Comparison

Card Binder vs Decksmith

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

Head to head
About

Card Binder

Easily manage your Magic The Gathering card collection by scanning and organizing cards. Access real-time pricing, detailed card information, and build custom decks. Sync your collection across devices and explore new cards.

Highlights
  • Scan and save cards
  • Real-time card pricing
  • Detailed card information
  • Build custom decks
  • Validate deck legality
  • Cross-device syncing
  • Export collection
Features
Read full description

The ultimate Magic The Gathering app. Quickly scan and save all your cards into your Binder collection, check each card price in real-time. You will be able to see a lot of details for each card: legality, all the card editions, first appearance date, and more! Features: - Build your collection quickly scanning all your cards. - Explore card details including the legality, price, editions, and much more. - Build amazing decks with support for sideboard and maybeboard. - Support for commander decks. - Validate your deck and ensure it is legal for any format. - All content is live and automatically updated. - Collection stored and shared between all your IOS devices. - Search for any card, even if it is not in your collection. - Get to know more cards using the explore tab. It will show random cards to you. - No ads, ever. - Dark mode support. - Export and share your collection using .csv files. If you have any question or feedback we'd love to hear from you at support@cardbinderapp.com

About

Decksmith

Effortlessly manage your Magic: The Gathering collection with real-time card scanning and price tracking. Build and validate decks for various formats, analyze their composition, and connect with a community of players. Enjoy offline access and robust privacy controls.

Highlights
  • Real-time card scanning
  • Automatic price tracking
  • Format-aware deck building
  • Collection inventory management
  • Offline access
  • Community features
  • Privacy controls
Features
Read full description

Scan a whole binder page in one photo. Decksmith finds every card on it — nine or twelve pockets, or up to about 20 loose cards on the table — and adds them to your collection with artwork and live prices. Then build decks that check their own legality, track every game with your playgroup, and see which of your friends already owns the card you need. — A WHOLE BINDER PAGE, ONE PHOTO — • 9- and 12-pocket binder pages, or loose cards laid out any way round • Pick as many photos as you like in one go • Review everything Decksmith found on one screen before anything is imported • Missed a card? Find it by typing its name • Just opened a pack? Scan single cards live from the camera — THE DECKSMITH COMMUNITY — Magic is played together, so Decksmith is built for your playgroup. • Game tracker: life, poison and commander damage for the whole pod, a random first player, and a top row that turns to face the far side of the table • Every game is filed against the deck you played, with win rates per deck and per commander • Wishlist: track the cards you still want, priced separately from your collection • Search your friends' collections for your wishlist and see who owns which card • Follow players, browse their collections and shared decks, and search all your favorites at once • Share any deck with one tap and collect likes and comments • Friend requests, an activity feed and notifications keep you in the loop — KNOW WHAT IT'S WORTH — Live market prices in USD or EUR, kept next to what you paid — card by card and across your whole collection. — A DECK BUILDER THAT KNOWS THE RULES — Standard, Modern, Pioneer, Legacy, Vintage, Commander, Pauper and Casual. Decksmith enforces deck size and copy limits, gives your commander its own slot, validates companions and tells you the moment a deck is legal. Mana curve, card types and average mana value come automatically. — FIND ANY CARD, INSTANTLY — Search the full Magic card database or your own collection. Filter by color, rarity, type, set, mana cost, finish and double-faced cards. Sort by name, price or date added. — SMART LISTS — Save any combination of filters as a list that fills itself — trade binder, EDH staples, every foil under $5 — or curate one by hand. — YOUR CARDS, FULL SCREEN — High-resolution art, glowing borders on foils, pinch to zoom, swipe from card to card and flip double-faced cards with a tap. — IPHONE, IPAD AND THE WEB — Sign in at app.decksmith.community with your free account, and your collection, decks and lists are on any computer, always in sync with your iPhone. — PRIVACY YOU CONTROL — Scanning, your collection, prices, deck building, lists and the gallery all work without an account, and your collection lives on your device. A free account is only needed for sync, the Community and the game tracker. Then you decide what is visible: your profile, whether you can be found, and each deck public or private. Block or report anyone. Export or delete your data at any time. — NO LOCK-IN — Import CSV exports from the popular collection and deck-building sites, restore a full Decksmith backup, and export everything to a single file whenever you like. No ads. No tracking. No subscription. The Community is free to use until December 31, 2026. Card data and images provided by Scryfall. Decksmith is an unofficial fan app and is not affiliated with, endorsed or sponsored by Wizards of the Coast. Magic: The Gathering is © Wizards of the Coast LLC.

