Comparison

ShadowDraw vs Clip Studio Paint

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

Head to head
About

ShadowDraw

Learn to draw with guided, step-by-step lessons designed for beginners. Follow the strokes of professional artists to build confidence and master fundamental techniques. Explore thousands of tutorials across various popular art subjects.

Highlights
  • Step-by-step guided drawing lessons
  • Thousands of tutorials
  • Manga, anime, people, animals, and nature subjects
  • Art Teacher Mode
  • Sketch My Way Mode
  • Builds drawing fundamentals
Features
Read full description

Learn to draw with confidence using your Apple Pencil. Featured by Apple as App of the Day in 2023 and 2025. ShadowDraw® is the easiest way for beginners to learn how to draw on iPad using their Apple Pencil. Our guided lessons teach you step-by-step by showing the real strokes of professional artists, helping you build confidence, accuracy, and real drawing fundamentals from your very first session. LEARN TO DRAW THE SMART, BEGINNER-FRIENDLY WAY
 ShadowDraw breaks every drawing into simple, guided steps. You follow the same strokes as a professional artist, learning: * Line control * Shapes & construction * Proportions * Shading * Final detailing
 Each step unlocks only after you complete the previous one, giving you a structured, supportive learning path—like having a private art teacher with you on your iPad. THOUSANDS OF STEP-BY-STEP LESSONS
 Explore beginner-friendly drawing lessons across the most popular art subjects: * Manga & Anime Characters * People & Portraits * Animals (cats, dogs, horses, birds, dragons, and more) * Architecture & Buildings * Botanical & Nature Drawing * Birds & Butterflies * Coloring & Simple Shading * Holiday & Seasonal Art * Warm-Ups & Foundations * Sketching Basics
 With over 2,000 guided tutorials, there’s always something inspiring to draw. PRACTICE YOUR WAY
 ShadowDraw offers two flexible learning modes: Art Teacher Mode
 We pick brushes and colors so beginners can focus on fundamentals. Sketch My Way
 Choose your own tools and colors for creative freedom. BUILD A DAILY DRAWING HABIT 
Short, approachable lessons help you build confidence and stay consistent. ShadowDraw makes daily practice easy, fun, and motivating—even for busy beginners. RECOGNIZED BY APPLE & TRUSTED WORLDWIDE 
ShadowDraw has been featured in the App Store collections, including: * Incredible iPad Apps * Great with Apple Pencil * Apple Pencil Starter Kit * Better with Apple Pencil * The Best Drawing Apps * The Best Apps for Creatives ShadowDraw has also ranked as the #1 Drawing App in its category. Apple writes: 
“With over 1,500 hand-drawn lessons developed by real artists, ShadowDraw is a drawing app for beginners who want to improve their skills through daily step-by-step exercises.” PRAISED BY THE PRESS
 The New York Times
“ShadowDraw… teaches drawing forms by having you follow along the animated pen strokes of another artist in an updated take on the ‘copying the masters’ approach.” MacBreak Weekly — Pick of the Week
“…the next generation of step-by-step.” Also featured by CNET and Creative Bloq. LEARN TOGETHER WITH SHADOWDRAW+
 A ShadowDraw+ membership unlocks the full library and supports Family Sharing, so everyone in your household can learn to draw at their own pace. WE’RE HERE TO HELP 
Need support or have feedback? Contact us anytime through in-app Chat Support. Email: support@shadowdrawapp.com
 Website: shadowdrawapp.com 
Instagram: @shadowdraw For our EULA agreement, please visit: 
https://www.apple.com/legal/internet-services/itunes/dev/stdeula/ ShadowDraw® and Shadow Draw™ are trademarks of Shadow Draw Inc.

About

Clip Studio Paint

Create digital art with a vast array of brushes, textures, and colors. This app offers tools for drawing, painting, comic creation, and animation, with features like 3D models for reference and advanced layer options. It provides a free trial and subscription plans for full access.

