# Charles Proxy vs FireHydrant

The clearest difference is price: FireHydrant at Free against Charles Proxy's $8.99. FireHydrant also leads on rating (4.3 vs 4.0) and update cadence (every 3 weeks vs every 2 months). Charles Proxy's advantage is review sentiment (52% vs 33%) and ratings volume (187 vs 8). On ads, in-app purchases and device support there is nothing between them.

FireHydrant is free to download; Charles Proxy costs $8.99 up front. Neither carries in-app purchases, so what you see is what you pay.

FireHydrant holds the better App Store score, 4.3 against 4.0. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: Charles Proxy has 187 ratings behind it against 8, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews complicate that: 52% of Charles Proxy's written reviews are positive against 33% of FireHydrant's, so the app with the better star average is not the one people write more warmly about.

Charles Proxy ships an update every 2 months, FireHydrant every 3 weeks. The most recent releases landed on October 13, 2026 and October 7, 2026 respectively.

## The numbers

| Metric | Charles Proxy | FireHydrant |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Price | $8.99 | **Free** |
| Rating | [4.0 (187 ratings)](https://appshunter.io/ios/app/charles-proxy/id1134218562/reviews) | **[4.3 (8 ratings)](https://appshunter.io/ios/app/firehydrant/id6473452572/reviews)** |
| Number of ratings | **187** | 8 |
| Positive reviews | **51.9% of reviews** | 33.3% of reviews |
| In-app purchases | No | No |
| Ads | No | No |
| Update frequency | Every 2 months | **Every 3 weeks** |
| Monetization | Paid | **Free** |
| Size | 20 MB | 98 MB |
| Requires iOS | 17.0 | **15.1** |
| Devices | iPhone, iPad | **iPhone, iPad, iPod** |
| Age rating | 4+ | 4+ |
| Developer | [XK72 Limited](https://appshunter.io/developer/284393209) | [FireHydrant](https://appshunter.io/developer/1718970083) |

## What reviewers say

### Charles Proxy

[App page](https://appshunter.io/ios/app/charles-proxy/id1134218562)

Capture and inspect network requests and responses directly on your iOS device. Debug networking issues without needing a computer. View detailed metadata, headers, and bodies, and even transfer sessions to a desktop for further analysis.

**Highlights:** Capture network requests and responses, Inspect metadata, headers, and bodies, SSL Proxying for plain text viewing, Measure network performance, Block requests to specific hosts, DNS spoofing

**Features:** macOS Compatibility, Vision Pro support

**In-app purchases:** none

**What reviewers like**

- 🚀 Great tool for developers
- 👍 Useful for debugging
- 🔒 SSL proxying works
- 💡 Convenient to use on mobile

**What reviewers complain about**

- 🐛 Stability issues, crashes
- 🐛 SSL certificate not trusted
- 🐛 Doesn't handle gzip compression
- 🐛 Slow performance compared to desktop

**Reported bugs**

- Doesn't work with latest iOS versions
- Fails to export sessions frequently
- Incompatible with apps using VPN
- Large JSON bodies not displayed properly

**Requested features**

- Add ability to edit and replay requests
- Improve JSON viewer and formatting
- Add support for WebSockets
- Provide option to map to local
- Add scripting and breakpoint features


### FireHydrant

[App page](https://appshunter.io/ios/app/firehydrant/id6473452572)

This platform streamlines incident response for teams, enabling faster resolution and learning. It provides automated runbooks, scribe tools, and analytics to improve products and processes.

**Highlights:** Incident notification with push alerts, Automated incident assembly, Step-by-step automated runbooks, Built-in scribe tools, Guided retro templates, Customizable analytics, Jira ticket assignment

**In-app purchases:** none


## Frequently asked questions

### Is Charles Proxy free?

Charles Proxy costs $8.99, with no in-app purchases.

### Is FireHydrant free?

FireHydrant is free to download, with no in-app purchases.

### Which has better reviews, Charles Proxy or FireHydrant?

FireHydrant is rated higher. Charles Proxy averages 4.0 out of 5 from 187 ratings, while FireHydrant averages 4.3 from 8 ratings.

### Do Charles Proxy or FireHydrant have ads?

Neither Charles Proxy nor FireHydrant shows ads.

### Which is updated more often, Charles Proxy or FireHydrant?

Charles Proxy ships an update every 2 months, and FireHydrant every 3 weeks. Most recently, Charles Proxy was updated on October 13, 2026 and FireHydrant on October 7, 2026.

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*Compared by [AppsHunter](https://appshunter.io/) from daily US App Store data. Review summaries are generated from verbatim App Store reviews.*