curtis,
we already talked by email but I would like to answer also here for others who might have the same question.
There will be a new description in the Settings from next release saying this:
The app can transform the identified value of a banknote into vibrations.
App vibrates for each currency according to this pattern: one vibration for the lowest denomination, two vibrations for the second lowest denomination and so on.
For the US dollar it means:
1 dollar bill vibrates one time.
2 dollar bill vibrates two times.
5 dollar bill vibrates three times.
10 dollar bill vibrates four times.
20 dollar bill vibrates five times.
50 dollar bill vibrates six times.
100 dollar bill vibrates seven times.
Answer regarding currency download and in app purchase
Thank you Alex for your question.
Regarding the on demand download of data for currency identification.
Cash Reader will have from next release already more than 30 currencies. Every currency needs a data package with the size of 15MB. If all data would be included in the app, it would grow unnecessarily large. Also with every update all these hundreds of megabytes would be downloaded again and again.
I think that it's more beneficial to have the currency package downloadable on demand. Also, when I make an improvement for some currency and there is a new data package the app will inform users who already downloaded this package before so they can update. Such update is not mandatory so user can easily update later when the device is connected to wifi.
Regarding the In App Purchase.
I wanted to give users the freedom to try the app completely before making the decision to purchase.
This is why the app is free to download and full version can be purchased from within the app.
Every user can activate trial period which will switch the app to Full version for 14 days.
When the trial expires the app returns back to Free version automatically.
There is no trick such as automatic purchase after the end of the trial, which some rogue developers do.
User can purchase the Full version at any time, even during the trial period. There is a button on the purchase screen with the price and in ideal world it would work seamlessly.
Unfortunately, Apple made the In App Purchase cumbersome and is not reliable, so sometimes it can happen that purchase takes a long time, because the app has to wait for response from Apple which might be delayed or never come.
In such a case, it's just best to try again or restart the app. After a successful purchase it's all done and the user will never face any issues as payment is just one for a lifetime.
I hope that I answered your question and I am open to ideas based on feedback from users.
Indonesian Rupiah
Dear Admin,
please ad Indonesian rupiah,
thx
Amazing app
Hello Tomas,
Warm greetings to you and your family.
Thank you for developing such an awesome app.
This is a must have app. I wish to thank you again for your responsiveness.
The app is worth every penny.
Thanking you again,
With regards,
Moses,
Nairobi, Kenya.
response
tomas, i sent you an email and never got a response. please check when able:)
Thank you
Hello hasyim,
Thanks for your note.
It will be available soon.
Thank you Moses,
Hello mate.
Thanks a lot for your kind words,
We really appreciated it.
Have a good use.
Sorry HarmonicaPlayer
We are sorry for the delayed response,
You will get a respond soon.
please add Indian Currencies
Hello there, please add Indian RS.
add Indian RS.
Hello there.
do not worry, more currencies and languages will be added soon.
Indian correnci
when you will update indian RS? i want to use your app.
so one thing I am not clear
so one thing I am not clear on, is do you have to release new app updates to add new currencies to it?
also, a thought the money reader app can give an announcement if there is low light, I think this would be helpful with cash reader.
I have one last comment about the name, I think it should be called cash reader and not make any reference to blind, or if that's important maybe it should b called cash reader for visually impaired people. I think the current app name is quite long that's all. But this is just my view and I don't feel strongly about it.
More African currencies.
Hi. Are there any plans to add more African currencies? Especially southern and central Africa?
haven't
Hi, i haven't tried this app, but will defenetly download it. About currencies... just a suggestion, but you should add currencies like pesos quetzales, and others from north and south america, if possibleW
Answer to your questions
Hello everyone,
thank you for your patience I took few days off around Christmas and now I am going to answer your questions and will work on new updates for Cash Reader.
Indonesian rupiah is already in processing and will be available during January, also with app translation to your language.