Screenshots

Card Binder4 screens
Decksmith4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is review sentiment: Decksmith at 100% against Card Binder's 59%. Decksmith also leads on rating (5.0 vs 4.5) and in-app purchases (none vs 2). Card Binder's advantage is ratings volume (578 vs 1) and update cadence (every 2 weeks vs every 5 weeks). On price, ads, device support and iOS requirement 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

Both are free to download. Card Binder sells 2 one-off in-app purchases. Decksmith asks for nothing beyond the download.

ReceptionRating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings

Decksmith holds the better App Store score, 5.0 against 4.5. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: Card Binder has 578 ratings behind it against 1, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews point the same way: 59% of Card Binder's written reviews are positive against 100% of Decksmith's.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

Card Binder ships an update every 2 weeks, Decksmith every 5 weeks. The most recent releases landed on November 7, 2026 and November 5, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard6 real differences · 4 level
Card Binder versus Decksmith: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterCard BinderDecksmith
PriceFreeFree
Rating4.5 (578 ratings)5.0 (1 ratings) — better
Positive reviews59.4% of reviews100.0% of reviews — better
Number of ratings578 — better1
Update frequencyEvery 2 weeks — betterEvery 5 weeks
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesYesNo — better
MonetizationFree with in-app purchasesFree — better
DevicesiPhone, iPadiPhone, iPad
Requires iOS17.6 — better18.0
Further details — not scored
Size32 MB27 MB
Age rating+49+
DeveloperNicolas Yuste TiradosWaldemar Schneider

Customer experience

Card Binder

All ratings573 ratings
Positive88.1%
Neutral3.3%
Negative8.6%
Written reviews138 reviews
Positive59.4%
Neutral12.3%
Negative28.3%

Decksmith

All ratings1 ratings
Positive100.0%
Neutral0.0%
Negative0.0%
Written reviews1 reviews
Positive100.0%
Neutral0.0%
Negative0.0%

Bugs and requests

Card Binder

Reported bugs

4 issues
  • Inability to recognize certain card names
  • Disappearing foil card data
  • Deck building issues with commander cards
  • Inconsistent set recognition

Requested features

5 requests
  • Ability to filter cards by set
  • Option to add custom tags to cards
  • Bulk card addition to decks
  • Wishlist functionality
  • Improved sorting and organization tools

Decksmith

Not enough reviews yet to summarise bugs or requests.

In-app purchases

2 purchases

Card Binder

One-time2
  • Space for 100 cards$0.99
  • Space for 1000 cards$4.99
None

Decksmith

No in-app purchases

Questions

Is Card Binder free?
Card Binder is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Is Decksmith free?
Decksmith is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Which has better reviews, Card Binder or Decksmith?
Decksmith is rated higher. Card Binder averages 4.5 out of 5 from 578 ratings, while Decksmith averages 5.0 from 1 ratings.
Do Card Binder or Decksmith have ads?
Neither Card Binder nor Decksmith shows ads.
Which is updated more often, Card Binder or Decksmith?
Card Binder ships an update every 2 weeks, and Decksmith every 5 weeks. Most recently, Card Binder was updated on November 7, 2026 and Decksmith on November 5, 2026.

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