Comparison

Writing Wizard vs OgStar Reading Early

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

Head to head
About

Writing Wizard

This app helps children learn to trace letters, numbers, and words with a fun, motivating system. It offers customizable tracing practice, interactive games, and progress reports for parents and educators.

Highlights
  • Trace letters, numbers, and words
  • Customizable tracing practice
  • Interactive games and animated stickers
  • Create custom word lists with audio
  • Progress reports for tracking
  • Printable PDF worksheets
Features
Read full description

"Fantastic, customizable tracing practice with fun rewards." 5 Stars - Common Sense Media 500,000+ units sold (including 300,000+ to schools) ! Writing Wizard is designed to help every child learn how to trace letters, numbers, and words through a fun system carefully designed to maintain motivation. • Show and enforce how to trace letters correctly • Letter names and phonics (customizable) • 16 Fonts available (including 3 most popular in the US) • Fun tracing using 50+ animated stickers, sound effects and interactive games that animate letters at the end of tracing • Uppercase & lowercase letters, numbers, and words • Ability to create your own word lists (and record audio for each word) • Fully customizable to suit every child’s needs (letter size, difficulty,...) • Check progress thanks to reports that display what the child has traced • Shapes tracing activity for toddlers • Create PDF Worksheets and print them to help your child to write on paper • Use Apple pencil to write at a very small size All the shapes, the first 7 letters, numbers, and words are free. The remaining letters and the ability to add your own words can be unlocked with a one-time purchase or a monthly subscription. _______ ACCOLADES • "Writing Wizard is the most complete and intelligent letter tracing app we’ve seen"" AppoLearning.com • "This brand-new app should be the go-to for every parent, teacher and therapist to work on handwriting" - TOP PICKS - 5 stars - SmartAppsForKids.com • "Writing Wizard by L’Escapadou is everything a parent wants in a handwriting app, and more." 5/5 - kids-app-reviews.com • "L’Escapadou has made handwriting fun." AppyMall.com 5/5 • Listed in "20 best educational iPhone and iPad apps for kids of 2013" - appsplayground.com • Editor's Choice Award for Excellence in Design - Children's Technology Review _______ PERFECT FOR KIDS Kids want to have fun, and Writing Wizard offers a lot of fun to keep them motivated in the learning process! • They can trace using 50+ animated stickers and sound effects • Once tracing is complete, they can interact with them on 4 games that animate letters • They can trace any word - like their name - and record their voice for each word • They can collect stars in 5-Stars play mode _______ PERFECT FOR PARENTS & TEACHERS • Ability to create your own word lists (and record audio for each word) • Detailed reports provide information on what kids have done, including the ability to replay and export the tracings to view kids' progress • Share word lists via iCloud Drive or other cloud providers, adhoc network, or email • Multiple parameters to customize the app according to the child’s current education level (e.g. letter size, difficulty, show/hide model, allow to stop between key points, etc.) • 3 most popular fonts in the US (ZB, DN & HWT) and 13 international fonts (UK, Scandinavia, Australia, Germany and France) • Upper and lower case letters, numbers (and word lists) • Letter names and letter sounds (which can be customized) • A customizable 5-Stars play mode prompting the child to trace a letter or a word 5 times using different parameters (each step is more challenging) • Create an unlimited number of users • Many settings to customize the app (sound, game time limit, black background,...) • In the A-Z section, special graphics available to match letters (e.g. ant graphic for A/a) _______ Privacy Policy KNOW WHAT'S INSIDE As a Moms with Apps member, we follow the "Know what's inside" best practices for kids’ apps L’Escapadou takes children’s privacy seriously. We believe you should not have to worry about your kids being tracked by apps or websites. This app: • Does not collect any user information (we do not use data collection tools) • External Links : Before accessing a parent section, an operation must be solved so that young kids cannot access it. Terms of use : https://www.apple.com/legal/internet-services/itunes/dev/stdeula/

About

OgStar Reading Early

This app offers a 35-lesson literacy game for young learners, employing a multisensory, structured approach to teach reading, writing, and spelling. It incorporates engaging mini-games and rewards to keep children motivated while developing essential phonics and fluency skills.

