Why log coffee in Jittr? It helps great local cafés get found

Jittr is a free iPhone app for rating coffee. You give a drink a score from 1 to 10, tag the flavors you taste and attach it to the café that made it. The app files that café under its city, state and metro area, and your score goes into the café rankings for each.

What a map rating measures

BrightLocal's 2025 Local Consumer Review Survey found that 81% of US consumers used Google to read reviews of local businesses in 2024. The same survey found that 42% trust online reviews as much as a personal recommendation, down from 79% in 2020.

A star rating on a map covers the whole visit. Service, seating, the wait and parking all go into the same five stars as the espresso. A one-star review about a parking ticket counts the same as a one-star review about burnt espresso.

A Jittr score covers one drink at one café on one day, on a scale with ten steps instead of five. Enough of those scores give a café an average built on its coffee.

From check-in to local ranking

When you check in, the app fills in the café's city, state and metro area from Google Places, so your score for a cortado in Richmond counts toward Richmond's list and Virginia's without you typing an address. Version 1.2, released October 15, 2026, improved café search and the live rankings. The Discover screen filters by drink and flavor, so you can pull up the highest-scored lattes in a city and see where people ordered them.

Why small cafés gain the most

World Coffee Portal counted more than 45,200 branded coffee shop outlets in the US in October 2025, counting any brand with five or more locations. A brand with dozens of locations collects reviews at every one of them. A café with one location and a good roaster depends on regulars telling friends.

When a list runs on average scores, one log counts for more at a café with fewer ratings. If a café has three ratings averaging 7 and you log a 9, its average rises to 7.5. At a chain location with 300 ratings averaging 7, the same 9 moves the average to 7.007. The rankings also weight recent ratings more than old ones, so a café that improves can climb without waiting for its old scores to age out.

Café owners can claim their café's profile in the app and see how their drinks score.

What you get from logging

Your history is searchable, so you can find the café where you had that oat latte in March. Logging also earns badges; the app has 35 of them. Your friends' check-ins show up in your feed, and check-ins save right away on a weak signal and sync later.

The company gives 5% of every dollar it earns to sustainable coffee farming and farming communities.

Logging a cup

1. Open the app and start a new log.
2. Pick the café from the nearby list or search for it.
3. Add a photo and the drink, and tag the flavors.
4. Score it from 1 to 10 and post.