# Calligraphy Handbook > Digital tool for learning, practicing, and creating calligraphy art with various tools and games. (iPhone/iPad app by Etienne Nguyen Tan Hon.) - Source: https://appshunter.io/ios/app/calligraphy-handbook/id830584075 (this page in markdown: same URL + `.md`) - Developer: [Etienne Nguyen Tan Hon](https://appshunter.io/developer/417852567) - Category: Entertainment, Education - Price: Free with in-app purchases - Rating: 4.50/5 from 518 App Store ratings · 112 written reviews indexed - Age rating: 4+ - Requires: iOS 9.0 · 257 MB - Languages: American English, French (France) - Released: 2014-03-21 - Data updated: 2026-06-09 - Monetization: free with in-app purchases - User reviews in markdown: https://appshunter.io/ios/app/calligraphy-handbook/id830584075/reviews.md ## What is Calligraphy Handbook? It's proven that practicing calligraphy can quickly improve bad handwriting by a better understanding of letters' structure and proportion. Writing bigger letters helps to make curves and lines correctly. The beauty of the letters will make the task of writing more pleasant. Calligraphy is also a very constructive leisure. It develops virtues such as patience, attention to detail, perfection, willingness to learn, and the sense of beauty. Calligraphy is a full art form using letters, words and illuminations. It’s also a meditation process when your mind focuses on the strokes, beautifully draw lines and curves, following your intuition and inspiration. The only pre-requirement to this art is the knowledge of writing, which everyone is proficient. Calligraphy has a high potential of discoveries, it’s one of the rare art form that you can start from a basis you already know: writing letters and words. 1/ CALLIGRAPHY HANDBOOK is a perfect tool for learning and improving your calligraphy skill. As a beginner, the app will provide the best digital pens and papers for your learning. Don’t waste paper and ink now, digital tools are endlessly renewable. As a confirmed calligrapher, you will find pen and color effects that are impossible to create in real life: 6 small parallel lines, 4 size-lines, light effect pen, shaded line, rainbow effect, mixed colors in one stroke, alternated colors in one letter… 2/ CHALLENGE your friends in different writing styles, or simply evaluate your skill with the incredible calligraphy game. Reproduce a model inside a limited space, with a limited number of strokes, and see how many stars you can gain. Avoid actions as: undo, exceeding strokes or using tracing image. Otherwise your score will be heavily cut down. 3/ WRITING TOOLS: - 11 calligraphic pens - 1 pointed pen - 12 mixed colors effects - 12 alternated colors effects - 1 eraser - Smoothed strokes for all pens, let you draw perfect curves and lines. NOTE: we have intentionally made the strokes slower and smoother, because drawing beautiful letters has to be done in a slower speed compared to handwriting or painting. Calligraphy is a highly relaxing activity, a slow motion is the best for it. Writing features and supplies: - 19 calligraphic hands in a large choice of styles (more hands are coming with future updates) - Old papers - Guiding lines - Shadowed letters for tracing - 24 preset pen angles - 63 premixed colors - Export your writing to the camera roll or by email. - Palm rejection - Pen offset 4 / ARTISTIC CREATION. Calligraphy Handbook is a truly comprehensive tool for creating calligraphic works (greeting card, invitation, letterhead, logo, brochure, magazine cover, etc ... - Users can create true works of art with all the calligraphic tools. - An entire page is provided with layers management. - A gallery to save works in progress. - The gallery is organized by blocks, each block contains an unlimited number of pages. - The works and the blocks can be exported and shared in png or pdf formats. - Shadows and texture can be added to your lettering. 5/ TIPS: - Draw your letters very very SLOWLY. - Take a long breathe before a long stroke, then expire slowly and regularly while drawing. - Take a comfortable sitting position. - Clean up your screen frequently. - When following the lessons in this app, don’t pressure yourself to immediately draw perfect letters, but simply follow your intuition and focus on the movement of the strokes. It’s not so important to get completely correct letters, don’t forget, it’s not typography. - Relax yourself before starting a calligraphy session, you will have better strokes. Stretch and simply shake your hands and shoulders. Take a comfortable sitting position. ## Key features - Digital pens and papers for learning - Unique pen and color effects - Calligraphy game for skill evaluation - 11 calligraphic pens and 1 pointed pen - 19 calligraphic hands in various styles - Layer management