Comparison

Bear vs Handwriting & Calligraphy Font

Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.

Head to head
About

Bear

A beautiful and simple Markdown app for capturing, writing, and organizing your thoughts and ideas. It offers a distraction-free writing environment, flexible formatting, and powerful organizational tools like tags and tasks. Ideal for anyone looking to streamline their note-taking and creative processes.

Highlights
  • Distraction-free writing environment
  • Flexible Markdown formatting
  • Tag-based organization
  • Task management
  • Note linking (WikiLinks)
  • Web clipping extension
  • Apple Pencil sketching
Features
Read full description

Bear is a beautiful, powerfully simple Markdown app to capture, write, and organize your life. ​ Take notes, plan your day, journal thoughts, organize tables, create lists and tasks, sketch ideas, link notes together, write a book, and much more. Bear is used by writers, lawyers, chefs, CEOs, teachers, doctors, engineers, students, parents.. you get the picture. Getting started couldn’t be faster—no signup and no account. Just open a note and write naturally. ​ "My journaling app of choice is Bear" - Kit Eaton, New York Times ​ * 2017 Apple Design Award * 2016 App Store App of the Year * Editors' choice for 7 consecutive years * Most of our parents love it ​ ## BEAUTIFUL. SIMPLE. POWERFUL. PRIVATE - Tools stay out of your way so you can just write - Sketch ideas on iPad with an extendable canvas and Apple Pencil (and other styli) - Clip web pages and other content with Bear’s app extension - The redesigned Info Panel now with Table of Contents and Backlinks - Use Apple Watch to dictate and append to recent notes - Support for all the scripts including RTL languages like Arabic, Hebrew, and Persian - Easily create notes with Siri and Shortcuts - Your notes, not ours - Bear is private at its core: We cannot see your notes, tags, or anything else ​ ## FLEXIBLE MARKDOWN ​ - Work in plain text - easy to move between apps - Still use formatting like bold, italics, strikethrough, links, tables, and more with Markdown - Combine text styles like bold and underline, even in headings - Markdown hides for a clean reading experience - Use WikiLinks to connect notes and build a personal wiki or knowledge management tool ​ ## GET ORGANIZED with #tags, tasks, and more ​ - Add #tags, #multi-word tags# and even #multiple/nested/tags anywhere in a note for quick organization - Pin important tags to the top of the Sidebar - Make important tags stand out in the Sidebar with TagCons - Add tasks to notes and easily view all notes that include tasks - Fold sections to get them out of the way ​ ## SHARING MADE EASY ​ - Export notes to plain text, Markdown, TextBundle, Bear note, and rich text - Export notes to HTML, DocX, PDF, JPG, and ePub (Bear Pro required) - Easily share your notes to any third-party app with the Share Sheet ​ ## SEARCH FAR AND WIDE ​ - Use Spotlight to search your notes from anywhere - Search for text inside photos and PDFs (Bear Pro required) - Focus on specific types of notes with powerful Special Searches like @todo, @images, and @yesterday ​ ## CREATE YOUR COZY SPACE ​ * Pick from nearly 30 themes for the perfect writing space in both Light and Dark Mode (Bear Pro required) * Choose an app icon that speaks to your personality (Bear Pro required) * Set your own fonts for plain text, headings, and code * Set line height and width, paragraph spacing, and more ​ ## GET MORE WITH BEAR PRO ​ One subscription enables a variety of features on all your devices and keeps the Bear hugs coming. ​ - Sync notes between your iPhone, iPad, and Mac via iCloud - Encrypt individual notes with a password that is entirely private to you - Lock Bear with Face/Touch ID - Export to more formats including HTML, DocX, PDF, JPG, and ePub - Search for text inside images and PDFs in Bear notes - Over 30 beautiful app themes & app icons ​ $2.99 monthly $29.99 yearly 14-day free trial ​ ----- Price may vary by location. Subscriptions will be charged to your credit card through your App Store account. Your subscription will automatically renew unless canceled at least 24 hours before the end of the current period. You will not be able to cancel the subscription once activated. After purchase, manage your subscriptions in App Store Account Settings. Any unused portion of a free trial period will be forfeited when the user purchases a subscription. ----- ​ bear@shinyfrog.net Twitter: BearNotesApp Reddit: reddit.com/r/BearApp Facebook: BearNotes Instagram: BearNotesApp Privacy Policy: http://www.bear.app/privacy/ Terms of Service: http://www.bear.app/terms/

About

Handwriting & Calligraphy Font

Create stylish invitations and event cards with a selection of 26 cursive fonts. Easily install and use these fonts across various applications like Office, Keynote, and Cricut. Test and share your creations directly within the app.

