Simmons Drums Advanced vs DrumToolz
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
Simmons Drums Advanced
Record, edit, and add custom sounds to your electronic drum kits. This app allows you to create a personalized sound library and improve your playing with playback manipulation tools.
- Record real-world sounds
- Edit custom samples
- Add sounds to drum kits
- Create a personal sound library
- Remote kit and sound editing
- Play Along function with speed manipulation
Read full descriptionHide full description
Simmons Drums Advanced is designed to extend the capabilities of the SD1200, SD1250, and SD2000 electronic drum kits. Use this app to record real-world sounds with your iPhone or iPad — anytime, anywhere. Later, edit your unique samples and add them to your kit. The result is a nearly a limitless personal library of samples and soundscapes for your Simmons Module. You can now remotely edit and save your drum kits and sounds with your iOS device using a user-friendly interface. There are also some great tools for improving your playing such as the “Play Along"" function that allows you to choose songs from your iOS's music library and manipulate the playback speed so you can slow down a song to learn the groove. SD2000 Users will need an Apple Lightning to USB Camera Adapter and USB cable to connect the kit drum module to their iOS device.
DrumToolz
Compose and practice drum cadences and beats on your mobile device. This app allows manual input of exercises, generation of new ideas, and practice of rudiments. Share your creations and learn from a community of drummers.
- Compose drum cadences and beats
- Manual exercise input
- Generate new rhythmic ideas
- Editable music score
- Practice snare rudiments
- Library of dynamic exercises
- Social profile and sharing
Read full descriptionHide full description
Compose cadences on the go! Choose from snares, tenors, bass drums, cymbals, and even drumset if you want. In a league of its own, DrumToolz also lets you manually input exercises for drum set, marching snare, tenors, and bass drums while generating new creative ideas using what you input, all shown on an editable music score. You can also upload your beats to your social profile, play what other users are playing, save rhythms, practice snare drum rudiments, and learn from a full library of dynamic exercises for both snare drum and drumset! It's perfect for all skill levels, from beginner to extremely advanced, drum wizards. Works great for sharing drum cadences with your drumline. Isolate individual snare, tenors, etc. parts. Practice the simplest to the most complex of beats and rhythms. If you can think of it, you can input it and practice it! Anything from beginner rock beats, to the most complex of jazz beats and fills. Lastly, top off the notes with ornaments: stickings, accents, flams, diddles, and cheese. Input up to 50 measures. When practicing drum set beats, choose from a ride cymbal, hihat, hihat foot, kick drum, snare drum, and three toms. Input everything from whole notes to thirtysecond notes and tuplets. Also, for tenors, choose from four tenors and a spock. Bass drums - five bass drums. Marching snare - a realistic marching snare and a ping sound. Generate new ideas (modifications) using beats that you input into the score. Choose from several modification methods: Add, Shuffle, Substitute, Permutate, Repeat, and Random. Modify individual parts of the beat (ex: kick drum only) or the entire beat if desired. Custom snare exercises. Choose the time sig, subdivisons, tuplets, stickings, accents, flams, diddles, cheese, drags. Save the beat in the score for later practice, keeping the modifications if desired. If the modifications are kept, this turns the beat into an endless, dynamic exercise! Each time you generate an exercise, it uses the modifications to give you an entirely new beat. String together saved rhythms and practice them as one exercise, perfect for practicing beats followed by a drum fill. Upload your beats to your profile. Find and follow other drummers in the social network. Learn from them as you see and practice what they have uploaded to their profile. Share your beats through PDF links and files. Also, share your entire score with a link that pre-populates the score into the app. Learn from a full library of dynamic drum set and snare drum exercises, essential and hybrid rudiments included. For highlighted rhythms, shuffle around groups of notes, stickings, accents, flams, diddles, and cheese.
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is rating: DrumToolz at 4.2 against Simmons Drums Advanced's 2.4. DrumToolz also leads on review sentiment (58% vs 20%) and ratings volume (270 vs 9). Simmons Drums Advanced's advantage is iOS requirement (12.3 vs 14.0). On price, update cadence, 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.
DrumToolz holds the better App Store score, 4.2 against 2.4. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: DrumToolz has 270 ratings behind it against 9, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews point the same way: 20% of Simmons Drums Advanced's written reviews are positive against 58% of DrumToolz's.
Both ship on a similar rhythm, roughly monthly. The most recent releases landed on September 10, 2026 and September 25, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | Simmons Drums Advanced | DrumToolz |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free |
| Rating | 2.4 (9 ratings) | 4.2 (270 ratings) — better |
| Positive reviews | 20.0% of reviews | 58.1% of reviews — better |
| Number of ratings | 9 | 270 — better |
| Update frequency | Monthly | Monthly |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | No | No |
| Monetization | Free | Free |
| Devices | iPhone, iPad, iPod | iPhone, iPad, iPod |
| Requires iOS | 12.3 — better | 14.0 |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 93 MB | 93 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 4+ |
| Developer | Simmons Innovations Ltd | Jared Simon |
Customer experience
Simmons Drums Advanced
DrumToolz
Bugs and requests
Simmons Drums Advanced
Not enough reviews yet to summarise bugs or requests.
DrumToolz
Reported bugs
13 issues- App crashes and deletes progress
- App won't open
- Repeat function doesn't stop
- Repeat save fails
- Accents, diddles, flams added automatically
Show 8 moreShow fewer
- Buzz roll cannot be removed
- Font camouflages in dark mode
- App crashes when opening after saving
- App crashes when opening
- App crashes when adding notes
- App crashes after saving
- App crashes when trying to reopen
- App crashes a lot
Requested features
15 requests- Turn off metronome
- Add rum shot for snare
- Add rim shots for other drums
- Add triplets, fivelets, sixlets
- Add dynamics (forte, piano)
Show 10 moreShow fewer
- Cymbals sizzle option
- Add buzz roll for snares
- Add diddle feature
- More measures
- Add bass drum notes
- Add open hi-hat sound
- Improve UI for tuplet measurement
- Improve UI for measure change
- Ability to hear multiple instruments simultaneously
- Fix replace button for bass drums
In-app purchases
Simmons Drums Advanced
No in-app purchases
DrumToolz
No in-app purchases









