Pixaki 4 Pro vs POLYCAM
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
Pixaki 4 Pro
Create detailed pixel art and animations with a comprehensive suite of tools. Features include pixel-perfect painting, advanced animation layers, and versatile import/export options. Ideal for game sprites, animated backgrounds, and more.
- Pixel-perfect painting mode
- Dither brushes and line tool
- Animation layers with scrubbable timeline
- Onion skinning and blend modes
- Multiple color selection modes
- Advanced selection and transform tools
- Import/export Aseprite, PSD, GIF, PNG
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Pixaki is the best pixel art app for iPad. It packs a whole load of features into a clean, modern interface, and it works great with Apple Pencil. So now you can make game sprites on the couch, animated backgrounds on your commute, or music videos in the park. DRAWING • Pixel perfect painting mode automatically removes double pixels when doing line art. • Round, square, and matrix dither brushes. • Line tool, which can be locked to isometric angles. • Rectangle and ellipse tools. LAYERS OF ANIMATION • Layers are shared across the whole project, which means every layer has its own timeline. • Static image layers for background and foreground elements that are the same on every frame. • 18 layer blend modes. • Rename layers. • Reorder layers and frames by using drag and drop. • Scrubbable timeline. • Advanced onion skin options. • Select multiple layers or frames at once to quickly make bulk adjustments. • Use high resolution reference layers to pixel over your sketches and photos. COLOR • Four color selection modes: a square picker with an infinitely scrolling hue slider, sliders for HSB and RGB, hex code input, and the project palette. • Eyedropper to sample any color from the canvas. • Bucket fill, with contiguous or discontiguous options. • Color replace across the whole project. SELECTION • Freehand, rectangular, and color selection. • Use the active selection as a mask. • Cut or copy the selected pixels and paste them to any app that supports pasting images. TRANSFORM • Move without needing to select. Position the image on or off the canvas without clipping. • Scale uniformly up and down, or squash and stretch. • Rotate by any angle. • Flip horizontally and vertically. IMPORT & EXPORT • Import any static image, or a GIF. • Import and export Aseprite documents (requires iPadOS 13 ore newer). • Import and export Photoshop documents (PSDs). • Use magnification when sharing to upscale without the results looking blurry. • Export as a single image or image sequence as PNG, TIFF, or JPEG-2000. • Export animated images as GIF or APNG. • Export QuickTime movies with H264 or HEVC codecs. • Export as a sprite sheet, with configurable columns. Screenshot artwork by Genuine Human, waneella, Chelsea Faust, and rachels_ham. Find out more at pixaki.com.
POLYCAM
Create unique visual effects by combining over 150 built-in filters. This app allows for real-time camera input manipulation, loading existing media, and exporting high-quality videos. Customize parameters with sliders, LFOs, or sensor data for interactive visualizers.
- Combine over 150 built-in filters
- Create and save custom filter chains
- Real-time camera input processing
- Load and export existing images/videos
- Adjustable filter parameters
- Interactive audio visualizers
- Full-screen output with smooth transitions
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To create a custom filter, use the built-in basic image filters and combine them. You can also load previously recorded images/videos and record/export. Filter Custom filters are created by connecting filters selected from over 150 collections in series. For instance, you can do the following: Camera input-> [Mirror effect-> Monochrome effect-> Glitch effect]-> Display / Recorder The items inside [] are called chains and can be selected and rearranged as you please. This chain can be saved, and once created and saved, it can be loaded with one tap. There are so many filters that it is hard to find immediately, but you can find them by searching or categorizing. The filters include a built-in iOS filter called Core Image Filter (* 1) and a POLYCAM original filter created with Metal (* 2) shader. The Loop filter has a built-in feedback circuit that allows you to re-read the output of the previous frame, making it ideal for more experimental video generation and circuit bending. Generic filters such as StarShine, SunBeam, Lenticular Halo, and Gradient are also included, so you can create generated images. Output Full screen output without indicators of 4 outputs. HDMI, AirPlay, NDI®, Aether, are possible. Using smooth alpha transitions for almost all transitions, you can create a smooth production when projecting full-screen images using Outputs. Export If the source input is selected from photos or videos in the