Comparison

Harmonious vs Decent Sampler

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

Head to head
About

Harmonious

This app provides an exhaustive reference for piano and guitar chords and scales, designed for musicians and students. It offers interactive tools, tutorials, and visualizations to explore music theory concepts, from basic harmony to advanced set theory.

Highlights
  • Interactive piano and guitar chord/scale search
  • Dozens of tutorials and glossary entries
  • Interactive circle of fifths reference
  • Audio examples and instrument toggling
  • Visualizations of scale and mode relationships
  • Roman numeral functions and chord analysis
Features
Read full description

Harmonious is the exhaustive piano and guitar chord and scale app for students, composers, songwriters, arrangers, and working musicians. What if you could learn music theory from a mentor that had all the answers? Start with what you know and follow your curiosity, confident that you have all musical options at your disposal, since Harmonious is the most complete chord and scale map. Find extensions, substitutions and chromatic flavors that lie at the edge of the familiar and the exotic. See connections through the dual lens of chords and scales, linking harmony and melody. Clean, clear design, bold visualizations, and simple interactions help you find what you are looking for without a lot of fiddling: — Everything is connected! Tap to navigate and use the convenient back button or index button to jump to different areas of the app with a few taps. — Tutorials and over one hundred glossary entries teach you music theory from the ground up, presenting a complete view of the sonic landscape. Dozens of useful animations and audio examples help drive home the concepts from musical set theory, traditional harmony, and jazz theory, giving you a broad view you likely won't find anywhere else. — Interactive piano search helps you determine how notes combine into chords and scales just by selecting notes. Tap a chord or scale to learn how to play it and more importantly, when to play it: its parent keys, modes or scales. — Interactive fretboard search (guitar standard tuning) helps you determine what you are playing, where to play the same or similar things, and why the chord matters harmonically. — Audio Feature: Hear chords and scales, and hear notes as you enter them. Toggle between multiple instruments, or mute to learn in silence. — An interactive circle of fifths reference includes all major and minor keys, showing you triads and seventh chord function with just a simple flick. Extensions (ninths, elevenths, thirteenths) are available as well, with just a tap. — Interactive scales and mode diagrams illustrate the voice-leading relationships between unordered and ordered 7-note collections (diatonic, acoustic or melodic, harmonic major and minor), allowing navigation with just a simple tap. — Haptic Feedback, on phone devices that support it — Share what you learn with links to the website, so other musicians, or you yourself, can find the info later. The exhaustive reference is built on top of the following: — Musical set theory reference — Forte codes and prime forms are the foundation of the reference, so you know it is exhaustive — Roman numeral functions — all chords in each key, including secondary dominants and chromatic, diatonic (major) and minor functions — Every possible triad (three-note chord) — major and minor, augmented and diminished, suspended chords, augmented sixth chords, and more — Every possible seventh chord (four-note chord) — diminished, half-diminished, major, minor, dominant, augmented, sixth chords, add nine, and more — Every mode — of every pentatonic, diatonic, acoustic or melodic minor, whole-tone, diminished (octatonic), harmonic major and minor, and augmented (hexatonic) scale — Every compatible chord for each mode — including extensions (ninths, elevenths, thirteenths; flat, sharp or natural) The aim is for Harmonious to be a complete, authoritative, and practical reference on everything harmony-related in twelve-tone equal temperament (and nearby tunings). Harmonious combines elements of musical set theory and atonal theory and jazz theory with harmony and music theory in the extended common practice, as outlined by Professor Dmitri Tymoczko in the 2011 textbook, A Geometry of Music. (See the website for more details and bibliographic references.) In addition to attempting to be as complete a reference as possible, Harmonious attempts to map out the richness and ambiguity inherent in harmony as precisely as possible.

About

Decent Sampler

This music app lets you use professional-quality sample libraries on your mobile device. It supports Decent Samples libraries and SFZs, and can be used within other music production apps as an AUv3 plugin.

Highlights
  • Use professional sample libraries
  • Supports Decent Samples libraries
  • Supports SFZ files
  • AUv3 plugin compatibility
  • Standalone app functionality
  • New libraries added weekly
Features
Read full description

Did you ever wish you could use professional quality sample libraries on your mobile device? Now you can! The Decent Samples plugin is a sample player that allows you to use your favorite Decent Samples sample libraries on the go (as well as SF2s, SFZs, and EXS files). Many of the most popular Decent Samples releases are available through the app with more being added every week. Because it's also an AUv3 plugin, you can use it from within GarageBand or with AUM.

Screenshots

Harmonious4 screens
Decent Sampler3 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is review sentiment: Harmonious at 100% against Decent Sampler's 52%. Harmonious also leads on in-app purchases (none vs 60) and rating (5.0 vs 4.6). Decent Sampler's advantage is price (Free vs $4.99) and update cadence (weekly vs every 3 months). On ads and device support 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

Decent Sampler is free to download; Harmonious costs $4.99 up front. Decent Sampler sells 60 one-off in-app purchases. Harmonious asks for nothing beyond the download.