Highlights
  • Multisensory learning approach
  • Structured literacy lessons
  • Phonological awareness practice
  • Systematic phonics instruction
  • Handwriting and speech recognition feedback
  • Progress tracking for parents/teachers
  • Engaging mini-games and rewards
Features
Read full description

Learn to read, write, and spell the multisensory way. Structured literacy works. OgStar Reading™: Early Reader provides students in grades pre-K through 3 with an enjoyable and comprehensive 35-lesson literacy game, based on the well-respected Orton-Gillingham approach. Students practice: - phonological awareness - systematic/synthetic phonics - multisensory sound/symbol associations - audio-visual-tactile reading and writing of sight words - oral reading of phonetically-controlled words and sentences - finger tracing and writing of syllables, words, and sentences - oral reading fluency activities OgStar takes students on a captivating reading adventure and includes built-in mini-games and rewards to keep them motivated and engaged. OgStar Reading is a patent-pending, technologically-sophisticated app with handwriting recognition feedback, speech recognition feedback, audio-visual synchronization, voiceover correction feedback, and built-in word pronunciation features. Data collection is available on the app for parents and teachers describing student performance and progress over time. This delightful, multisensory, structured literacy game helps students of all ages to independently develop evidence-based literacy skills, in accordance with the scientific standards recommended by the National Reading Panel indicating the best ways to teach students how to read.

Screenshots

Writing Wizard4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is price: Writing Wizard at Free against OgStar Reading Early's $1.99. Writing Wizard also leads on ratings volume (5.2K vs 6) and device support (3 vs 1). OgStar Reading Early's advantage is in-app purchases (none vs 4) and review sentiment (100% vs 74%). On update cadence and ads 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

Writing Wizard is free to download; OgStar Reading Early costs $1.99 up front. Writing Wizard sells 4 in-app purchases, starting at $2.49 per month. OgStar Reading Early asks for nothing beyond the download.

ReceptionRating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings

OgStar Reading Early holds the better App Store score, 4.7 against 4.4. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: Writing Wizard has 5.2K ratings behind it against 6, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews point the same way: 74% of Writing Wizard's written reviews are positive against 100% of OgStar Reading Early's.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

Writing Wizard ships an update every 4 months, OgStar Reading Early every 6 months. The most recent releases landed on October 29, 2026 and October 24, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard8 real differences · 2 level
Writing Wizard versus OgStar Reading Early: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterWriting WizardOgStar Reading Early
PriceFree — better$1.99
Rating4.4 (5.2K ratings)4.7 (6 ratings) — better
Positive reviews73.6% of reviews100.0% of reviews — better
Number of ratings5.2K — better6
Update frequencyEvery 4 months — betterEvery 6 months
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesYesNo — better
MonetizationFree with in-app purchases — betterPaid
DevicesiPhone, iPad, iPod — betteriPad
Requires iOS15.610.0 — better
Further details — not scored
Size68 MB552 MB
Age rating4+4+
DeveloperPierre AbelOGSTAR READING, LLC

Customer experience

Writing Wizard

All ratings5,184 ratings
Positive84.3%
Neutral6.0%
Negative9.7%
Written reviews208 reviews
Positive73.6%
Neutral6.7%
Negative19.7%

OgStar Reading Early

All ratings6 ratings
Positive100.0%
Neutral0.0%
Negative0.0%
Written reviews4 reviews
Positive100.0%
Neutral0.0%
Negative0.0%

Bugs and requests

Writing Wizard

Reported bugs

3 issues
  • App crashes when trying to access locked features
  • Purchased content not unlocking properly
  • Inconsistent letter formation guidance

Requested features

4 requests
  • Add more letters, numbers, and shapes
  • Allow recording of custom voice instructions
  • Improve compatibility with stylus/digital pens
  • Provide more customization options

OgStar Reading Early

Not enough reviews yet to summarise bugs or requests.

In-app purchases

4 purchases

Writing Wizard

Subscriptions1
  • Full Access - Monthly$2.491 Month
One-time3
  • All Letters and Numbers$5.99
  • Add Your Words and Word Lists$5.99
  • Lifetime Full Access$9.99
None

OgStar Reading Early

No in-app purchases

Questions

Is Writing Wizard free?
Writing Wizard is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Is OgStar Reading Early free?
OgStar Reading Early costs $1.99, with no in-app purchases.
Which has better reviews, Writing Wizard or OgStar Reading Early?
OgStar Reading Early is rated higher. Writing Wizard averages 4.4 out of 5 from 5.2K ratings, while OgStar Reading Early averages 4.7 from 6 ratings.
Do Writing Wizard or OgStar Reading Early have ads?
Neither Writing Wizard nor OgStar Reading Early shows ads.
Which is updated more often, Writing Wizard or OgStar Reading Early?
Writing Wizard ships an update every 4 months, and OgStar Reading Early every 6 months. Most recently, Writing Wizard was updated on October 29, 2026 and OgStar Reading Early on October 24, 2026.

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