photo album, it can be asynchronously exported to the photo album. This is different from real-time recording at the time of shooting, and is written in non-real time for each frame. Smooth videos can be saved even at resolutions and settings that lack the power of the CPU or GPU. Parametrics Each filter has several parameters that you can adjust with the sliders to adjust the filter's balance and effect. Parameters can be automated with the LFO oscillator or random generator. You can also assign audio input peaks from microphones, accelerometers, gyro sensors, MIDI inputs, etc. for interactive control and create audio visualizers. Settings Camera select (internal / external, double, triple also available) Aspect ratio (Original, 1: 1, 3: 4, 9:16, 4: 3, 16: 9) Resolution (Original, QD, HD, FHD) Microphone gain NDI® on / off (*3) Aether wireless sender bit rate (*4) Tint color change Rotation lock Saving, sharing, and exporting Chains The created chain can be saved with the save button at the lower right of the chain table view. The saved chains are arranged in the collection view, and the chains can be loaded by tapping or dragging and dropping. You can share the chain by dragging and dropping it on the share mark. You can send it to macOS or save it to the File app. Exporting the settings will share the entire collection in the current chain. You can save all the filters you have created or share them with someone. (*5) Notes: *1 Core Image Filter Reference - Apple Developer https://developer.apple.com/library/archive/documentation/GraphicsImaging/Reference/CoreImageFilterReference/index.html#//apple_ref/doc/filter/ci/CIDiscBlur *2 Metal - Apple Developer https://developer.apple.com/jp/metal/ * 3 NDI® is a low-latency NewTek IP video library. It is built into various devices and applications such as macOS and Windows, and enables high-quality video communication by wireless or wired connection. https://www.ndi.tv/ (Currently, POLYCAM's vertical 9:16 transmission has a bug, but it works normally with other aspect ratios.) * 4 Aether is a low-latency, lightweight original IP video communication framework. It can be sent to Mac via wireless or wired connection and connected to Siphon for use in various applications. https://sites.google.com/view/aetherframework * 5 Chains and chain collections saved in the File app can be opened and read from POLYCAM when selected from the File app. Please send by AirDrop when sharing to other devices.
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is price: POLYCAM at $4.99 against Pixaki 4 Pro's $20.00. POLYCAM also leads on chart position (#53 vs unranked) and device support (3 vs 1). Pixaki 4 Pro's advantage is ratings volume (136 vs 6) and review sentiment (65% vs 50%). On rating, 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
Pixaki 4 Pro costs $20.00 and POLYCAM $4.99 up front. Neither carries in-app purchases, so what you see is what you pay.
On the App Store both sit at effectively the same score — 4.1 for Pixaki 4 Pro against 4.0 for POLYCAM. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: Pixaki 4 Pro has 136 ratings behind it against 6, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews are what separate them: 65% of Pixaki 4 Pro's written reviews are positive against 50% of POLYCAM's.
Pixaki 4 Pro ships an update every 2 months, POLYCAM every 6 weeks. The most recent releases landed on October 22, 2026 and October 26, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | Pixaki 4 Pro | POLYCAM |
|---|---|---|
| Price | $20.00 | $4.99 — better |
| Rating | 4.1 (136 ratings) — better | 4.0 (6 ratings) |
| Positive reviews | 65.2% of reviews — better | 50.0% of reviews |
| Number of ratings | 136 — better | 6 |
| Update frequency | Every 2 months | Every 6 weeks — better |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | No | No |
| Monetization | Paid | Paid |
| Best chart rank | — | #53 — better |
| Devices | iPad | iPhone, iPad, iPod — better |
| Requires iOS | 12.0 — better | 13.0 |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 29 MB | 4 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 4+ |
| Developer | Rizer Creative Ltd | Narumi Inada |
Customer experience
Pixaki 4 Pro
POLYCAM
Bugs and requests
Pixaki 4 Pro
Reported bugs
5 issues- Crashes when exporting animated images
- Layers disappearing or getting corrupted
- Selection tool issues causing unintended changes
- Unreliable cloud/file sync
- Zooming and panning glitches
Requested features
9 requests- Layer groups/folders
- Clipping masks
- Layer blend modes
- Gradient tools
- Symmetry/mirroring tools
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- Keyboard shortcuts
- Spritesheet import/export
- Onion skinning improvements
- Multiple animation sequences per file
POLYCAM
Not enough reviews yet to summarise bugs or requests.
In-app purchases
Pixaki 4 Pro
No in-app purchases
POLYCAM
No in-app purchases