Highlights
  • Unlimited custom brushes
  • Realistic color mixing
  • Artist-made materials
  • 3D model references
  • Comic creation tools
  • Animation features
  • Advanced layer editing
Read full description

Start drawing and painting in a free 30-day trial. ・Up to 3 months free with your first plan ・Subscribe for the time you want to use it. Get all the latest features, materials, and cloud storage (10 GB)! *Please note that after your trial, you will need to make an in-app payment to save and export. Clip Studio Paint makes drawing a piece of cake, in any style! Whether you are a beginner or a pro, Clip Studio Paint will improve your creative experience while helping you grow. Now with new, powerful features! Unlimited amount of brushes at your fingertips to recreate any style - Use brushes with the same textures as real art materials - Adjust details such as brush shape and paper quality to your liking - Make unique colors with realistic color mixing, like traditional paints - Draw with transparency to erase, so no need to switch brushes Countless artist-made materials - Level up your art with free materials, for backgrounds and more - Discover community-made brushes from creators worldwide - Add details with materials like frills and more Coloring made easy - Easily color even with line gaps using the magnetic lasso tool - Lock transparency to paint over layers without affecting other areas - Set light source and shadow position with Shading Assist - Instantly reference and apply colors from an image to your art using Color Match - Enhance your art with filters like Chromatic Aberration, Retro Film, Pencil, and more Learn alongside other creators - Loads of official tutorials and creator tips available - Watch tutorials on our YouTube channel, for step-by-step advice - Ask questions on the Clip Studio Ask community Create the perfect reference with 3D models - Use 3D drawing figures to help with drawing anatomy - Customize character face and body models with beginner-friendly tools - Attach 3D objects like hats and shoes to characters for more specific references - Use 3D shapes to draw perspective Adjust after you draw - Liquify to make adjustments to the balance of your illustrations - Mesh Transformation allows you to transform to different shapes - Change up the poses of your character drawings with Puppet warp - Non-destructive color adjustment layers to get your art just right - Gradient maps give color to your grayscale illustrations Stress-free layer features - Assign colors and make multiple columns of layers to browse them at a glance - Enjoy the freedom of masking and clipping on multiple layers to edit and move your work - Add various effects to apply to the layer in a non-destructive way The ultimate comic creation app - All the tools you need for comic creation, from storyboard to finishing touches - Panel frames, speech balloons, text, effect lines, and screen tones in an instant - Make data for prints, web comics, manga, or webtoons (6 GB+ memory recommended) - Manage multi-page projects Professional animation, on any device - Use all the same tools as animation studios - Unique features allow you to draw your frames as you like - Enjoy a pencil and paper look and feel, but digitally - Expand your drawings to 4K resolution without losing quality by saving it as vector data ●Grade features ・PRO: All the tools you need to create stunning illustrations & short animations ・EX: All the above + multi-page functionality for comic/manga artists and unlimited animation frames *Clip Studio account needed to buy a plan. ● Target Devices and Specifications ・Minimum free storage space: 3GB, 4GB recommended ・Recommended display size: 10.5"+ Please see the following for supported devices. https://support.clip-studio.com/en-us/faq/articles/20200153 Supported pressure-sensitive pens ・Apple Pencil ● In-app purchases ・Required to save the canvas and export it to various file formats on iPad. Note: You will be charged to the Apple ID used for subscription. Terms of Service https://www.celsys.com/en/information/csp/ https://www.apple.com/legal/internet-services/itunes/dev/stdeula/

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is ads: Clip Studio Paint at none against ShadowDraw's shown. Clip Studio Paint also leads on rating (4.7 vs 4.2) and ratings volume (15K vs 1.8K). ShadowDraw's advantage is review sentiment (59% vs 46%) and iOS requirement (16.0 vs 18.0). On price, update cadence, in-app purchases and monetization model 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

Both are free to download. ShadowDraw sells 2 in-app purchases, starting at $7.99 per month and Clip Studio Paint sells 10 in-app purchases, starting at $4.89 per month. Whichever you choose, the download price is not the number that matters.

ReceptionRating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings

Clip Studio Paint holds the better App Store score, 4.7 against 4.2. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: Clip Studio Paint has 15K ratings behind it against 1.8K, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews complicate that: 59% of ShadowDraw's written reviews are positive against 46% of Clip Studio Paint's, so the app with the better star average is not the one people write more warmly about.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

ShadowDraw ships an update every 6 weeks, Clip Studio Paint every 3 weeks. The most recent releases landed on November 6, 2026 and November 8, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard5 real differences · 5 level
ShadowDraw versus Clip Studio Paint: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterShadowDrawClip Studio Paint
PriceFreeFree
Rating4.2 (1.8K ratings)4.7 (15K ratings) — better
Positive reviews59.4% of reviews — better45.8% of reviews
Number of ratings1.8K15K — better
Update frequencyEvery 6 weeksEvery 3 weeks — better
AdsYesNo — better
In-app purchasesYesYes
MonetizationFree with in-app purchasesFree with in-app purchases
DevicesiPadiPad
Requires iOS16.0 — better18.0
Further details — not scored
Size820 MB583 MB
Age rating12+4+
DeveloperShadow DrawCELSYS,Inc.

