Keep It Mobile vs References
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
Keep It Mobile
This app is a powerful notebook and document organizer for mobile devices. It allows users to create and edit various file types, scan documents, manage PDFs, and archive emails. Organize everything with folders, tags, and color-coded labels for easy retrieval.
- Create and edit notes, rich text, plain text, and Markdown files
- Scan documents and edit PDFs
- Archive emails and save web links
- Organize with folders, tags, and color-coded labels
- Search across file names, content, and dates
- Share items via iCloud
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Keep It for iPad and iPhone is a powerful notebook and document organizer that can be used on its own or in conjunction with Keep It for Mac, available separately. Keep It can create and edit notes, rich text, plain text and Markdown files, scan documents, edit PDFs, archive emails, save web links in a variety of formats, preview and search just about any kind of file, and organize these in a variety of ways. All the files, folders and tags you store in Keep It are available in the Files app, can be opened and edited in other applications, and shared with other Keep It users via iCloud. Notes, Documents and Everything Else • Create notes with styles, checklists and attachments that look good and read well on all your devices • Create and edit rich text, plain text and Markdown files • Adjustable display margins and word count available in all Keep It’s text editors • Scan documents, add photos or videos, and save any kind of file to Keep It’s library • Edit PDFs, play movies, and preview everything else with Quick Look • Save web links for offline viewing as PDFs or web archives • Create templates or empty files in any format using stationery • View and work with mail messages and their attachments • Merge multiple items into a single note Organize • Use folders to organize things hierarchically • Swipe right on a folder to focus the sidebar on it and its children • Add tags to items and filter items with one touch using the Tag Filter • Use color-coded labels to quickly identify items • Use bundles to collect items together and see them in more than one place • See favorite items, and add lists to the Favorites Bar • All lists can have their own sort settings and colors Works With Other Apps • Add text, links, and files to Keep It using its share extension • Access and manage all the files, folders and tags you add to Keep It in the Files app • Open files for editing in other apps from within Keep It or their document browser • Share items in Keep It to other apps using the Share sheet • Drag text, images, links, files and mail messages to Keep It • Automate Keep It with Shortcuts Search • Search for items by their names, kind, content, dates, tags and more • Combine suggestions to create complex queries with ease • Step through found text in notes, editable text documents, web pages, and PDFs • Save searches to the sidebar for reuse Keep It on iPad • Use Quick File to file items quickly using a keyboard-friendly interface • Use Quick Open to quickly navigate to any list or item by typing its name • Constrain the width when editing notes or text files in full screen mode • Annotate PDFs and images and add sketches to notes with Apple Pencil And More… • Use the Recents list to see things you’ve added or viewed lately • Share folders and items with other Keep It users via iCloud • Encrypt any file with a password • Copy clickable links to items and lists in Keep It • See items that link to the current item and navigate between them SUBSCRIPTIONS Use of Keep It Mobile requires a paid subscription that you can purchase in the app. A choice of monthly and yearly subscriptions is available, and these include a free trial. Payment will be charged to your iTunes Account following the free trial, unless you cancel the subscription at least 24-hours before the end of the trial period. The subscription will automatically renew unless auto-renew is turned off at least 24-hours before the end of the current period. Your iTunes Account will be charged for renewal within 24-hours prior to the end of the current period. Subscriptions may be managed and auto-renewal may be turned off by going to your Account Settings after purchase. Any unused portion of a free trial period, if offered, will be forfeited when the user purchases a subscription to that publication, where applicable. Terms of Use: https://reinventedsoftware.com/keepit/ios/terms.html
References
Browse and interact with your BibTeX libraries on your mobile device. View references, follow links, and access file attachments like PDFs. Supports both classic BibTeX and BibLaTeX formats.
