Hooktheory II vs APM Sweep
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
Hooktheory II
This app helps you understand and create sophisticated music by teaching advanced chord progressions and melody techniques. Learn from interactive exercises and audiovisual examples inspired by popular artists. It's designed for musicians looking to enhance their songwriting skills.
- Learn seventh chords, embellishments, and secondary chords
- Master minor harmony, modes, and modal mixture
- Discover songwriting tactics from famous artists
- Interactive exercises and audiovisual examples
- Compose chords and melody in various scales
- Utilize chord inversions and complex chord types
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Continue on your musical journey! Build on the foundation you learned in Hooktheory I, and discover an intuitive and deep understanding of richer, more sophisticated music. Unlock the songwriting tactics used by The Beatles, Bowie, Queen, Michael Jackson, and more. Learn about seventh chords, embellishments, secondary chords, minor harmony, modes, and modal mixture. Validated by over 30,000 hobby and pro musicians like you, the Hooktheory Book Series is the best-selling how-to series for musicians for a reason. Hooktheory II isn’t like other music theory books. Hooktheory teaches with an easy-to-understand music format that emphasizes chord and melody function. Rich audiovisual animations play along as you learn. We dissect popular songs and show you how the pros do it. Immediately practice concepts and tactics with our companion musical sketchpad, Hookpad. There is nothing else like it! Fun to read. Easy to understand. Full of practical knowledge. Learn from 84 interactive exercises and 228 audiovisual examples from artists like The Beatles, Elton John, Queen, David Bowie, Michael Jackson, Boyz II Men, Coldplay, Van Morrison, Adele, Ariana Grande, John Mayer, and many more! In Hooktheory II, you’ll learn the following skills: • Composing chords and melody in minor (and other scales). • Using chord inversions (reordering chord tones) to create effective bass lines. • Using complex chord types (e.g. 7th chords, extended chords, suspended chords, and “add” chords) to enrich your chord progressions. • Using secondary chords (chords based on a different key) to create tension. • Combining melody and chords from multiple scales (modal mixture). • Utilizing songwriting techniques like energy control, deception, and harmonic scope to control listeners' expectations. Benefits: • Simple piano roll notation (sheet music knowledge not required). • Every concept + technique demonstrated through an actual song. • 228 audiovisual examples from artists like The Beatles, Elton John, and Queen. • Reinforce learning at every step with 83 exercises. • Designed to be used with Hookpad Music Making Software. Hookpad lets you immediately practice every concept and tactic you learn in the books. To sum it up: Hooktheory II will teach you all of the essential techniques for crafting effective and compelling chord progressions and melodies. Reading Hooktheory II doesn’t require the ability to read sheet music or any music knowledge outside what was covered in Hooktheory I. On average, it takes about twelve hours to read (but more to fully absorb) so it isn't a huge time commitment. Dedicate only a few days to absorbing this book and gain a lifetime of skills that will give your music that professional edge.
APM Sweep
This application helps measure and analyze a room's acoustical performance, including reverberation time and clarity. It suggests materials to improve sound quality and allows for saving, loading, and exporting results in common spreadsheet formats. PDF reports with photos can also be generated.
- Acoustical performance measurement
- Reverberation time and clarity analysis
- Material recommendation for improvement
- Save, load, and export results
- Generate PDF reports with photos
- Tutorial slideshow for guidance
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APM Sweep is the successor of the well known APM Tool: it let you quickly measure the acoustical performance of a room (reverberation time, clarity, etc. in octave and third octave bands), check if that room is well suited for its purpose and, if not, choose which materials can improve the acoustical quality. Everything still there but with an exciting improvement: now you can use all the power of the Exponential Sine Sweep technique for the measurement process, so your results can be extremely precise and accurate. You can also, save, load and export results in common spreadsheet format. The app can also generate pdf reports with photos. A tutorial slideshow explains the app use. Required at least iOS 11.0
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is price: APM Sweep at Free against Hooktheory II's $19.99. APM Sweep also leads on in-app purchases (none vs 1). Hooktheory II's advantage is rating (4.8 vs 1.0) and review sentiment (92% vs 50%). On 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
APM Sweep is free to download; Hooktheory II costs $19.99 up front. Hooktheory II sells 1 one-off in-app purchase. APM Sweep asks for nothing beyond the download.
Hooktheory II holds the better App Store score, 4.8 against 1.0. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: Hooktheory II has 28 ratings behind it against 1, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews point the same way: 92% of Hooktheory II's written reviews are positive against 50% of APM Sweep's.
Hooktheory II ships an update monthly, APM Sweep every 10 months. The most recent releases landed on September 21, 2026 and September 24, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | Hooktheory II | APM Sweep |
|---|---|---|
| Price | $19.99 | Free — better |
| Rating | 4.8 (28 ratings) — better | 1.0 (1 ratings) |
| Positive reviews | 92.0% of reviews — better | 50.0% of reviews |
| Number of ratings | 28 — better | 1 |
| Update frequency | Monthly — better | Every 10 months |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | Yes | No — better |
| Monetization | Free with in-app purchases | Free — better |
| Best chart rank | #165 — better | — |
| Devices | iPhone, iPad, iPod | iPhone, iPad, iPod |
| Requires iOS | 13.0 — better | 15.6 |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 123 MB | 35 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 4+ |
| Developer | Hooktheory LLC | Lorenzo Rizzi |
Customer experience
Hooktheory II
APM Sweep
In-app purchases
Hooktheory II
- Full Version$19.99
APM Sweep
No in-app purchases