Thank you Moses for all your help with support for Kenya currency and translation to Swahili. We will do our best to have a new release for Kenya soon!
Regarding Indian Rupee. We are currently trying to purchase these banknotes in order to make them available in Cash Reader. However it is quite difficult because we have to collect all banknotes in circulation. I already try to buy them on eBay, but nobody offers newly issued Rupees (10, 50, 100, 200, 500, 2000) and I currently don't have any friend travelling to India to collect them for me.
If anybody from India wants to help us please write me email to tomas@cashreader.app We can send you money to bank account in advance to cover all costs with purchase and shipping.
Regarding identification at low light conditions. By default the Cash Reader uses automatic mode to switch on camera light in low light. You can also change this behaviour in app Settings.
On App Store the title can be maximum of 30 characters, this is the reason for the name "Cash Reader Tool for Blind". I would rather use "Cash Reader for visually impaired" but it's simply too long. Maybe we should have a contest for the best title with max 30 characters? :-)
Regarding other currencies. We are from Europe, Czech Republic so we could easily collect all European currencies but it is a bit difficult to reach to Latin America or African countries. However with your help all is possible. So don't hesitate to write us as almost half of currencies in Cash Reader is coming from cooperation with people like you and we value those most!
Many thanks
Tomas
The Romanian localization
Hello developers! I really like this app. Many thanks for your great work! I am writting to you cause I am willing to contribute to the Romanian localization for a small monthly payment of 5 or 10 USD, we can negotiate in private. I don't check my e-mail address so often, so you can add me on Skype at live:florianionascu or on Facebook at Florian Ionașcu. Thanks!
Hi, maybe just calling the
Hi, maybe just calling the app cash reader would be the simplest option, after all most people won't be putting cash reader for blind into the app store.
I do have a question on identification, have you considered allowing for the app to identify coins as well as notes? I find coins equally as annoying as notes to identify more so as usually I end up with more of them than notes particularly towards the end of a holiday, and its not so easy to memorize shapes in a very short time.and in fact I don't think there are any apps out that that currently identify coins including money reader so this would be filling a real niche not catered for in any app.
Answer regarding name and coins
Hi Alex,
if you search just for Cash Reader it will be also shown in results. Having more words in title means that if someone does not know the name of our app and will just search the word blind, we will also appear in results.
Regarding coins. Our identification engine would be able to do it. However we would need to collect all coin designs and this would be a difficult task to do. We are a small team therefore it's not doable right now but we would like to work on coins in future.
idea for app
greetings tomas, This is Joseph Weakland, Since my response to your last email never got received, i'll enclude my suggestion here. It would be nice if your app could tell the difference between the front of a bill versus the back. Fore example, if you had a $1 and had the front side towards the camera it could say $1 front
Hi, Joseph I don't understand
Hi, Joseph I don't understand why someone who is blind would need to know if they are identifying the front or back of a bill, from my testing I have found that the app seems to identify notes from either the back or the front at least for UK notes.
As regards coins, I appreciate that you as developers are a small team, maybe you could add coins for easily obtainable currencies for example euro as I believe that's where you said you are based.
As to currencies that are not easily obtainable maybe members of applevis could help with coins in there native currencies I mean especially if they are obscure it would be in people's interests to help.
Do you just need good quality photos of coins or do you need to have physical access to coins?
Obviously people will know coins in there own native currencies, but people from outside a particular country don't so it would help the community as a hole if people could help with coins even if they themselves won't find it useful for there own countries. I myself could help with uK coins, as there aren't that many of them, though only problem is I guess postage might be more than the value of the coins, still it wouldn't be fair for developers to cover this, its all about people being willing to contribute to the community I guess.
Answer regarding coins
Hello Alex,
I appreciate your feedback and ideas.
As I am talking to visually impaired from Czech (my country) they would also like to have coins identification for foreign currencies as it helps on travels.
Right now the effort connected with adding coins would be too much on us.
