Here, you can find the answers to some frequently asked questions. If you did not find the answer to your question, please feel free to contact us via the in-app feedback system (which you can find on the More screen in the app) or via email at support@flora.appfinca.com.
Q: I keep growing the same plants. How to grow different types of trees?
Please tap on the Seed icon on the main screen before pressing the Start button. Then, you enter the Grand Tour screen and can choose different types of plants to unlock at different stops. Have a nice trip!
Q: Can I plant a tree while staying offline?
Yes. Flora supports the Offline Planting mode. To plant a tree offline, please disconnect from the Internet before pressing the Start button. Note, however, that
because there is no Internet connection.
Q: How to get notified when a tree grows up?
Just lock your phone, and then you will receive a notification when your tree successfully grows up. Please make sure that you have enabled notifications on the More screen.
Note that you won't receive notifications while your phone screen is on because you can see the result directly.
Q: Can I use other tooling apps (e.g. a dictionary) without killing a tree?
Yes. You can pause your current tree-planting session by pressing the Pause button. Then you can switch to other tooling apps without killing the tree. When done, press the Resume button to continue the session. The pause time will be subtracted from the final focus time of the session.
Note that the Pause feature is available only when there is no price associated with the tree. To see how the Price feature works, please click on the ? (question mark) icon next to the Price menu on the main screen.
Q: What if I finish my tasks before a tree grows up?
Just press the Pause button, and then you can leave the app to do whatever you want. After the tree grows up, the associated story will correctly keep track of the time you have spent—it will show the duration between the start and pause time.
Note that the Pause feature is available only when there is no price associated with the tree. To see how the Price feature works, please click on the ? (question mark) icon next to the Price menu on the main screen.
Q: Can I turn off the Pause feature?
Yes. To turn off this feature, switch off the Allow pauses while planting option on the More screen.
You can also set a non-zero Price before growing a tree, which automatically disables the Pause feature for the next planting session. To see how the Price feature works, please click on the ? (question mark) icon next to the Price menu on the main screen.
Q: How to set a break timer when I apply the Pomodoro technique?
After successfully growing a tree, press the Timer icon at the left of the See Stories button on the Congrats screen, then you will be able to set a Back to Work timer, which reminds you to go back to work after the specified time.
Q: I didn't leave Flora but my tree was still killed. What should I do?
If you get your tree killed and think it was not your fault, please report a False Detection by pressing the ! (triangular exclamation) button at the upper-right corner of the red screen. If verifying that it is indeed a false detection, we will revive your tree. If we find any bug that leads to a false kill, we will fix it ASAP. Meanwhile, you can take the following steps to minimize the chance of false detection:
Q: How to make friends in Flora?
Share your QR code displayed on the Friends screen to your friends, or scan the QR codes shared by your friends. You can also quickly make friends with other Flora users in your contact or Facebook friend list by pressing the Import from Contact or Import from Facebook buttons on the Friends screen, respectively.
Q: How to grow a tree with friends?
There are two ways: you can either host or join a room.
To host a room, tap on the People icon at the left of the Start button on the main screen, and then select the Friends or Selected Partners options. You can also share the passcode of your room to other Flora users. To see the passcode, press the Key icon at the upper-right corner of the main screen. Other people can discover and join your room only after you press the Start button on the main screen.
To join someone else’s room, first you either find your friends’ rooms on the Friends screen or enter your friend’s passcode after pressing the Key icon on the main screen. Then, you can preview their rooms (for example, seeing the time left) to decide whether to join a room or not. As a guest, you can select your own plant to grow by tapping on the Seed icon on the preview screen. You then start growing a tree with the host by pressing the Join button on the preview screen.
Q: What will happen if I leave Flora during a group tree-planting session?
If you are the host of the session, everyone’s tree will be killed because the session will be terminated. If you are a guest, on the other hand, you will only kill the tree grown by yourself. Other people will continue growing their trees in the session.
Q: When and why should I grow trees with other people?
You can always invite your family, friends, and colleagues to plant a tree together while you work, enjoy meals together, or try to go to sleep on time, etc. Psychologists and researchers, such as Festinger (1957), Heider (1946), and Newcomb (1953), have found that this will boost your productivity in the long term because your commitment to them keeps your behavior in sync. Group tree-planting sessions can also strengthen your relationships as the sense of accomplishing something together brings you closer.
Flora encourages joint tree planting by allowing each participant of a successful group tree-planting session to win an additional tree grown by a random peer. Are you ready to win your friend’s trees?
Q: Where can I find my total focused time?
Tap on your avatar in the garden to go to the Badges screen. You will see the total amount of time that you have logged and how far you are away from the next badge.
