TodayTix – Theatre Tickets

Review by eFreeware

If you go to the theatre more than once or twice a year, or you plan trips around a show you want to see, TodayTix is the sort of app that saves you a queue and a phone call. It puts Broadway, Off-Broadway and West End tickets in one place, along with performing arts events in a list of North American and Australian cities. The pitch is simple: see what is playing, know the price, and book without standing at a box office window.

What makes it interesting to me is the mix of ways to buy. You can reserve seats in advance, but the app also runs daily lotteries for popular shows and releases day-of Rush tickets at reduced prices. Those two routes are how a lot of people see a big musical without paying full price, and having them in the same app as ordinary booking is the reason I would keep it installed rather than check a website once a year.

It is free to download, which is unusual for a ticketing product and removes a layer of friction. The app has been on Google Play since April 2014 and currently sits at a 4.9 average from more than 61,000 ratings, with over a million installs. Those numbers tell you it is established, not that every seat you want will be available.

What booking through TodayTix looks like

The core loop is browsing, choosing a performance, and paying. The developer claims you can book in 30 seconds or less, and the appeal of that claim is easy to understand if you have ever tried to buy theatre seats through a clunky desktop site on a phone. You pick a show, pick a date, and the app lists the prices it has for tonight, next week or further out.

The catalog is not limited to musicals. Plays and more experimental work sit alongside the big commercial titles, and the shows named include Hamilton, The Lion King, The Book of Mormon, Dear Evan Hansen, The Phantom of the Opera and Wicked. I would treat that as an indication of the kind of inventory the app carries rather than a promise that any specific show is available on the night you want it.

One detail that matters more than it sounds: the company says it deals directly with theatre box offices rather than with ticket brokers. For a buyer, that is the difference between a straightforward purchase and a marked-up resale, and it is the single most reassuring thing about the app. It does not guarantee a particular seat or price, but it does explain where the inventory comes from.

Lotteries and Rush seats

The lottery is the feature I would use most. Entries are daily, and winners get access to tickets for popular Broadway and Off-Broadway shows, including free tickets and other exclusive deals. It is the closest thing to a standing chance at a show that would otherwise be out of budget.

Rush works differently. On each performance day, the app unlocks day-of tickets at steep discounts on a first-come, first-served basis. That is a genuine bargain if your schedule is flexible, and it is also the part that will frustrate anyone who needs certainty. You are competing with everyone else who opened the app at the same moment, so the outcome is never guaranteed.

The two systems suit different temperaments. If you can go on short notice and treat the show as the reward rather than the plan, Rush and the lotteries are the reason to install TodayTix. If you are organizing an evening for a group on a fixed date, you will be using the ordinary booking path and the other features become secondary.

Alerts, discovery and the service behind it

Alerts are the quiet workhorse. You can sign up to be told when tickets to a sold-out show become available, and to get reminders when Rush and Lottery offers go live again. For anyone chasing a popular title over several weeks, that removes the need to check the app manually every morning.

There is also a discovery side to it. The app highlights what it considers the week's hot event and gives some guidance on what is playing, which is useful in a city you do not know well. The company was founded by Broadway producers, and that background shows in the way shows are presented rather than in any feature you can point to.

Support gets mentioned in the developer's own material, where customers are described as enthusiastic about the service. A ticketing app lives or dies on what happens when a performance is canceled or a seat is wrong, so the quality of that side of the business matters as much as the booking screen.

Cities and coverage

TodayTix started with New York's Broadway and Off-Broadway productions and has since expanded. The app now covers London's West End as well as Chicago, Los Angeles, the San Francisco Bay Area, Boston, Washington D.C., Seattle, Philadelphia, Toronto, Connecticut, Houston, Dallas and Melbourne.

That list is broad but it is not everywhere, and it is the first thing to check before you install. If you live in or regularly visit one of those places, the app has something to offer you. The catalog concentrates on venues in the cities the app covers, so it suits regular theatregoers there.

The London coverage is worth calling out separately because it makes the app useful on a trip abroad, not just at home. Someone who sees shows in New York and travels to the West End a few times a year can keep both in one place, which is a small convenience that adds up.

What the app asks of you

The trade-offs here are mostly about availability rather than money. The app is free, so the cost of trying it is your time. What it cannot do is conjure seats that do not exist, and both the lottery and Rush depend on supply that varies by show and by night.

Discounts are also not universal. The best prices the developer talks about are the ones listed for a given performance, and a hit show on a Saturday evening will look very different from a Tuesday preview. Going in with the expectation of a cheap ticket every time is the fastest way to be disappointed.

The other thing to accept is that this is a booking tool, not a guide to theatre. It tells you what is on and what it costs. Deciding whether a particular production is any good is still down to reviews and word of mouth elsewhere.

Who gets the most from it

The people who will get the most out of TodayTix are frequent theatregoers in its supported cities, travelers who want to see a show without spending an afternoon in a queue, and anyone flexible enough to take a lottery win or a Rush seat when it appears. Those three groups overlap heavily, and for them the app replaces a set of habits that were previously spread across box offices, phone lines and luck.

It also suits the planner who wants to book a specific date well ahead and would rather do it from a phone in a few taps. The direct relationship with box offices is the part I would weigh most heavily, because it means the price you see is coming from the theatre rather than from someone reselling.

If your theatregoing is occasional, or your city is not on the list, there is less here for you. That is not a flaw in the app so much as a description of what it is built to do.

Is TodayTix worth installing?

Yes, if you see shows regularly in New York, London or one of the other covered cities. It is free, and it bundles three genuinely different ways to get a seat: advance booking, daily lotteries and day-of Rush.

The caveats are the ones the app itself implies. Availability depends on the show and the date, the cheapest routes are the least predictable, and the catalog only reaches the cities listed. None of that is hidden, and none of it undermines the basic proposition.

I would install it before your next trip or your next free evening and see what is listed. If you are in the right city and you are willing to be a little flexible, it is one of the more useful free apps you can keep on a phone.

What's new in version 2.327.1

We've made some behind-the-scenes updates to keep things running smoothly, so you can focus on what matters most: getting tickets to the theatre at incredible prices.