SkyCity vs Ethereal
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side ā with what reviewers say about each.
SkyCity
Explore world-class entertainment, dining, and accommodation across multiple locations. Manage your loyalty program, view exclusive offers, and enjoy hotel services like digital check-in and room access.
- Discover dining options and signature restaurants
- Explore hotel accommodations
- Access loyalty program status and balances
- View promotions and offers
- Digital hotel check-in and room access (Adelaide)
- Property information for multiple locations
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Find out all you need to discover, dine, play and stay at SkyCity. The SkyCity App is your mobile gateway to world class entertainment. Discover a huge range of dining options, signature restaurants and hotels across all of our SkyCity properties; Auckland, Hamilton, Queenstown, New Zealand and Adelaide, Australia. Sign up to our loyalty programme, where you can check your status points, account balances and see promotions and offers, anytime anywhere. The MyStay feature, exclusive to Eos by SkyCity in Adelaide, allows hotel guests to check in and access their room via a digital key on their mobile. Download the SkyCity app today to access the very best SkyCity has to offer.
Ethereal
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Ethereal is a calm, interactive art toy: a whole gallery of living worlds of light that answer your touch. And when the day is done, it becomes something new: a glowing bedside clock that keeps you gentle company all night. It plays on the biggest screen in the house too, cast from your phone. Open a world, reach out with a finger, and watch it respond. Stir a river of stars into a slow vortex. Fling a planet around a burning sun. Gather a swarm of fireflies to your fingertip like a lantern. Set paper lanterns adrift on a midnight river. Strum luminous strings into singing waves. Every world is generative and endlessly re-playable: no levels, no score, no way to lose. Just light, motion, and you. Every world sounds like itself, too. A warm, steady rain-wash soundscape rests under everything, and each world speaks the moment you see it: balloons pop, thunder cracks with the bolt, fireworks boom on the burst, candles light and snuff under your finger, the lava lamp glorps. Sounds pitch with where and what you touch, so nothing ever feels stamped out, with soft haptics and tilt-gravity for the worlds that obey your hands. NIGHTSTAND Turn any charging phone, or the old one in a drawer, into a living bedside clock. ⢠An elegant clock floats over the world of your choice, tinted to match its light ⢠It breathes softly and drifts, or fades and reappears somewhere new each minute, designed to protect your screen from burn-in ⢠Dim the whole scene with a two-finger drag, right down to almost-dark ⢠The screen stays awake while you charge; brightness and sound are one tap away ⢠The calmest worlds keep the night: fireflies blink, candles breathe, rain runs down the glass, lanterns drift downriver, and Fireworks stages its own lazy show while you sleep ON THE BIG SCREEN Cast Ethereal to the TV and take the couch. ⢠Switch worlds, place the clock and change the sound from your phone: it stays the remote ⢠Worlds that live and move on their own play on the TV; the touch-painting worlds stay in your hands, where your fingers are ⢠Pure black by default, made for OLED Made for quiet moments: winding down, finding focus, letting your mind wander somewhere beautiful, and watching over you until morning. FREE, FOREVER ⢠Ripples: send rings rippling across a still pool ⢠Solar: fling planets from a living solar system; hold the sun to charge a flare ⢠Nebula: a flowing river of silken star-trails; stir it into a vortex ⢠Starlines: trace your own constellations between the stars ⢠Trails: draw with a glowing, colour-shifting ribbon ⢠Bloom: grow unfolding mandalas of light ⢠Frost: grow branching crystals of frost Nightstand is free too, with Ripples, Solar and Nebula keeping the night. THE FULL GALLERY, WITH PRO Bounce a festival of Balloons. Pop rising Bubbles. Wipe Rain from night glass. Light a row of Candles. Send lanterns down a midnight River, or release sky Lanterns into the stars. Warm a neon Lava lamp. Startle a Reef of glowing fish. Bend the Aurora. Gather Fireflies. Hatch Jellyfish from the deep. Call down Starfall. Stage Fireworks. Pop drifting Orbs. Pump the Spectrum equaliser. Paint in Kaleido symmetry. Fork Tempest lightning. Stir molten Plasma. Weave points of light into Orbit. Strum the Harp. Drop Ink into water. Reshape Ferro's magnetic field. Ethereal Pro is a single one-time purchase, yours for good, every future world included, one unlock across iPhone and iPad. CALM BY DESIGN ⢠No ads · No accounts · No subscriptions Ethereal uses the network for the store's billing for the one-time purchase, and for casting to your TV if you use it. Best with the sound on and the lights low, and when you close your eyes, let the light keep watch.
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is in-app purchases: SkyCity at none against Ethereal's 1. SkyCity also leads on iOS requirement (12.0 vs 16.0). Ethereal's advantage is update cadence (every 10 days vs every 4 months). On price, ads and device support there is nothing between them.
Scored on Price Ā· Rating Ā· Positive reviews Ā· Number of ratings Ā· Update frequency Ā· Ads Ā· In-app purchases Ā· Monetization Ā· Best chart rank Ā· Devices Ā· Requires iOS
Both are free to download. Ethereal sells 1 one-off in-app purchase. SkyCity asks for nothing beyond the download.
SkyCity ships an update every 4 months, Ethereal every 10 days. The most recent releases landed on October 12, 2026 and October 25, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | SkyCity | Ethereal |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free |
| Positive reviews | 15.4% of reviews | ā |
| Update frequency | Every 4 months | Every 10 days ā better |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | No ā better | Yes |
| Monetization | Free | ā |
| Devices | iPhone, iPod | iPhone, iPad |
| Requires iOS | 12.0 ā better | 16.0 |
| Further details ā not scored | ||
| Size | 65 MB | 49 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 4+ |
| Developer | Skycity Entertainment Group Limited | Zone7 Studios |
In-app purchases
SkyCity
No in-app purchases
Ethereal
- Ethereal Pro$2.99
Questions
Is SkyCity free?
Is Ethereal free?
Do SkyCity or Ethereal have ads?
Which is updated more often, SkyCity or Ethereal?
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