Paperpile vs Anara
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
Paperpile
Organize and manage your research papers effortlessly. Collect, read, and annotate PDFs from millions of academic journals. Beat paper chaos with a tidy digital library.
- Search millions of academic papers
- Collect PDFs with one tap
- Organize with folders and labels
- Read and annotate PDFs
- Highlight and add notes
- Browser integration for saving
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Get a head start for you research and finally beat the paper chaos on your desk. With Paperpile you have all your research PDFs in one place — nice and tidy. Paperpile makes it easier than ever to collect, manage, read, and annotate your papers. FIND & COLLECT - Search millions of papers from 20,000+ academic journals right in the app. - Add new papers to your collection with one tap and the PDF will be downloaded automatically. - Save directly from your browser to your Paperpile library - User your university's off-campus proxy access to get restricted content behind paywalls. MANAGE & ORGANIZE - Bring structure to your library with folders and subfolders - Organize your library visually with colored labels - Mark important papers with stars. - Search your library to find the paper you need fast. READ & ANNOTATE - Read like on paper with a fast and slick PDF viewer experience - Highlight important sections in different colors - Add notes and never forget an important idea. - Add hand-drawn annotations - with your fingers or your Apple Pencil The Paperpile App requires a Paperpile account.
Anara
This AI-powered tool assists scientists with academic research. It enables searching, reading, and writing scientific content with verifiable citations. The mobile app provides on-the-go access to your library, allowing you to ask questions about papers and get cited answers.
- AI-powered academic search
- Summarize and cite sources
- Write with verifiable citations
- On-demand research on mobile
- Read and highlight PDFs offline
- Save papers and links
- Scan pages with camera
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Anara is AI purpose-built for science. Search, read, and write academic content with every claim cited back to its source. Anara searches your library and the web, summarizes what it finds, and helps you write with citations you can check. Anara is 4x more accurate than general-purpose AI like ChatGPT and Claude at finding information in documents. Our iOS app is a companion to the Anara web app, designed for on-demand research while you are away from your keyboard: Ask questions about your papers and get cited answers on the go Tap any citation to open the source at the exact passage Read and highlight your PDFs, offline once downloaded Save papers and links into your library from any app, or scan pages with your camera Anara requires an account. A free plan is available; paid plans and credit packs are offered as in-app purchases. Subscriptions renew monthly until canceled in your App Store account settings. Terms of Use (EULA): https://www.apple.com/legal/internet-services/itunes/dev/stdeula/ Terms of Service: https://anara.com/terms Privacy Policy: https://anara.com/privacy
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is in-app purchases: Paperpile at none against Anara's 14. Paperpile also leads on ads (none vs shown) and ratings volume (131 vs 1). Anara's advantage is rating (5.0 vs 4.5) and update cadence (every 6 days vs every 2 months). On price 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
Both are free to download. Anara sells 14 in-app purchases, starting at $11.99 per month. Paperpile asks for nothing beyond the download.
Anara holds the better App Store score, 5.0 against 4.5. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: Paperpile has 131 ratings behind it against 1, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews point the same way: 72% of Paperpile's written reviews are positive against 80% of Anara's.
Paperpile ships an update every 2 months, Anara every 6 days. The most recent releases landed on October 23, 2026 and October 25, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | Paperpile | Anara |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free |
| Rating | 4.5 (131 ratings) | 5.0 (1 ratings) — better |
| Positive reviews | 71.6% of reviews | 80.0% of reviews — better |
| Number of ratings | 131 — better | 1 |
| Update frequency | Every 2 months | Every 6 days — better |
| Ads | No — better | Yes |
| In-app purchases | No — better | Yes |
| Monetization | Free — better | Free with in-app purchases |
| Devices | iPhone, iPad, iPod — better | iPhone, iPad |
| Requires iOS | 12.0 — better | 26.0 |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 242 MB | 53 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 12+ |
| Developer | Paperpile LLC | Anara Labs Inc |
Customer experience
Paperpile
Anara
Bugs and requests
Paperpile
Reported bugs
12 issues- App crashes frequently on iPad and iOS devices
- Highlighting disappears when revisiting papers
- Overlapping annotations delete together when removing one
- Sync failures requiring logout/login cycles
- Annotations not syncing between iPad and web versions
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- PDF metadata recognition failures when adding papers
- Settings reset when returning to previously edited files
- App incompatible with older iOS versions (iOS 12)
- Login authentication errors with university accounts
- App crashes without reliable internet connection
- Search functionality broken after updates
- Annotations not saving/loading on iOS 14.4.2
Requested features
17 requests- Dark mode implementation
- Edit citation metadata on mobile app
- Change PDF file functionality
- Save to downloads feature
- Dictionary/lookup function for reading
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- Cite while you write feature
- BibTeX export capability
- Ability to upload PDFs directly from mobile app
- Support for Safari and other browsers
- Desktop application version
- Shared library access in mobile app
- Advanced sorting options (by title, author, date)
- Custom color options for annotations
- Paste images into PDFs
- Shape snapping for drawing tools
- University email authentication
- Paper rating system beyond stars
Anara
Not enough reviews yet to summarise bugs or requests.
In-app purchases
Paperpile
No in-app purchases
Anara
- Plus$11.991 Month
- Plus$14.991 Month
- Pro$23.991 Month
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- Pro$28.991 Month
- Max 5x$117.991 Month
- Max 5x$141.991 Month
- Max 20x$239.991 Month
- Max 20x$289.991 Month
- 500 credits$5.99
- 1,000 credits$11.99
- 2,000 credits$27.99
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- 5,000 credits$70.99
- 10,000 credits$141.99
- 20,000 credits$239.99
