Trade Hounds

Review by eFreeware

If you earn your living with tools, Trade Hounds is the sort of app that wants to sit on your phone next to the ones you actually use for work. It is a social and professional community built around the skilled trades, and the developer pitches it as the largest professional app of its kind in the US, with hundreds of thousands of members. The idea is simple: a place where electricians, carpenters, welders, plumbers and everyone else in the trades can show what they build, ask each other questions and get a sense of what the job pays elsewhere.

That combination is what separates it from a general social feed. You are not posting into a void of friends and relatives; you are posting into a crowd that understands why a clean conduit bend or a finished deck matters. The app is free to install, carries no ads and has no in-app purchases. For someone who wants a professional network without paying for one, that is an easy starting point.

It has been on Google Play since late 2018 and has been updated regularly, most recently in September 2026. The install base sits above 100,000, and the average rating is 3.9 from 441 ratings. Those numbers describe a community that is established rather than enormous, which is worth keeping in mind when you think about how lively the feeds and comment threads will feel in your own trade.

Checking your pay against the local market

The feature the developer leads with is a pay comparison tool. You enter your wage and see how it stacks up against tradespeople in your area doing similar work. That is a genuinely useful thing to have in your pocket, especially when a raise, a job offer or a move to another state is on the table. Instead of guessing whether your rate is fair, you get a reference point drawn from other people in the same trade and the same region.

What I like about the framing is that it is comparative rather than prescriptive. The app is not telling you what you should earn; it is showing you where you sit relative to your peers. That makes it a conversation starter, whether you are negotiating with an employer or deciding whether a subcontract is worth taking. It is also the kind of feature that gets more useful the more people in your trade and your area take part, so the value depends on the community around you.

The developer describes this as a new addition, which suggests the app is still growing its feature set rather than resting on what it launched with. If pay transparency is the thing you care about most, this is the part of Trade Hounds to look at first.

Project photos, questions and advice

The rest of the app is built around the everyday exchange of knowledge. You can post photos of work you are proud of, whether that is a finished staircase or a tricky pipe run, and browse projects from other parts of the country for ideas. Seeing how someone in another state solved a problem you are facing is a form of professional development that does not require a course.

Questions work the same way in reverse. If you are stuck on a project, you can post the problem and let other tradespeople weigh in, or search the existing threads for someone who has already dealt with it. The developer also frames the community as a place to mentor younger tradespeople and to pick up tips that sharpen your craft. Both directions matter here: the app is designed for people who are willing to give an answer as well as ask for one.

There are also member perks. Completing your profile earns you free hard hat stickers, and the developer runs giveaways of tools and gear from brands for members. These are small incentives rather than the reason to install, but they fit the tone of the app, which is closer to a jobsite conversation than a corporate networking platform.

What the app asks of you

Trade Hounds is free, with no ads and no in-app purchases. What it asks for instead is participation. A profile is the entry point, and the developer ties a completed profile to the hard hat sticker offer. Beyond that, the value you get out of it depends on how much you put in: posting your work, answering questions, and contributing to the pay data that makes the comparison tool meaningful.

The content rating is Teen, which is consistent with a general-audience community app. The app is aimed at skilled tradespeople, and the whole design assumes you are one or are heading that way. If you are outside the trades, the conversations and the pay comparisons will not have much to say to you.

There is also a new piece on the horizon. The developer is rolling out an Order Materials feature that is meant to generate bills of materials faster, connect with supply houses, request pricing and reorder supplies in one place. It is being released gradually, and the developer has set up a waitlist for early access. It is being released gradually, so treat it as something to watch rather than something to count on today.

Getting something out of it

The most practical way to approach Trade Hounds is to decide what you want from it before you start posting. If pay is your question, fill in the comparison tool early and check back as more people in your area join. If you want feedback on your work, post a photo with enough context that other tradespeople can actually respond to it, and be specific about what you are asking. Vague posts tend to get vague answers in any community.

The advice side rewards a bit of generosity. Answering a question from an apprentice or a homeowner-facing tradesperson costs you a few minutes and builds the kind of reputation that makes people take your own posts seriously. The developer clearly wants the app to work as a two-way street, and the features are arranged around that idea.

It is also worth updating the app when new versions arrive, since the developer is actively adding to it. The materials-ordering tool is the clearest example of where things are heading, and members who join the waitlist will see it first. For everyone else, the current version is a community app, and it should be judged on how well the community around your trade is doing.

A community app that earns a place on a tradesperson's phone

Trade Hounds is worth installing if you work in the skilled trades and want a professional space that is separate from your personal social accounts. The pay comparison tool gives it a concrete purpose beyond posting pictures, and the question-and-answer side turns it into a resource you can return to when a job gets tricky. The free hard hat stickers and gear giveaways are a nice touch on top of that, not the main event.

The caveats are straightforward. The app is built for the trades and does not pretend otherwise, so the audience is narrow by design. Its usefulness rises and falls with how many people in your trade and your region are active, which is the trade-off that comes with any community platform. The Order Materials tool is still rolling out and requires joining a waitlist.

With a 3.9 average from 441 ratings and more than 100,000 installs, this is an established app rather than a brand-new experiment, and it costs nothing to try. If you are a working tradesperson who wants to compare pay, show your work and swap advice with people who speak your language, this is a sensible place to start.

What's new in version 5.2.0

What’s New: Order Materials Coming Soon A faster way to generate Bills of Materials, connect with supply houses, and keep your jobs moving. Build BOMs in seconds, request pricing, and reorder with ease — all in one place. Rolling out gradually, so join the waitlist to get early access. Keep grinding. WOOF!