Somni
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The basics
| Tab | What it is |
|---|---|
| Nights | Your dreams, one at a time. Swipe up for an earlier night, tap the card to open it. |
| Journal | Every night as its picture, by month, or on a calendar. Search reads your own words. |
| You | Your account, credits, what may leave your phone, reminders, privacy, and deleting things. |
The Write bar at the bottom is always there. Tap the words to type, or the microphone to speak.
The four steps
Each dream shows where it is: Words, Telling, Pictures, Film. Only Words is needed. Telling and Pictures are free. The movie costs one credit for each scene of cuts at standard sharpness, two for a scene that flows into the next, or three for the sharper 1080p version. Somni shows the total before you tap. A simple dream has about four scenes and a long one can have up to ten.
Fine tune your dream
On a dream with pictures, open Fine tune the scenes. You can describe the people and creatures who return, in plain words, so they look the same in every picture they are in. You can choose a look and a colour, change what any picture shows, write what should change, choose who is in each scene, leave a scene out of the movie, and make any picture again. Pictures are free to make again. The pictures you have when you make the movie are the ones it uses.
Flow or cuts
When you make the movie you choose how it moves. Flow is the default: each scene starts on one picture and melts into the next, so it plays like one film, at two credits a scene. Cuts makes each scene its own shot, at one credit a scene, or three for the sharper 1080p version. Somni shows the total before you tap. A person or creature is kept the same by the words you give them, so the more exactly you describe them, the closer they stay from scene to scene.
The free preview
Once a dream has its pictures, Watch a free preview makes a short film on your phone from those pictures, moving the way the plan says the camera should. If you recorded the dream, your own voice plays under it. It costs nothing, sends nothing, and you can share it. It is replaced when you make the real movie.
Credits and sign in
Pictures and movies need an account made with Sign in with Apple, because credits belong to the account. A new account starts with 2 credits, enough for a taste: one clip, your first scene gliding into the second. If you want the rest, the movie grows from your taste and that scene is not paid for twice. If a credit purchase does not appear, open the You tab, choose Get credits, and use Restore purchases.
A picture or movie will not start
Check that you are signed in, have enough credits and are online. If a movie was started and the app was closed, open Somni again: it picks up where it was. A movie usually takes a few minutes. If one scene does not finish, its credit is returned and making the movie again redoes only that scene.
Speaking does not work
Allow the microphone and speech recognition when iOS asks, or turn them on in Settings > Somni. You can always type instead.
Words I had not saved yet
What you type or speak on the Write screen is kept as a draft on your iPhone as you go, so closing the app or locking the phone never costs you a dream. Open Write again and it is waiting. Leaving the screen offers Save for later, Discard or Keep writing. A recording is not kept with a draft. A draft is forgotten after a week.
Writing from the Lock Screen or Control Center
Add the Speak a dream widget to your Lock Screen or Home Screen, or its button to Control Center. You can also ask Siri to speak a dream in Somni, or put the shortcut on the Action Button. Each one opens Somni on the Write screen, listening. None of them holds any of your dream.
When my movie is ready
If you allowed notifications, Somni tells you when a movie is finished. A quiet screen then waits for you and nothing plays until you press Watch your movie. If it finished while the app was closed, the dream opens on that screen the next time you open Somni. At the end you can watch it again, share a copy, or go back.
Sleep and feeling
Open a dream and choose Sleep and feeling. You can read the night from Apple Health, or place the dream on a typical night, which is shown as a modelled night and not a measurement. Somni never writes to Health.
Backing up your journal
Your journal lives on your iPhone, and it is part of your iPhone's own backup (iCloud Backup or a computer backup) if you use one. Apple holds that backup, not Somni, and restoring it on a new iPhone brings your journal back. Somni does not sync between devices, so for a file of your own, keep a copy too. In the You tab choose Export my journal. It makes one zip with every dream as readable text and as JSON, plus your pictures, movies and recordings, and opens the share sheet so you can save it to Files, AirDrop it or send it anywhere you trust. Nothing is sent until you pick a place.
A picture or movie looks wrong, or is not okay
Pictures and movies are made by AI services and can come back unexpected, disturbing or not what you described. Open the dream, tap the three dots, and choose Report a picture or movie. Pick what it is about and what is wrong, add a note if you like, and send it. The report does not include your dream or your account. If a picture looks broken, you can also tap it to make it again, and if one movie scene fails, its credit is returned automatically.
Deleting things
You tab, then Delete everything on this phone, or Delete account. Account deletion also removes your credits, and cannot be undone.
Refunds
Credit packs and Dreamer are bought through Apple, so refunds go through Apple: open reportaproblem.apple.com. If Apple refunds a purchase, the credits from it that you have not used yet are taken back. Credits you already used on movies stay used.