ORB Participant vs ManageBac
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
ORB Participant
Track your progress for The Duke of Edinburgh's International Award. Log activities, manage your sections, and submit them to your Assessor and Award Leader for completion, all from your mobile device.
- Manage Award progress
- Set up activities
- Create progress logs
- Submit Award sections
- Assessor and Leader approval
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This application was developed by The Duke of Edinburgh's International Award Foundation as a simple and fast tool to assist Award participants in completing their Award, anytime anywhere. The participant is able to manage their Award progress using the App. They can set up activities, create logs for their progress and also send their Award sections to their Assessor and Award Leader for completion. Your Award must be using the latest version of the Online Record Book system (sometimes known as "ORB Next Generation") and have a valid participant login to the system in order to be able to use this App.
ManageBac
This app helps students, parents, and educators manage academic tasks, track progress, and collaborate across various curricula. It supports planning, goal-setting, coursework submission, and communication for a streamlined educational experience.
- Academic deadline tracking
- Goal setting and portfolio building
- CAS/service-learning management
- Curriculum planning and collaboration
- Assessment and grade management
- Attendance and behavior tracking
- Parental progress monitoring
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ManageBac is built for students, parents, teachers, admins and coordinators on-the-go! With multi-curricula support for the full IB Continuum (PYP, MYP, CP, DP), IGCSEs and universally with a Build-your-Own (BYO) model. Students: • Stay organised with key academic deadlines and assessment tasks. • Set goals and build a portfolio with coursework, photos and more. • Manage CAS or service-learning activities with reflections. • Plan projects and communicate with your teachers & advisors. • Browse and reference QuickStart guides for the IB to stay one step ahead. Teachers: • Collaboratively plan your curriculum. • Manage teaching and learning with Stream & Resources. • Share experiences and goal-setting within the Portfolio. • Mark tasks, annotate coursework and submit term grades. • Record attendance and Behaviour & Discipline. Coordinators: • Plan and organise key year group deadlines. • Manage service learning & project-based learning. • Manage exams from start to finish. • Analyse your curriculum and manage term reporting. Parents: • Browse the curriculum alongside teaching & learning within the Portfolio. • Monitor academic progress with grades, teacher comments, and report cards. • Submit attendance excusals and communicate with homeroom advisors. • Collaborate with fellow parents via the Parent-Teacher Association.
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is rating: ManageBac at 4.1 against ORB Participant's 3.1. ManageBac also leads on update cadence (every 2 weeks vs every 4 months). ORB Participant's advantage is review sentiment (32% vs 20%) and iOS requirement (12.0 vs 17.0). On price, ratings volume, ads and in-app purchases 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. Neither carries in-app purchases, so what you see is what you pay.
ManageBac holds the better App Store score, 4.1 against 3.1. Both are backed by a comparable volume of ratings — 66 and 189 respectively. Written reviews complicate that: 32% of ORB Participant's written reviews are positive against 20% of ManageBac's, so the app with the better star average is not the one people write more warmly about.
ORB Participant ships an update every 4 months, ManageBac every 2 weeks. The most recent releases landed on November 2, 2026 and November 6, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | ORB Participant | ManageBac |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free |
| Rating | 3.1 (66 ratings) | 4.1 (189 ratings) — better |
| Positive reviews | 31.8% of reviews — better | 19.6% of reviews |
| Number of ratings | 66 | 189 — better |
| Update frequency | Every 4 months | Every 2 weeks — better |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | No | No |
| Monetization | Free | Free |
| Devices | iPhone, iPad, iPod — better | iPhone, iPad |
| Requires iOS | 12.0 — better | 17.0 |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 43 MB | 199 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 4+ |
| Developer | The Duke of Edinburgh's International Award Foundation | Faria Education Limited |
Customer experience
ORB Participant
ManageBac
User reviews
ORB Participant
From 66 App Store ratingsWhat we love
- 👍 Easy to use interface for logging hours
- 🚀 Convenient mobile access for on-the-go logging
- ✅ Reliable for basic activity tracking
- 📱 Simple and straightforward design
- ⭐ Helpful for Duke of Edinburgh participants
Room to improve
- 🐛 Frequent crashes and freezing
- ⚠️ Hours calculation errors and inaccuracies
- 🔌 Network error messages despite working connection
- ❌ Limited editing capabilities after submission
- 😤 Slow and laggy performance
ManageBac
From 189 App Store ratingsWhat we love
- 👍 Convenient for school/IB
- 🚀 Helpful for distance learning
- 👍 Useful for tracking assignments
Room to improve
- 🐛 Buggy and glitchy
- 👎 Confusing and unintuitive UI
- 👎 Difficult to navigate
- 👎 Slow and laggy
- 👎 Frustrating to use
Bugs and requests
ORB Participant
Reported bugs
18 issues- Hours not accumulating correctly - logs multiple hours as single hour
- Progress bar not increasing when adding logs
- Network error messages appearing despite valid connection
- App crashes when entering journey observations
- App crashes when editing and resubmitting assessments
Show 13 moreShow fewer
- Login logout issues preventing re-access
- Payment details field not accepting input during registration
- Award leader change not persisting after switching schools
- Confirmation buttons not scaling properly on mobile screens
- Photo/link attachment not saving on iPhone
- Copy-paste functionality only adding partial text
- Long text input being deleted when submitting
- Cannot delete additional activities even without logs
- Approval emails not being received by assessors
- Assessments getting stuck in 'waiting for approval' state
- App not loading after login despite successful authentication
- Persistent notification bubble that won't disappear
- Inconsistent hour calculations across activities
Requested features
17 requests- Ability to edit activities and submissions after approval
- Resend assessment/approval functionality
- Message/comment system between users and leaders
- View approved evidence and journey details after submission
- Edit activity names if misspelled
Show 12 moreShow fewer
- Support for 5-minute time intervals instead of 15-minute
- Delete authorized awards option
- Change major activity selection
- Upload photos from files instead of gallery only
- Edit overview and plan sections of adventurous journey
- Clearer information about hour reset timing
- Include Duke of Ed information within the app
- Support for sub-submissions in log details
- Resend assessment button on mobile app (exists on website)
- Larger description text box with line break support
- Countdown percentage for remaining award completion
- Remove persistent notification badges
ManageBac
Reported bugs
4 issues- Frequent log-outs
- Issues with file uploads
- Inconsistent notification system
- Grades and assignments not displaying properly
Requested features
4 requests- Easier access to grades and assignments
- Better organization and filtering of tasks
- Improved mobile experience
- Ability to view all past work
In-app purchases
ORB Participant
No in-app purchases
ManageBac
No in-app purchases
Questions
Is ORB Participant free?
Is ManageBac free?
Which has better reviews, ORB Participant or ManageBac?
Do ORB Participant or ManageBac have ads?
Which is updated more often, ORB Participant or ManageBac?
Other comparisons