for artistic creation - Export creations to camera roll or email ## Pricing and in-app purchases Base price: Free. **One-time purchases** | Purchase | Price | Type | | --- | --- | --- | | Unlock All Features | $3.99 | one-time | ## What do users think of Calligraphy Handbook? Overall sentiment: positive **Pros** - 👍 Helpful for learning calligraphy - 💡 Variety of font styles and color options - 👍 Calming and meditative experience - 👍 Great for beginners and intermediate users - 👍 Useful for practicing without supplies - 👍 Intuitive and easy to use **Cons** - 🐛 Frequent crashes and bugs - 💰 Misleading about free features - 🔒 Lack of palm rejection and input issues - 👎 Overly strict grading system - 👎 Limited free features, need to pay for full access **Commonly reported bugs** - App crashes when switching between uppercase and lowercase letters - Undo feature causes freezing and loss of progress - Inconsistent performance and lag when using Apple Pencil - Restoration of in-app purchases not working as expected **Most requested features** - Add more font styles, especially Gothic and modern - Implement better palm rejection and input handling - Allow users to favorite/save preferred font styles - Add the ability to practice full words and sentences - Improve export and sharing options ## Recent user reviews (10 of 112) All indexed reviews: https://appshunter.io/ios/app/calligraphy-handbook/id830584075/reviews.md ### 4/5 — good but *2025-07-29, version 3.7* whenever i try to restore perchases it wouldn’t let me and i still have ads ### 5/5 — Terrific way to learn this skill *2025-04-10, version 3.6.5* Challenging and encouraging ### 5/5 — Brilliant!! *2024-09-17, version 3.5* The best calligraphy app thats free with NO ADS !! I’m loving it Thanks so much to the developers for making this app free xx ### 4/5 — Good but some bugs and suggestions *2024-08-04, version 3.5* It is pretty thorough with a lot of hand (font) options. They’re beautiful and pretty easy. But there are certain things like making a nice serif that’s tricky. It would be nice if it had a little video on each letter and hand. Also, like the L, at the end where it ticks up and thicken on the right, how can I do that with a digital pen? Or even a calligraphy pen & nibs without changing nibs? Initially, it started great but then the app keeps registering my stroke and stops halfway and the whole page shifts instead. Maybe it’s my pen’s battery? I love that it’s free with possible upgrades. One thing I can’t stand are very limited apps for a free trial. Definitely worth a try! ### 1/5 — In app purchases *2024-08-02, version 3.5* In app purchases are the leading cause for all simple apps to lose download potential from users. Unless your app is super amazing. Which it isn’t. Not worth the download unless it was free ### 5/5 — Amazing! *2024-06-14, version 3.5* I just started and so far this app is great! I’m basically transitioning to goth and I kinda want to be able to do calligraphy. I saw another app like this and I thought it looked cool, so I got it … but it wanted me to pay to do it so obvi, I did not continue it. I started looking for another app like it and found this so, I got it, and I’m resaying or what ever the word is, so far this is great. ### 5/5 — Great for getting started *2023-12-15, version 3.5* I’m relatively new to calligraphy and wanted an app that would allow me to practice without spending all the money on equipment and paper until I felt more comfortable. Perfect for practice ### 3/5 — Usability *2023-12-03, version 3.5* Clunky. ### 5/5 — I like it, does have some bugs (update 2) *2023-10-30, version 3.3* * free version is basically just a sample and you’re not going to get much out of it, there is a small (under $5) one time charge to use the app as intended. No ads, no subscription, no endless series of in-app purchases. * variety of fonts, many many color options, some nice extras * I strongly recommend reading the user’s guide in “getting started”, there’s a lot that the app has to offer that won’t be obvious without it * I was basically just looking for somewhere where I could make letters calligraphy-style, without the wide side of the “pen” changing directions on me unexpectedly. So, obviously this app met that expectation but it also went way beyond it. And I thought I’d enjoy myself but I wasn’t expecting to enjoy myself this much. I downloaded this app maybe two days ago and have been using it more than I’ve been doing anything else other than sleeping. * the “words” section is prone to crashing, so don’t put a lot of effort into that section if you’re new to the app. When you use it more you get a sense of what causes it to crash and can usually avoid it crashing at bad times and losing your creations. * I don’t think I’ve