We would have no problem to pay for the coins and shipping but it would mean a lot of time taken by arrangements with people collecting coins. Afterwards we would need to make several thousands of photos for every coin as we do for banknotes to add them to out identification engine. I am sure that we will get to this point one day but right now we want to focus our limited resources to banknotes identification.
Thanks for your understanding.
Tomas
Cash Reader update 1.20
Hello everyone, I would post here the release notes when new update of Cash Reader is on App Store.
If this information would be annoying for you just let me know. You can always find the release notes on the App Store and in the Cash Reader on first launch after installing the new update.
Release notes for version 1.20:
New settings to switch Cash Reader into black and white color palette for maximum contrast.
Denomination number displayed on screen now respects the language settings of phone e.g. uses arabic letters for arabic language.
Cash Reader is now localized also into these new languages:
Italian, Croatian, Bosnian.
Cash Reader is now able to identify the banknotes of these new currencies:
Israeli shekel, Qatari riyal, Omani rial, Iranian rial, Pakistani rupee.
Hi, I completely understand
Hi, I completely understand you have limited resources and so need to use them carefully, and its great to see your really keen to work with the community, as you say hopefully you will get to coins one day but of course you have to prioritize.
I would like to know though why does the app need several thousand photos just for one note? that seems an incredibly large number just for a very simple object, yes I could understand more than one but thousand seems a lot for each individual note.
I am also curious your offering lifetime licenses for the app where people don't have to pay again, so how is the app or you as developers going to be financially viable to support new features, adding more currencies, updating existing ones etc, I mean money reader eventually stopped being developed,, and surely you need to be sustainable and getting income from somewhere, or is cash reader more of a hobby for you in spare time?
actually I guess you didn't try to buy the money reader app to use that as a foundation for future development?
There is a subscription model
There is a subscription model, so I guess some revenue would come from there, but why have a subscription model if you have the choise to buy the full version outright anyway?
I think one password also has this option, but buying the full version for one password is a lot more expensive, so it's easier to simply subscribe.
This app, at least here in australia is still quite affordable.
kool_turk
Hello there.
Yes we do have two types of subscription,
That’s because we get options to everyone to let them try the app as wish as they want.
About the price: yes the price is flexible to everyone around the world.
Thanks for your feedback.
Philippine Peso
Following, I wish you add also the Philippine peso in the future update. I installed this app in my iPhone 7 but can't use it yet because no Philippine peso yet. Hoping for the best.
Thanks
Initial feedback
I am comparing this app to NantMobile Money Reader, the app I’ve been using for currency detection for the past couple of years or so. This app will probably end up replacing Money Reader, since the latter hasn’t been kept up to date and is not recognizing newer bills in some areas (not yet an issue in the US to my knowledge, but I’m sure the day will come when it becomes an issue).
I should note that my only iOS device right now is an iPad Mini, which does not have a flashlight. This means that the app is probably more sensitive to lighting conditions than it would be if I had a flashlight available.
In my bedroom, which does not have much lighting, Cash Reader didn’t work at all, but the older Money Reader had absolutely no trouble identifying any of the bills in my wallet. I have always been amazed at how well Money Reader operated in low light, even without a flashlight. I have no idea how they managed to pull it off, but it sure was a nice feature of the app.
I went into the bathroom, which has much better lighting, and in that room the two apps performed about equally, although one or two of the bills took a little longer for Cash Reader to identify (they were older bills and are likely faded). Even with the short delay, the identification was more than quick enough for me, and I am happy with the overall results.
I don’t know if it is possible for you to improve low light performance, but if you can that would be appreciated.