Q: I don’t like the layout of trees in my Garden. Can I change it?
Sure. Just tap on your Garden for the current week, and then the layout will be changed. There are 5 different layouts for you to choose from. So, you can repeatedly tap on the Garden until you are satisfied with it.
Q: Why do some trees in my Garden disappear after a while?
Each tree in your garden for the current week lasts for 7 days. For example, if you grew a tree last Wednesday, the tree will disappear on this Wednesday. So, you have to plant trees regularly to maintain a beautiful garden, just like how you would maintain a garden in the real world.
You can swipe the Garden view to the left or right see all the trees that you have grown.
Q: Can I add notes to a tree or story?
Yes. You can either note what you will be doing in the What to focus on next? area on the main screen before pressing the Start button, or note what you have done in the Attach a message... area of the associated story on the My Stories screen after growing the tree.
Q: How to hide a story from my friends?
Tap on the ⋮ (Kebab) button at the upper-right corner of the story, then you can change its visibility. Select the Only Me option to be the only person who can see it.
Note, however, that your story may be a great motivator to your friends and could trigger fun interactions. You will lose these opportunities if you make your story private.
Q: How to create a to-do item and be reminded of it?
You can create a to-do item by navigating to the To-Dos tab on your Garden screen and then pressing an + (add) button. If you would like to be reminded of the do-to item at a specific time in a week, turn on the Reminder in the To-Do menu.
Q: Can I set up a goal of spending time on a to-do item and track it?
Yes. First, turn on the Goal in the menu of a to-do item. A progress bar will appear in the item. Then, during a tree-planting session, you can tap on the Tag icon to tag your tree with the to-do. After the tree grows up successfully, the time you have spent on the session will be automatically added to the progress bar. You can also make progress by tagging your stories shown in the My Stories tab with different to-do items.
Q: Can I set up a repeating goal?
No problem. In a to-do menu, you can set up a Repeating Goal that automatically resets its progress at the beginning of every day, week, or month.
Q: How to set up a habit tracker?
You can track your activities for a specific to-do item by enabling the Habit Track in the menu of the to-do. Then, you will get a winning streak if you successfully grow trees and tag them with the to-do in successive days.
Flora also compiles your focus activities into detailed daily, weekly, monthly, and yearly statistics so you can find opportunities to improve your time-management and planning skills. Your stats are shown in the Stats tab of the Garden screen.
Q: The tours (e.g., Amazon Rainforest) I bought is missing. What should I do?
Please go to the More screen and press the Restore In-App Purchases button. Then, all the torus you bought will be restored.
Q: I set a Price when growing a tree, but later the tree was false killed by the app. Can I get a refund?
When using the Price feature, you are not charged unless you confirm that you killed a tree by pressing the Honor My Price button on the red screen. If you get your tree false killed, please report a False Detection by pressing the ! (triangular exclamation) button at the upper-right corner. If you have pressed the Honor My Price button and want a refund, please contact us via email at support@flora.appfinca.com and describe the situation you encountered. We will help you from there.
Q: I got an error code during the payment process. What should I do?
Please email the error code to support@flora.appfinca.com and describe the situation briefly. We will help you from there.
Q: Can I have a receipt for my payment?
Of course. Please send an email to support@flora.appfinca.com with your account name, account email address, and purchase date and time. We will email you back your receipt.
Q: Where and what types of real trees do you plant?
We partner with tree-planting organizations in Africa and East Asia, such as the Trees for the Future, to plant fast-growing soil rebuilding trees, fruit trees that diversify nutrition, and trees that can provide forage and fuel-wood. All these trees help make the earth greener and provide long-term financial aid to families who need it most.
Q: Does Flora keep a copy of my data in the cloud?
While most of your data, including the tour progress, garden, and stories are kept in the cloud, Flora currently does not store your to-dos and stats on our servers. This means that you will lose your to-dos and stats if you re-install the app. We will expand our servers to store everything in the future.
Q: How much energy does Flora consume?
Although Flora uses a sophisticated algorithm to correctly detect whether you have left the app open during a tree-planting session, we kept the energy consumption in mind when designing the detection mechanism. Based on our experimental results, the app does not consume more energy than an average music-streaming app.
Q: Is there a “paid version” of Flora?
No. There is only one, free version of Flora. Flora is the original app for multi-user tree planting. Any other apps that tried to clone this feature (and even charge it for money) are not associated with us. If you like planting trees with your friends and enjoy our unique features such as the Grand Tour, to-do list, and habit tracker, please choose the original Flora.
If you have any other questions, please contact us via the in-app feedback system or email us at support@flora.appfinca.com.