ReceptionRating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings

Harmonious holds the better App Store score, 5.0 against 4.6. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: Decent Sampler has 53 ratings behind it against 6, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews point the same way: 100% of Harmonious's written reviews are positive against 52% of Decent Sampler's.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

Harmonious ships an update every 3 months, Decent Sampler weekly. The most recent releases landed on October 24, 2026 and October 27, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard8 real differences · 2 level
Harmonious versus Decent Sampler: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterHarmoniousDecent Sampler
Price$4.99Free — better
Rating5.0 (6 ratings) — better4.6 (53 ratings)
Positive reviews100.0% of reviews — better52.2% of reviews
Number of ratings653 — better
Update frequencyEvery 3 monthsWeekly — better
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesNo — betterYes
MonetizationPaidFree with in-app purchases — better
DevicesiPhone, iPad, iPodiPhone, iPad, iPod
Requires iOS10.3 — better13.0
Further details — not scored
Size38 MB41 MB
Age rating4+4+
DeveloperJared UpdikeDecidedly, LLC

Customer experience

Harmonious

All ratings6 ratings
Positive100.0%
Neutral0.0%
Negative0.0%
Written reviews3 reviews
Positive100.0%
Neutral0.0%
Negative0.0%

Decent Sampler

All ratings53 ratings
Positive90.6%
Neutral3.8%
Negative5.7%
Written reviews67 reviews
Positive52.2%
Neutral14.9%
Negative32.8%

Bugs and requests

Harmonious

Not enough reviews yet to summarise bugs or requests.

Decent Sampler

Reported bugs

23 issues
  • Instant crash on load
  • App stopped working after iOS update
  • AUV3 crashes out of nowhere
  • Unresponsive upon opening
  • Server issues for login
Show 18 more
  • Instrument remains stuck on a note
  • Projects need to be reloaded to show app
  • Crash when loading samples
  • Failing to load presets when reloading host project
  • Adding unwanted temp presets
  • Crashing when selecting different samples
  • Login prompt won't let paste text
  • Can't paste password to login
  • Login screen covered by keyboard
  • Error 500 when downloading
  • Restore Purchases button not working
  • Forgotten Password button not working
  • Invalid email address for registration
  • No URL found when downloading sound packs
  • Clicking sounds while using
  • Glitching, clicking, and ghost sounds on held notes
  • Instrument crashes after a few minutes
  • Earthquake pad 02 glitching

Requested features

14 requests
  • Add user/pass fill from password keeper
  • Implement a download manager for multiple instruments
  • Allow running within IAA or Audiobus
  • Add ability to clear cache
  • Fix multi-track support in AUV3
Show 9 more
  • Add MIDI sequencing
  • Add pitch bend functionality
  • Add velocity response curve knob
  • Add filter stage and more flexible envelope
  • Allow disabling iOS auto-lock
  • Configure receiving MIDI channel
  • Improve preset selection
  • Add dark mode
  • Support VoiceOver

In-app purchases

None

Harmonious

No in-app purchases

60 purchases

Decent Sampler

One-time60
  • Box ViolinFree
  • Dave ChoirFree
  • Resonator GlockenspielFree
Show 57 more
  • Banjo UkuleleFree
  • KalimbaFree
  • Ukelin$0.99
  • Decent Sampler Store Item 3$2.99
  • Decent Sampler Store Item 4$3.99
  • Weber 1929 Baby Grand$4.99
  • Ramshackle Zither$4.99
  • Decent Sampler Store Item 5$4.99
  • Music Major Sample Library$4.99
  • Sawblade Kalimba Library$4.99
  • Melodica$4.99
  • Distance: Zero$4.99
  • Little Church Organ$4.99
  • Indie Guitar$5.99
  • Decent Sampler Store Item 6$5.99
  • Decent Sampler Store Item 7$6.99
  • Paper Drums$6.99
  • Relic Keyboard$7.99
  • Decent Sampler Store Item 8$7.99
  • HS-3715 Keyboard$7.99
  • Malevolence by Venus Theory$8.99
  • Viola Ensemble$9.99
  • Indie Bass$9.99
  • Metal Cups$9.99
  • Phonoharp$9.99
  • Violin Ensemble$9.99
  • Ethereal Vocals$9.99
  • Decent Sampler Store Item 10$9.99
  • Kalimba by Darel$9.99
  • Dangerous Undertones$9.99
  • Chroma Vol. 1$9.99
  • Luminate$9.99
  • Horror Box$9.99
  • Tape Violins Sample Library$10.99
  • Decent Sampler Store Item 11$11.00
  • Interlaced Sample Library$14.99
  • Decent Sampler Store Item 15$15.00
  • Decent Sampler Store Item 16$16.00
  • Decent Sampler Store Item 19$19.00
  • alt.strings$19.99
  • Felt & Fog$19.99
  • Organic Orchestra$19.99
  • Indie Drums$19.99
  • Bitscape 95$19.99
  • Thyssia by Venus Theory$19.99
  • Decent Samples Store Item 20$20.00
  • Decent Samples Store Item 24$24.00
  • The Void$24.99
  • Processed Guitars$24.99
  • Decent Samples Store Item 25$25.00
  • String Flows$29.99
  • 70s Summer Camp Sample Library$29.99
  • Decent Samples Store Item 30$30.00
  • LoFi VaporTones Ds$33.99
  • Decent Samples Store Item 39$39.00
  • Decent Samples Store Item 40$40.00
  • Chamberlin M1 by Jamie Lidell$49.99

Questions

Is Harmonious free?
Harmonious costs $4.99, with no in-app purchases.
Is Decent Sampler free?
Decent Sampler is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Which has better reviews, Harmonious or Decent Sampler?
Harmonious is rated higher. Harmonious averages 5.0 out of 5 from 6 ratings, while Decent Sampler averages 4.6 from 53 ratings.
Do Harmonious or Decent Sampler have ads?
Neither Harmonious nor Decent Sampler shows ads.
Which is updated more often, Harmonious or Decent Sampler?
Harmonious ships an update every 3 months, and Decent Sampler weekly. Most recently, Harmonious was updated on October 24, 2026 and Decent Sampler on October 27, 2026.

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