Customer experience

ShadowDraw

All ratings1,622 ratings
Positive77.0%
Neutral6.4%
Negative16.6%
Written reviews483 reviews
Positive59.4%
Neutral13.0%
Negative27.5%

Clip Studio Paint

All ratings13,919 ratings
Positive92.1%
Neutral2.4%
Negative5.6%
Written reviews944 reviews
Positive45.8%
Neutral11.8%
Negative42.5%

User reviews

ShadowDraw

From 1.8K App Store ratings

What we love

  • 🚀 Helpful for beginners
  • 🎨 Variety of drawing topics
  • 👍 Intuitive step-by-step guidance
  • 💡 Relaxing and therapeutic experience
  • 🤖 Responsive customer support

Room to improve

  • 💰 Many features locked behind paywall
  • 🐛 Buggy and glitchy at times
  • 🤔 Tracing-focused approach may not teach drawing fundamentals
  • 🔍 Difficulty finding purchased content
  • 🔀 Jumping between steps too quickly

Clip Studio Paint

From 15K App Store ratings

What we love

  • 🚀 Best drawing software for iPad
  • 🎨 Powerful features like vector layers
  • 💻 Seamless transition from desktop to iPad
  • 👍 Great for comics and illustrations
  • 🎨 Diverse brushes and materials

Room to improve

  • 💰 Expensive subscription model
  • 🔍 Confusing interface for beginners
  • 🔒 Requires internet connection to save
  • 🐛 Frequent crashes and bugs
  • 💻 Lacks full desktop feature parity

Bugs and requests

ShadowDraw

Reported bugs

3 issues
  • Drawings disappearing after completion
  • App crashing on launch for some users
  • Eraser tool not working properly with coloring feature

Requested features

5 requests
  • More free drawing content
  • Canvas rotation and reference image positioning
  • Ability to save progress on drawings
  • Clearer visual indicators for brush/pen changes
  • Side-by-side drawing mode to practice without tracing

Clip Studio Paint

Reported bugs

4 issues
  • Inability to save work without subscription
  • Laggy performance with large files
  • Unreliable auto-save and recovery
  • Issues with brush and tool responsiveness

Requested features

4 requests
  • One-time purchase option
  • Improved file management and cloud integration
  • Simplified interface for casual users
  • More animation and 3D tools

In-app purchases

2 purchases

ShadowDraw

Subscriptions2
  • ShadowDraw: Monthly Plan7 Days trial$7.991 Month
  • ShadowDraw: Yearly Plan7 Days trial$49.991 Year
10 purchases

Clip Studio Paint

Subscriptions10
  • PRO Monthly$4.891 Month
  • PRO Monthly Single-Device Plan3 Days trial$4.891 Month
  • PRO Monthly Single-Device Plan3 Months trial$4.891 Month
Show 7 more
  • PRO Monthly Dual-Device Plan3 Days trial$7.991 Month
  • EX Monthly3 Months trial$9.691 Month
  • EX Monthly Single-Device Plan3 Months trial$9.691 Month
  • EX Monthly Single-Device Plan3 Days trial$9.691 Month
  • EX Monthly Dual-Device Plan3 Days trial$13.491 Month
  • PRO Annual Single-Device Plan3 Days trial$28.901 Year
  • PRO Annual Single-Device Plan3 Months trial$28.901 Year

Questions

Is ShadowDraw free?
ShadowDraw is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Is Clip Studio Paint free?
Clip Studio Paint is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Which has better reviews, ShadowDraw or Clip Studio Paint?
Clip Studio Paint is rated higher. ShadowDraw averages 4.2 out of 5 from 1.8K ratings, while Clip Studio Paint averages 4.7 from 15K ratings.
Do ShadowDraw or Clip Studio Paint have ads?
ShadowDraw shows ads; Clip Studio Paint does not.
Which is updated more often, ShadowDraw or Clip Studio Paint?
ShadowDraw ships an update every 6 weeks, and Clip Studio Paint every 3 weeks. Most recently, ShadowDraw was updated on November 6, 2026 and Clip Studio Paint on November 8, 2026.

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