Our Caring Circle is an app that helps families share the work of caring for an aging parent — tasks, appointments and updates in one shared circle.
It's built for the adult children, spouses and siblings who end up coordinating a parent's care — while working, raising kids, or living hours away. One person sets up a circle and invites the family. From then on, everyone sees the same plan.
What is Our Caring Circle?
A circle is a shared space centered on one person being cared for. Inside it, family members post tasks — a grocery run, a ride to the dentist — and claim the ones they can take. Every appointment sits on one shared calendar, and an activity feed keeps a running record of what got done and by whom, so nobody has to ask the family thread whether anyone called the pharmacy.
It runs in any web browser at app.ourcaringcircle.com, installs to a phone's home screen, and is on Google Play for Android in the US. An iPhone app is coming soon. How to install it.
Who is it for?
Families coordinating care for an aging parent or another loved one, especially when:
- Siblings are splitting the work, and it keeps landing on one person.
- Someone helps from a distance and needs to see what's happening without calling around.
- The plan lives in one person's head, or in a group text that scrolls away.
It's built for the sandwich generation — caring for a parent while still working and raising kids. But a circle can include anyone who helps: a spouse, a grandchild, a neighbor, a hired aide.
How is it different from a group text or a shared doc?
A group text is good at conversation and bad at holding a plan. A shared doc holds a plan but nobody owns its rows. A circle gives every job one owner and keeps the record in one place.
| Group text | Shared doc | Our Caring Circle | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Who's doing a task | Whoever replied, maybe | Whoever typed their name | The one person who claimed it |
| Appointments | Buried in the thread | A list someone keeps current | On a calendar the whole circle sees |
| What got done | Scroll back and guess | Only if someone updates it | Recorded in the activity feed |
| When a helper drops out | You find out late | You find out late | On Circle Essentials, the backup helper is moved up and notified |
More on that in why group texts fail at caregiving coordination.
Does my parent need to use it?
No. The person being cared for has a place in the circle as its care recipient, but they never need to download anything, log in, or accept an invite. The family members doing the coordinating are the ones who sign in. See your parent doesn't have to use the app.
What does it cost?
The Free plan covers one circle with up to 3 family members, 4 tasks and 1 appointment a month — enough for a small family handling occasional coordination. Circle Essentials starts at $12 a month. It raises the member, task and appointment limits and adds calendar sync, automatic backup helpers and appointment notes, and you'll see the option in the app when you need it. Details are on the pricing page.
What it is not
- Not a medical or health app. It coordinates who is helping with what. It doesn't give medical advice or keep medical records, and it isn't the place for diagnoses, prescriptions or insurance details.
- Not a care agency. It doesn't find, vet or employ caregivers. It organizes the people you already have.
- Not a reminder service. Push notifications cover activity in the circle: a task you claimed, a task you helped with being completed, someone joining, and — on Essentials — being moved up as a backup. There are no appointment reminders or overdue alerts. Push works from the web version; the Google Play app doesn't receive push yet. Email digests send a daily recap on days with new tasks or appointments and a look at the week ahead every Sunday. How notifications work.
Who's behind it?
Our Caring Circle was founded by Jason Northup and is built by OurCaringCircle LLC in Oklahoma City. We built it for our own family first, to coordinate care for our parents, and opened it to other families once we saw how much it helped.
Questions reach a real person at support@ourcaringcircle.com. You can also find Jason on LinkedIn and the team on Facebook.
Set up a circle and invite your family. The Free plan covers up to 3 family members.
Start your circle free