The US government also has an app for detecting US currency, called EyeNote, which I used to use before I switched to Money Reader. EyeNote was, in my experience, much slower at detecting currency, and it was more picky about how far away from the device the bill was positioned. That said, one thing the app did do was announce whether it was detecting the front or back of a note. As I recall, the documentation indicated that the reason for this was to help in orienting the bill when inserting it into a vending machine or similar, because apparently some machines require the front of the bill to be face up. I wouldn’t know, because I have never used such a machine myself, but if that is indeed the case, then I suppose having this knowledge could be beneficial. The OCD in me would also like to have all bills facing the same way in my wallet, simply for the sake of neatness, but for me there is no practical value in knowing which is the front and which is the back.
Philippine Peso
Hello there.
If you want to add your own currency?
You have to contact Mr. Tomas at his Email:
tomas@cashreader.app
Thanks.
Hasan.
Feedback
Hello Tomas,
Thanks for engaging the community in developing this app.
I've noticed that the vibrations occur slightly behind the speech announcement of the bill. Would it be possible to have it vibrate at the same time as it reads the bill?
I find that this app does do a good job of identifying bills quickly but I feel like it's still not as fast as Money Reader. I have several friends who have used Money Reader as a cashier because they can identify bills just as quickly as sighted people. It would be wonderful if the speed of Cash Reader is just as quick. also, knowing the front and back of bills would be helpful when using vending machines since some machines can be picky.
Think I'll Be Getting This One
I'm currently using the 14-day trial of this app, and like what I've seen so far. It's identified all the Canadian bills I've scanned perfectly. For comparison, I also tried using the same bills with Money Reader and Seeing AI. With Money Reader, it seemed to take a long time before it would tell me the denomination of the bill I was scanning (or maybe I didn't have the camera pointed at it correctly). Seeing AI worked as well, but also tends to crash every so often on my iPhone 6 Plus device when on the Currency screen. I think Cash Reader will be my go-to app for money identification at this point. Keep up the great work.
Answer to your questions
Dear everyone at AppleVis,
I am back from vacation. Thank you for all your questions and I will try to answer them below. I am adding also some answers for question I missed before and it will be a long post so I will try to be brief at answers :)
#24: Alex, yes in order to add new currency I have to collect one banknote for every design actively used in the country, which is sometimes difficult, than add meta information to the app and make a new release.
#25: More African currencies are coming. Many thanks to Moses who helps with Kenyan currency and maybe he will be able to collect neighbouring countries. Some currencies are tricky to get so your help here is invaluable.
#35: We need several thousand of photos for every banknote to support any distance from camera, any angle, any light conditions such as sunny, rainy, inside buildings, dark, night, flash usage, etc. This is why the Cash Reader is different from other apps and works so fast and reliably, we really put this effort into it :)
You are right that apps can easily die out because they choose wrong model to be financially viable. Cash Reader started with lifetime license which were expensive and auto renewable subscriptions on monthly and yearly basis which were cheap but gave us the stable income. After 5 months in production we did not pass the Apple review during some minor update, because Apple said that our app does not offer content dynamic enough to justify subscriptions. I argued for weeks with Apple but at the end had to remove subscriptions. Currently the app has Lifetime license with discounted price and on February I try it again with cheaper non-renewable yearly subscription which might pass the review. We will see, but for future viability I would like to support both lifetime license and subscription based model.
Regarding the Money Reader, we don't have any connection to them.
#38: Philippine peso is scheduled to be released on February.
#39: Regarding low light conditions. It's actually my fault because I did not realise that there are apple devices capable of iOS11 or newer without flashlight so I did not consider this option. I will take a look on that. In new release there will be option to use also front camera, so in case you would let the screen enabled it would work, but I am not sure if your iPad has front camera.
I have a large debt for US dollars which makes it's identification less precise then other currencies. It was one of the first currencies in Cash Reader and our procedure of making photos in that time was not as good as what we do now. There will definitely come an update during February which will help it. Also I am aware of new bills designs coming soon to US and they will be implemented.
#41: Synchronization between the start of vibrations and start of speech is a nice idea I will think of that.