- Browse BibTeX libraries
- Search references
- Follow links (DOIs, URLs)
- View file attachments (PDFs)
- Supports BibLaTeX
- Group by keywords
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Carry your BibTeX libraries with you on your iPad and iPhone! A BibTeX library is a collection of bibliographic references (papers, books, reports, etc.), designed to work with the LaTeX typesetting system. Each library is stored in a specially-formatted text file (typically ending in .bib), which you can create with your favourite text editor. The References app gives you an easy way to browse through and interact with your BibTeX libraries. You can scroll, search, follow links, and view file attachments. In particular: - The app creates links from DOIs, MathSciNet references, ACM IDs, and of course URLs. - The app understands elementary LaTeX, so if your titles and/or abstracts contain markup or mathematics (and if your LaTeX is simple enough) then the app can display them nicely. - If you used BibDesk or JabRef to create your library, the app can view your file attachments (e.g., PDFs that you have attached to your references). - You can view references grouped by keywords, if you use the Keywords field in your BibTeX libraries. You can also view all of your smart/static groups from BibDesk, and your dynamic/static groups from JabRef. - The app supports BibLaTeX libraries as well as classic BibTeX. The References app can open BibTeX libraries from anywhere on your device. In particular, you can use iCloud Drive to keep them synchronised between your devices. This app is read-only, not an editor. It takes great care in helping you view and explore BibTeX libraries and their links and file attachments; however, it does not provide a way to modify your libraries. FILE ATTACHMENTS: To view file attachments (e.g., PDFs), the path to each file should be included in the corresponding entry in your BibTeX library. You can do this using the specially encoded Bdsk-File-* fields (as used by BibDesk), or the plain text File field (as used by JabRef). If you are writing your BibTeX files by hand, just add a File field giving the location of the attachment, such as File = {../PDFs/foo.pdf}. You can tell References where to find these attachments by linking folders in your app settings. The app will look for your attachments within these folders – for example, if you link your Documents folder then the app will be able to match the BibTeX field {../PDFs/foo.pdf} to a real location such as Documents/PDFs/foo.pdf or Documents/foo.pdf. The app is able to read attachments stored on your device, or on iCloud Drive, or on third-party providers including Box, Dropbox, Google Drive, Nextcloud or OneDrive. If you are having trouble viewing attachments from a third-party provider, please mail the References developer with the details. FURTHER INFORMATION: To learn more about BibTeX, see http://www.bibtex.org/ .
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is price: Keep It Mobile at Free against References's $4.99. Keep It Mobile also leads on ratings volume (640 vs 25). References's advantage is in-app purchases (none vs 2) and review sentiment (88% vs 57%). On update cadence, ads and iOS requirement 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
Keep It Mobile is free to download; References costs $4.99 up front. Keep It Mobile sells 2 in-app purchases, starting at $1.99 per month. References asks for nothing beyond the download.
References holds the better App Store score, 4.9 against 4.5. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: Keep It Mobile has 640 ratings behind it against 25, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews point the same way: 57% of Keep It Mobile's written reviews are positive against 88% of References's.
Keep It Mobile ships an update every 2 weeks, References monthly. Both last shipped on September 23, 2026.
| Parameter | Keep It Mobile | References |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free — better | $4.99 |
| Rating | 4.5 (640 ratings) | 4.9 (25 ratings) — better |
| Positive reviews | 56.8% of reviews | 87.5% of reviews — better |
| Number of ratings | 640 — better | 25 |
| Update frequency | Every 2 weeks — better | Monthly |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | Yes | No — better |
| Monetization | Free with in-app purchases — better | Paid |
| Devices | iPhone, iPad | iPhone, iPad, Mac, Vision Pro — better |
| Requires iOS | 18.6 | 18.0 — better |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 36 MB | 55 MB |
| Age rating | 17+ | 4+ |
| Developer | Steve Harris | Benjamin Burton |
Customer experience
Keep It Mobile
References
Bugs and requests
Keep It Mobile
Reported bugs
4 issues- Notes randomly disappearing after sync
- Inability to delete items from 'All Items' view
- Typing cursor issues and UI lag
- Unreliable 'Save for Offline' functionality
Requested features
5 requests- Add ability to edit note dates
- Improve photo and image handling
- Implement web clipping and article saving
- Add Dropbox/Google Drive sync options
- Introduce a one-time purchase option
References
Not enough reviews yet to summarise bugs or requests.
In-app purchases
Keep It Mobile
- Keep It for iPad and iPhone14 Days trial$1.991 Month
- Keep It for iPad and iPhone14 Days trial$19.991 Year
References
No in-app purchases
Questions
Is Keep It Mobile free?
Is References free?
Which has better reviews, Keep It Mobile or References?
Do Keep It Mobile or References have ads?
Which is updated more often, Keep It Mobile or References?
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