Highlights
  • 26 stylish cursive fonts
  • Create invitation cards
  • Use in Office, Keynote, Cricut
  • Easy font installation
  • Test and share text
  • Privacy-focused, no tracking
Features
Read full description

A selection of 26 fonts to create your invitation cards, thank you, birthday, birth or other event. Use these fonts in: ● Word Excel PowerPoint Office ● Numbers Keynote Pages ● Cricut ● any application allowing the use of fonts installed by the user. Very easy to use, just click on install and restart the application where you want to use the fonts. You can now test and choose your favorite font directly in the application, and share your text by message or on social networks. I wanted an easy to use app without any tracking to maintain your privacy, that's why this app is not free and ad-free like my other apps. It is very important for me.

Screenshots

Bear4 screens
Handwriting & Calligraphy Font2 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is price: Bear at Free against Handwriting & Calligraphy Font's $4.99. Bear also leads on update cadence (every 9 days vs every 4 months) and ratings volume (6.9K vs 157). Handwriting & Calligraphy Font's advantage is in-app purchases (none vs 2). On rating, review sentiment, ads and device support there is nothing between them.

Scored on Price · Rating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings · Update frequency · Ads · In-app purchases · Monetization · Best chart rank · Devices · Requires iOS

CostPrice · In-app purchases · Ads · Monetization

Bear is free to download; Handwriting & Calligraphy Font costs $4.99 up front. Bear sells 2 in-app purchases, starting at $2.99 per month. Handwriting & Calligraphy Font asks for nothing beyond the download.

ReceptionRating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings

On the App Store both sit at effectively the same score — 4.7 for Bear against 4.7 for Handwriting & Calligraphy Font. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: Bear has 6.9K ratings behind it against 157, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews are what separate them: 77% of Bear's written reviews are positive against 75% of Handwriting & Calligraphy Font's.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

Bear ships an update every 9 days, Handwriting & Calligraphy Font every 4 months. The most recent releases landed on September 24, 2026 and September 20, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard5 real differences · 5 level
Bear versus Handwriting & Calligraphy Font: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterBearHandwriting & Calligraphy Font
PriceFree — better$4.99
Rating4.7 (6.9K ratings)4.7 (157 ratings)
Positive reviews76.9% of reviews — better75.0% of reviews
Number of ratings6.9K — better157
Update frequencyEvery 9 days — betterEvery 4 months
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesYesNo — better
MonetizationFreemium — betterPaid
DevicesiPhone, iPad, iPod, Apple WatchiPhone, iPad, iPod, Mac
Requires iOS15.615.0 — better
Further details — not scored
Size230 MB16 MB
Age rating4+4+
DeveloperShiny Frog Ltd.michael dardol

Customer experience

Bear

All ratings6,858 ratings
Positive91.6%
Neutral2.6%
Negative5.8%
Written reviews1,752 reviews
Positive76.9%
Neutral9.5%
Negative13.6%

Handwriting & Calligraphy Font

All ratings157 ratings
Positive93.6%
Neutral2.5%
Negative3.8%
Written reviews16 reviews
Positive75.0%
Neutral0.0%
Negative25.0%

Bugs and requests

Bear

Reported bugs

3 issues
  • Sync issues causing note conflicts and data loss
  • Cursor jumping and input issues on iPad
  • Inconsistent behavior when importing/exporting content

Requested features

5 requests
  • Add password protection for individual notes
  • Improve search capabilities to find text within notes
  • Implement table support for more robust note-taking
  • Develop a web-based version for broader accessibility
  • Allow manual sorting and organization of notes

Handwriting & Calligraphy Font

Not enough reviews yet to summarise bugs or requests.

In-app purchases

2 purchases

Bear

Subscriptions2
  • Monthly Pro subscription7 Days trial$2.991 Month
  • Yearly Pro subscription7 Days trial$29.991 Year
None

Handwriting & Calligraphy Font

No in-app purchases

Questions

Is Bear free?
Bear is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Is Handwriting & Calligraphy Font free?
Handwriting & Calligraphy Font costs $4.99, with no in-app purchases.
Which has better reviews, Bear or Handwriting & Calligraphy Font?
Bear and Handwriting & Calligraphy Font are both rated 4.7 out of 5 on the App Store, from 6.9K and 157 ratings respectively.
Do Bear or Handwriting & Calligraphy Font have ads?
Neither Bear nor Handwriting & Calligraphy Font shows ads.
Which is updated more often, Bear or Handwriting & Calligraphy Font?
Bear ships an update every 9 days, and Handwriting & Calligraphy Font every 4 months. Most recently, Bear was updated on September 24, 2026 and Handwriting & Calligraphy Font on September 20, 2026.

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