Regarding the identification of front and back side of the note. Currently it would mean a huge effort to do it so I don't plan this feature in near future, thanks for understanding.
#42: Many thanks I am happy to hear that Canadian bills are working fine. I think that there will be some new bill designs coming soon so they will be definitely implemented and provided in update. Please consider giving us review on App Store, this would help us rank better on Canadian market, much appreciated!
Cash Reader update 1.21
Hello everyone,
we just released a new update and I hope you will like it. Please find the release notes below.
You can switch between rear and front camera in Settings.
Camera now continuously changes focus for more reliable identification.
Cash Reader is now able to identify the banknotes of these new currencies:
Saudi riyal (serie 4 and 5)
Cash Reader is now localized also into these new languages:
Hebrew, Spanish, Serbian, Swahili, Portuguese (Brazil), Chinese (Simplified).
HI, I have a question and
HI, I have a question and some observations about the vibrate feature,
what does the section in the release notes mean when it says camera changes focus for more reliable identification? is changing focus just a strange use of English? is it something like the camera takes photos of what it sees more quickly or something?
Now I have some observations about the vibrate feature for bank notes, although we have the help text that says the current state of the setting I don't think this button labeling is clear, as for me my app is set to vibrate on silent only, the help text says this, but if I have this setting enabled then flick to the button the label says vibrate always.
I get that the button is displaying the next available setting but I think this could be confusing, as when I first saw the button and help text I thought that the wrong text was being displayed with the button label.
I also think the vibrations for bank note value should be more spaced apart, as when I tried this feature out I got two very close together so it was hard to count the number of vibrations accurately.
Lastly when I tested the app only vibrating in silent mode VoiceOver was still announcing the value of the bank note, maybe you should offer some settings for VoiceOver behavior so that it can be set for VoiceOver to either announce the value always, or never. as I think if someone is using this vibrate feature its obvious they want privacy.
Maybe you could offer settings to control the spacing of vibrations, and one final thought I wonder if sliders to control the settings would be better than buttons what do people think?
Answer to questions about vibrations and continuous focus
Hi Alex,
the camera is now changing focus to the closest object continuously.
This means that when the banknote is near the camera it will change the focus to have more sharper image and the same the other way around when the banknote is at larger distance.
The number of images from camera processed by Cash Reader depends in processing power of iPhone so it just works better on newer iPhone.
When you have the settings set to "vibrate always", it means that you can have the silent mode switch in any position and it will always vibrate.
If you can come up with better wording I'll be happy to consider it and change it.
In general the settings have header for you to be able quickly jump with up and down voiceover gesture between the settings headers.
Then a description what this settings does in general. Afterwards there is a current state of this setting and button to change to settings to different state. I hope this logic is fine as nobody complained about it so far.
The vibrations are always made from consecutive short and long vibrations. It should be easy to count them because of short and long but I noticed that iPhone is representing these vibrations a bit differently based on the type of iPhone. I will come up in some release with option to customise vibrations.
You are right that VoiceOver does not respect the silent mode switch. I firstly developed this with just text to speech and the iPhone did not allow to speak laud in silent mode. I will provide the new settings option and it will work the same as with vibrations. You will be able to setup whether the VoiceOver should speak in silent mode or not. It will be available in some release on January.
Thanks for all your suggestions!
Tomas
Great job!
Hi
I love this app! Great job!
Best
Malthe
Simply the best
Cash reader is the most effective money identifier app out there. When it comes to efficiency, it is the clear winner. I had to push a whole folder away and fix it on my HomeScreen.
Purchasing this app was money well spent.
I love it
I love the app too. One question though. Sometimes, I put a dollar bill up to it and it says 50 then it says the correct dollar value. I know I don't have any $50 bills. lol
The correct identification
Hello mate,
You can enable a button on the main screen to send the developer images for anonymous verification. Tap the button whenever you think the app is giving you incorrect results. Thank you.