Userscripts vs a
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
Userscripts
This open-source Safari extension allows you to run custom JavaScript and CSS code on any website. Enhance your browsing experience with personalized styling, automatic redirects, and ad-blocking.
- Run custom JavaScript
- Inject custom CSS
- Automatic page redirection
- Website page manipulation
- Custom ad-blocking
- Open source
- No user tracking
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Userscripts is an open source Safari extension that lets you save and run arbitrary bits of JavaScript (and CSS) code for the websites you visit. Features: - Open source - No user tracking Use cases: - Automatic page redirection - Website page manipulation (styling, element creation) - Custom ad-blocking - Custom code injection - Custom style injection If you're looking for a way to easily create quality of life Javacript code snippets for your web browsing experience, give Userscripts a try. Visit the GitHub repository for help or to report bugs: https://github.com/quoid/userscripts/
a
Run a full Unix-like terminal environment on your iOS device. Execute a wide range of commands, edit files, and even program using included interpreters and compilers. Supports multitasking and integration with Shortcuts.
- Local Unix terminal emulator
- SSH client
- File transfer (scp, curl)
- Text editing (vim, ed)
- Scripting languages (Python, Lua, Perl, JS)
- C/C++ compiler
- TeX distribution
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a-Shell is a complete local terminal emulator, allowing to run most Unix commands on your iOS device. You can transfer files using scp and curl, edit them with vim and ed, process them using grep, awk and sed. You can work with git repositories using lg2. Most commands are compiled for iOS native Arm64 format, making them fast and well integrated with the BSD Unix that powers iOS/iPadOS. a-Shell includes Python, Lua, Perl, JavaScript, C, C++ for programming and TeX (texlive 2025, with Tikz and LuaTeX) for text processing. There are also multiple network utilities: nslookup, ping, whois, ifconfig... Type help for help, help -l to get the full list of commands. a-Shell can be controlled from Shortcuts: run commands in order, process files in a-Shell, get the results as text or files, transfer files to other apps... a-shell uses iOS 13+ “multiple windows” ability, so you can run multiple shells at the same time, with different commands, in different directories. You can edit a file in one window with vim and process it in the other with python. Compile your C or C++ programs to webAssembly using clang or clang++, and execute the resulting binary. A complete webAssembly SDK is included (WASI-libc). a-Shell is the complete version. If you need a smaller app, and you don't need a C compiler, a TeX engine, or numpy and matplotlib, there is a-Shell mini.
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is monetization model: Userscripts at free against a's paid. a's advantage is rating (4.6 vs 4.3) and ratings volume (553 vs 181). On price, review sentiment, 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
Both are free to download. Neither carries in-app purchases, so what you see is what you pay.
a holds the better App Store score, 4.6 against 4.3. Both are backed by a comparable volume of ratings — 181 and 553 respectively. Written reviews split almost evenly too, at 78% and 79% positive.
Both ship on a similar rhythm, roughly monthly. The most recent releases landed on September 22, 2026 and September 23, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | Userscripts | a |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free |
| Rating | 4.3 (181 ratings) | 4.6 (553 ratings) — better |
| Positive reviews | 78.1% of reviews | 78.6% of reviews — better |
| Number of ratings | 181 | 553 — better |
| Update frequency | Monthly | Monthly |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | No | No |
| Monetization | Free — better | Paid |
| Best chart rank | #20 | #19 — better |
| Devices | iPhone, iPad, iPod, Mac — better | iPhone, iPad, iPod |
| Requires iOS | 15.0 | 14.0 — better |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 2 MB | 1.9 GB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 17+ |
| Developer | Justin Wasack | Nicolas Holzschuch |
Customer experience
Userscripts
a
User reviews
Userscripts
From 181 App Store ratingsWhat we love
- 🚀 Works well to inject CSS on iPad in Safari
- 👍 Best thing since sliced bread
- 💡 Allows you to do thousands of things that were previously desktop only
- 🔒 Very stable and works flawlessly with Safari
- 👍 Excellent Safari extension
Room to improve
- 🐛 Satisfactory to an extent, stops working sometimes
- 🐛 Broke until reinstall
- 🐛 Slowed my Safari down to a crawl
- 🐛 Unpredictable when it applies scripts, but still useful
- 🐛 It's been way too unpredictable for a while now
a
From 553 App Store ratingsWhat we love
- 🚀 Powerful terminal with Linux commands
- 👍 Useful for programming and development
- 🔒 Secure and reliable
- 💡 Impressive capabilities for an iOS app
- 👍 Helpful documentation and developer support
Room to improve
- 🐛 Occasional crashes and bugs
- 🔍 Limited customization options
- 🔍 Missing some basic terminal features
- 🔍 Compatibility issues with certain packages
Bugs and requests
Userscripts
Reported bugs
4 issues- Failed to load user data
- Saying there's an error when trying to download something
- Won't work, keeps saying there's an issue and retry
- Disappeared from Safari preferences and won't return after troubleshooting
Requested features
5 requests- Add support for Safari Tech Preview
- Allow editing of userscripts from the browser extension popup
- Allow creation of a new script from the Safari Extension for the current site
- Allow specifying the order in which scripts should be loaded
- Add support for running scripts in normal mode, private mode or both
a
Reported bugs
3 issues- Toolbar buttons not accessible in portrait mode on some devices
- Pasting from clipboard can insert unexpected characters
- Sourcing certain script files causes crashes
Requested features
5 requests- Add support for package managers like Homebrew or APT
- Implement more advanced shell features like job control and better tab completion
- Integrate Git for version control
- Allow installing additional packages and libraries
- Improve clipboard and file management integration
In-app purchases
Userscripts
No in-app purchases
a
No in-app purchases
