National Rail reviews: what App Store users complain about
We read the 300 most recent App Store reviews of National Rail (by Train Information Services Limited) from 2 storefronts, dated 15 May 2025 to 21 October 2026. Average rating in this sample: 1.39★. All-time App Store rating: 4.3★ from 5k ratings. 286 reviews (95%) gave 1–3 stars.
Star ratings in this sample
| Stars | Reviews | Share |
|---|---|---|
| 5★ | 10 | 3% |
| 4★ | 4 | 1% |
| 3★ | 17 | 6% |
| 2★ | 30 | 10% |
| 1★ | 239 | 80% |
Rating by month
| Month | Reviews | Avg stars | 1–3★ share |
|---|---|---|---|
| October 2026 | 7 | 2.14★ | 86% |
| September 2026 | 17 | 1.65★ | 88% |
| August 2026 | 18 | 1.11★ | 100% |
| July 2026 | 17 | 1.59★ | 88% |
| June 2026 | 6 | 1.50★ | 83% |
| May 2026 | 6 | 1.67★ | 100% |
What 1–3★ reviews mention
284 English-language 1–3★ reviews in the sample (UK and Ireland storefronts), matched against fixed keyword lists per theme.
| Theme | Reviews mentioning it | Share of 1–3★ reviews |
|---|---|---|
| UX / design | 80 | 28% |
| Bugs | 73 | 26% |
| Performance | 53 | 19% |
| Crashes / freezes | 29 | 10% |
| Feature requests | 29 | 10% |
| Pricing / subscription | 25 | 9% |
| Ads | 13 | 5% |
A review can mention several themes.
Most-mentioned issues
- Soften the redesign backlash: 59 of 284 1–3★ reviews. What to do: Explain the change in-app, restore the most-missed option, or offer a setting for the old behaviour.
“Always used to use this app and almost never use it now, unless very very desperate. Impossible to do anything with any speed, clunky, unintuitive, long winded. Used to be able to check train departure times so fast, now so slow I often don’t bother and just take my chances. Ap…” (1★, v10.3.8, 2025-10-12, GB) - Speed up loading: 52 of 284 1–3★ reviews. What to do: Profile cold start and the slowest screens on older devices; cache content.
“Poor quality when it does work (the menu bar moves up the screen blocking content). Half the time it gets suck on the loading screen and even when it does load it’s painfully slow with adverts clogging up the screen” (1★, v10.4.1, 2026-09-11, GB) - Fix in-use crashes and freezes: 25 of 284 1–3★ reviews. What to do: Match quoted actions to crash reports; ship a hotfix for the top stack trace.
“This app used to be so good showing state of live trains. Now it appears take you to the website instead. If you click on live trains it just says error 300 page not found. I have tried deleting and reinstalling. All I have now is a blank screen. At least SWR app is still working…” (1★, v10.3.8, 2025-10-20, GB) - Ship the most requested feature: 22 of 284 1–3★ reviews. What to do: Read the quotes below for the exact request; consider a public roadmap.
“Following on with what many of the reviews are saying, the previous version was better. Whether the developers want to listen or not is a different story. Some people use it solely to route plan/check live trains, accidentally clicking on ticket purchase options because you blen…” (1★, v10.3.8, 2026-01-12, GB) - Fix features broken by the latest update: 21 of 284 1–3★ reviews. What to do: Add regression tests for the features users name in these reviews before the next release.
“A recent update broke the redirect functionality when purchasing tickets. It used to redirect reliably to the website of whichever company operates the train you’ll be boarding e.g. Northern Rail, but now it’s seemingly random as to which ticket reseller’s site it directs to whic…” (1★, v10.4.1, 2026-09-01, GB) - Stop data / progress loss: 18 of 284 1–3★ reviews. What to do: Reproduce sync and restore paths; add server-side backup and a visible "restore" option.
“I kept getting an error 404 message when I opened the National Rail app so deleted it as thought that would clear it. Unfortunately the previous app has gone and been replaced with this awful update. It’s just messy but the other one worked fine. Please restore it to how it was…” (1★, v10.4.1, 2026-08-29, GB)
Rating by app version
| Version | Reviews | Avg stars | 1–3★ share |
|---|---|---|---|
| 10.4.1 | 30 | 1.70★ | 90% |
| 10.4.0 | 41 | 1.41★ | 93% |
| 10.3.9 | 21 | 1.48★ | 95% |
| 10.3.8 | 177 | 1.34★ | 97% |
| 10.3.7 | 8 | 1.38★ | 100% |
| 10.3.6 | 22 | 1.23★ | 95% |
Versions with fewer than 5 reviews in the sample are left out.
Is National Rail your app?
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Launch prices until 30 Nov 2026 or the first 20 orders (then €49).
Method and limits
Reviews were collected once from Apple's public customer-reviews feed (most recent first; UK, Ireland, Germany, France, Spain, Italy, Poland and Netherlands storefronts merged, 2 with reviews; up to 300 reviews). Star, month and version figures are plain counts of that sample. Theme and issue figures come from fixed keyword patterns (for example “subscription”, “charged”, “refund” for pricing) run on English-language 1–3★ reviews from the UK and Irish stores only (reviews in other languages count in the star, month and version figures but not in the themes); a keyword match is not a judgement of the review, so check the quotes. The paid report classifies every review with an AI model into 7 themes and 18 issues with severity. This is a snapshot of recent reviews, not the app's full history. Generated 24 October 2026. Not affiliated with Train Information Services Limited or Apple.
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FAQ
What do National Rail users complain about most?
In 284 English-language 1–3★ App Store reviews from 2025-05-15 to 2026-10-21, the most-mentioned theme was UX / design (28%) and the most-mentioned issue was “soften the redesign backlash” (59 reviews).
How many National Rail App Store reviews are negative?
286 of 300 recent reviews (95%) gave 1–3 stars. Average rating in this sample: 1.39★.