Which was scarier?

Every film app asks the same impossible question: out of five, how good was it? You know the answer is a feeling, not a number, and you know your four stars for Hereditary (2018) and your four stars for Scream (1996) do not mean the same thing. Gasper never asks. It asks something you can actually answer: which of these two was scarier?

What it is

Head-to-head ranking is the way every film enters Gasper. Instead of typing a score, you compare the film you just watched with films you already ranked, one pair at a time. Each answer moves the new film up or down your list until it finds its place. That ordered list is your rankings, and the number the film gets, its scare score, is read off where it landed.

The method comes from the same family as pairwise ranking apps for restaurants, but the question is built for horror. Nobody has to decide what a 7 means. They only have to remember which film made them check the hallway afterward.

How it works

First, find the film. The Rank tab is the plus in the middle of the tab bar. It asks "Watch any movies recently?", with a search box ("Search a film to rank") and two shelves, "New this season" and "Watchlist". A film's own page has a Rank button too, and so does the daily pick card ("Rank the film"). A film that is not out yet says so and cannot be ranked.

Second, "How scary was it?" Three answers: Terrifying (nightmare fuel), Some scares (a few good jolts), or Barely flinched (slept fine). This is not a score. It decides which of your films the new one is compared against and the range its score can land in, so a film that terrified you can never finish below a film you slept through.

Third, "Anything to remember?" An optional review ("What did you think of it?") with a "Contains spoilers" switch, who you watched with, tags like Jump scares or Slow burn, the "Loved this?" heart, and Stealth mode, which hides this rank from the feed. All of it is optional. The button reads "Start ranking", or "Rank it" when there is nothing yet to compare against.

Fourth, the head-to-heads. The question is "Which was scarier?" You tap a poster, or drag toward the scarier one, with an undo if your thumb slipped. Each answer narrows the range where the film can sit, so a long list still takes only a handful of comparisons. When the range closes, the screen says "Added to your rankings" and shows the poster, the score in skulls, the number with one decimal, and its place, something like #10 of 49. A heart card sits under it, and then Share and Done.

Scores are out of 10 with one decimal, and each answer keeps its own range: Terrifying from 7.0 to 10, Some scares from 4.0 to 6.9, Barely flinched from 1.0 to 3.9. Gasper needs 5 ranked films before it shows numbers. Until then the number is blurred and the app says "Rank N more films to unlock your scare scores".

Why head-to-heads beat typed ratings

Typed ratings drift. Your scale in January is not your scale in October, and your five stars for a film you saw on a great night are not the five stars you gave a classic out of respect. Comparisons do not drift the same way, because each one is relative: you are only ever asked about two films at once, and you have the memory of both.

Horror makes this sharper. Scariness is a bodily thing, remembered as a flinch or a held breath, and people are good at recalling which of two films did more of that to them. They are bad at translating the flinch into a 7 or an 8. Gasper asks for the thing you remember and does the arithmetic itself.

Asking only about fear matters too. A film can be a masterpiece that never frightens you, like The Innocents (1961) for many modern viewers, or a cheap shocker that got under your skin for a week. One ranked number cannot hold both facts, so Gasper does not ask it to. The score is for the flinch, and the heart is for the rest. The blog post on why "which was scarier" beats a typed rating makes the longer argument.

Tips for honest answers

Answer fast. Your first instinct about which film was scarier is usually your most honest one, and second-guessing tends to pull in reputation instead of memory.

Judge the watch, not the film's standing. The Exorcist (1973) is a classic for a reason, but if it did not rattle you, do not let it win a head-to-head out of politeness. Your list is only useful if it is yours.

Use the heart for films you adore but did not find scary. Loving a film and being scared by it are separate things, and Gasper keeps them separate; the Loved it heart exists for this.

If a film lands somewhere that feels wrong, re-rank it. Tap "Ranked" on its page, choose "Re-rank head-to-head", and the new answers move it. Nothing is permanent.

What it does not do

Head-to-head ranking does not compare you with anyone else. Every question is about your own films, and the result is your own ordered list. The Community Scare on a film page is a separate figure, an anonymous average of everyone who ranked it, and your answers feed it only as part of that aggregate.

It does not let you set a number directly. That is a feature, not a gap. The moment you can type 8.5, the scale starts drifting again.

It does not ask which film was better. Scare is the only thing Gasper ranks. How much you loved a film is a different question, and the answer to it on Gasper is the heart, not a second ladder.

It cannot rank a film that is not out yet. An unreleased film's page says "Not released yet", the Rank button is dimmed, and you can add it to your watchlist instead.

And it does not need a long list to work. The first film you rank goes in on its own, the second gets one comparison, and from there it builds. For a walkthrough of those first few, start with the start here guide, or read how the scare score works. The glossary entry on head-to-head is the one-paragraph version.