Focus apps like Centered and Session charge $5–10/month for a timer, a task list and some rain sounds. Deepdesk is the whole deep-work loop — a Pomodoro engine, session intents, per-task tallies, an always-on-top mini timer, procedurally generated ambient noise and a streak dashboard — stored on your machine, purchased exactly once.
This is the full pricing breakdown: what Centered actually costs over one, two and three years, what Deepdesk gives you for $15 paid once, and the honest cases where the subscription is still the right call.
What Centered actually costs you
At ~$10/mo, one Centered subscription adds up to $120 every year — $360 over a three-year window, for software you stop owning the day you cancel. Deepdesk is $15 the day you buy it, and the meter never runs again.
| Deepdesk | Centered | |
|---|---|---|
| Sticker price | $15 once | ~$10/mo |
| Cost after 1 year | $15 | $120 |
| Cost after 2 years | $15 | $240 |
| Cost after 3 years | $15 | $360 |
Three years in, the gap is $345 — and every year after that adds another $120 to the subscription side of the ledger.
Deepdesk vs Centered, feature by feature
Price is only half the story — here's how the two line up on the things that decide day-to-day use:
| Deepdesk | Centered | |
|---|---|---|
| Price | $15 once | ~$10/month |
| Cost over 2 years | $15 | ~$240 |
| Account required | Never | Yes |
| Works offline | Always | Partly |
| Pomodoro + intents + tasks | Yes | Yes |
| Floating mini timer | Yes | Yes |
| Ambient noise | Generated locally | Streamed |
| Source code | MIT, yours | Closed |
What you get for $15, once
Pomodoro engine, session intents, floating mini timer, generated ambient noise & focus stats. The highlights:
- 🍅 Pomodoro engine — Configurable focus / short break / long break lengths, auto-cycling, long break after every N sessions, pause and skip.
- 🧭 Session intents — Answer "what are you working on?" before each session — every intent lands in your session log.
- ✅ Tasks with pomodoro tallies — Add tasks, pick the active one, and watch its 🍅 count grow as you complete sessions.
- 🪟 Always-on-top mini timer — A frameless, draggable floating widget with a live progress ring — hover to expand pause / skip / open controls.
Deepdesk costs six weeks of Centered — and it keeps working after every focus startup pivots or shuts down.
Switching is 3 steps
- Buy once on Whop. One-time $15 for the packaged Windows installer — lifetime updates included.
- Set an intent, start a session. Pick your active task, answer "what are you working on?", and let the mini timer float over whatever you're doing.
- Watch the streak build. Focus minutes, day streaks and a 30-day chart accumulate in your local dashboard — with every intent logged.
When paying Centered is still the right call
Being straight about it: the subscription earns its keep in three situations. If your team is large enough that Centered's collaboration features, permissions and admin controls are genuinely load-bearing; if your workflow is built on its integrations and leaving means rebuilding that plumbing; or if you have enterprise requirements — SSO, audit logs, SLAs, a vendor to call — that a pay-once app doesn't come with. Everyone else is paying ~$10/mo for a job that runs fine on hardware they already own.
If that's you, Deepdesk is $15, once. For the deeper dive, read the Deepdesk vs Centered head-to-head or the full Centered comparison.
Frequently asked questions
Is it really free on GitHub?
Yes — MIT source at github.com/bensblueprints/focus-dashboard-mvp. $15 buys the signed installer, auto-shortcuts and zero setup.
How is the ambient noise generated?
Mathematically, in real time — white/pink/brown noise and droplet-synthesized rain as pure sample-buffer math through WebAudio. No audio files are shipped and nothing streams, which is why it works offline forever.
Does it block distracting websites or apps?
No — Deepdesk is a timer, intent and stats tool, not a blocker. Pair it with a hosts-file blocker if you need hard enforcement. Centered's coaching nudges and Flow music are also things Deepdesk deliberately doesn't do.
Can paused time leak into a session?
No — the Pomodoro brain is a pure tick-driven state machine fed wall-clock deltas. Pausing simply stops feeding ticks, so paused minutes can't count. The engine has its own test suite.
Is my history private?
Completely — everything persists as plain JSON under your OS user-data folder. Yours to back up, grep or delete.
More on Centered pricing
Deepdesk — product page, demo & full feature list · All OneTimeSuite pricing breakdowns
Try Deepdesk — $15, once
Pomodoro engine, session intents, floating mini timer, generated ambient noise & focus stats.