had it crash when making art directly from “layers gallery” or “stencils models”. I enjoy tracing the lettrines (extra fancy letters) a lot. For some reason I can’t figure out you can get a grid or lines in that part of the app, but not the same sorts of lines you get in the practice sections of the app which is just weird imo. * This isn’t a shiny subscription based app with perfect function and new features all the time. It’s more like the early apps. Personally I think that’s a good thing. * it’s been idk a month and I still spend maybe an hour or two every day on this. Very calming. ### 4/5 — Excellent app *2023-10-30, version 3.3* It’s a pretty good app. I can learn the structure of different letters. Thanks. ## Frequently asked questions about Calligraphy Handbook ### What is Calligraphy Handbook? Calligraphy Handbook is a digital application designed to help users learn and improve their calligraphy skills. It provides a range of virtual pens, papers, and color effects, suitable for both beginners and experienced calligraphers. The app also includes a game to challenge users' abilities. ### What are the key features of Calligraphy Handbook? Key features include digital pens and papers for learning, unique pen and color effects impossible in real life, a calligraphy game for skill evaluation, 19 different calligraphic hands, layer management for artistic creation, and the ability to export your work. It also offers features like palm rejection and pen offset for a better user experience. ### How much does Calligraphy Handbook cost? The application is free to download and use, offering a foundational set of tools and features. Additional features, such as more calligraphic hands or advanced tools, may be available through in-app purchases. ### What devices is Calligraphy Handbook compatible with? While specific device compatibility is not detailed, the app is designed for mobile use. It supports features like palm rejection, suggesting it is optimized for touch-screen devices, likely tablets and smartphones. ### What are the common use cases for Calligraphy Handbook? Common use cases include learning and practicing calligraphy strokes, improving handwriting, creating artistic works like greeting cards or invitations, and engaging in a relaxing and meditative creative activity. It's also used for challenging oneself and friends with its built-in game. ## Version history (last 5 releases) ### 3.8 — 2026-03-21 Version 3.8: - General app improvement - Added a new function for using digital stickers to create decorative patterns - Added the possibility to generate drop shadows when using layers ### 3.7.1 — 2025-07-30 Version 3.7.1: Minor bug fixes ### 3.7 — 2025-07-12 Version 3.7: - We have added stylish models to use as stickers or stencils. - More features for drawing with layers - Bug fixes ### 3.6.5 — 2024-10-16 Version 3.6.5: - Bug fixes ### 3.6 — 2024-10-12 Version 3.6: - We have added an amazing new function: "replace and adjust your last stroke". Instead of undoing your last stroke (which is well done but slightly misplaced), you can move it to the right place and angle. - Bug fixes ## Apps similar to Calligraphy Handbook | App | Rating | Price | Category | | --- | --- | --- | --- | | [Fluids & Particle Simulation](https://appshunter.io/ios/app/fluids-and-particle-simulation/id1532653221) | 4.7 (770) | Free | Entertainment | | [How to Draw Graffiti 3D](https://appshunter.io/ios/app/how-to-draw-graffiti-3d/id1201250639) | 4.4 (60) | Free | Entertainment | | [Flowers - Adult Coloring Book](https://appshunter.io/ios/app/flowers-adult-coloring-book/id1084194490) | 4.6 (3,920) | Free | Entertainment | | [Handwriting Practice App](https://appshunter.io/ios/app/handwriting-practice-app/id1567948511) | 4.4 (547) | Free | Entertainment | | [KaleidoPaint](https://appshunter.io/ios/app/kaleidopaint/id518275953) | 4.6 (76) | Free | Entertainment | | [Bot3D Editor - 3D Anime Editor](https://appshunter.io/ios/app/bot3d-editor-3d-anime-editor/id1215161139) | 3.8 (3,323) | Free | Entertainment | ## More apps by Etienne Nguyen Tan Hon - [Drawing Box](https://appshunter.io/ios/app/drawing-box/id417852564) - [Drawing Box Ltd](https://appshunter.io/ios/app/drawing-box-ltd/id417861734) - [Calligraphy Art](https://appshunter.io/ios/app/calligraphy-art/id434085666) - [Magic Draw Wondershape](https://appshunter.io/ios/app/magic-draw-wondershape/id488716042) - [e Folding](https://appshunter.io/ios/app/e-folding/id955285305) All apps by Etienne Nguyen Tan Hon: https://appshunter.io/developer/417852567 --- *Data collected daily from the US App Store and indexed by [AppsHunter](https://appshunter.io/). User reviews are verbatim App Store reviews. Ratings, prices and chart positions refresh continuously; this snapshot is from 2026-06-09.*