Radio Unit vs Circa Looper
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
Radio Unit
Stream over 35,000 internet radio stations with this app. Enhance your audio experience by using it as an AUv3 plugin with other compatible music apps. Discover new music and save your favorites.
- Access 35,000+ radio stations
- Enhance audio with AUv3 plugins
- Intuitive interface
- Song discovery and saving
- Favorites sync across devices
- MIDI control for AUv3 plugin
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Discover a world of music with Radio Unit, a sleek and powerful Internet radio player with a built-in Audio Unit (AUv3) plugin. Elevate your listening experience by enhancing streaming audio in real time using your favorite third-party audio processing plugins (not included) within AUv3-compatible hosts like Drambo or GarageBand. Features: • Intuitive Interface: Enjoy a clean, user-friendly design for effortless navigation. • Song Discovery: Tap to add the currently playing song to your favorites, then open it in the Apple Music app or search for it on Google. • Massive Station Library: Access over 35,000 radio stations—search by name, browse by genre or location, and sort by popularity. • Favorites Sync: Save stations and songs to your favorites list, seamlessly synced across your devices. • AUv3 Integration: Use Radio Unit as a standalone app or as an AUv3 plugin in hosts like Drambo, GarageBand, and more, with support for multiple plugin instances. • MIDI Mapping: Control buttons can be triggered by MIDI Note events (C3 to F3). (AUv3 only) • Battery Efficient: Stream music without draining your device. The app requires internet connection.
Circa Looper
A powerful multi-channel looping instrument for iPad, designed for musicians and producers. It offers six independent stereo loop layers, deep modulation, precision syncing, and built-in effects for creating complex patterns and evolving soundscapes. Its touch-friendly interface allows for hands-on creative control and seamless DAW integration.
- Six independent stereo loop layers
- Deep modulation control
- Precision syncing
- Built-in reverb and delay
- Touch-friendly interface
- Full MIDI mapping
- Drag-and-drop audio export
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Circa runs as a standalone app, or as an AUv3 plugin in hosts such as GarageBand, Logic, AUM and Cubase. Equal parts workhorse and abstract creative tool, Circa is a six track multi-layer looping environment that can do most of the things your popular floor pedal looper can while also paying homage to the serendipitous world of ambient looping. Each layer can sync to the host, a master loop, or free run, and can be triggered in sync, with an audio signal, or freely. Circa has seven stereo outputs (including a dedicated cue output for monitoring) and built-in reverb and delay. Add in a complete MIDI control and LFO modulation system and Circa is a full looping workstation. Features -- Multi-Layered Looping Circa has six layers that can operate independently or in sync with each other and/or the host. Circa can record from the stereo input, or self-record via an internal buss for interesting feedback possibilities. -- Standalone Or Plugin As a standalone app, Circa has its own audio and MIDI settings: choose your audio interface, sample rate and buffer size, pick the input pair, send each of Circa's seven outputs to any output pair on your interface, and select a MIDI input. Sync to incoming MIDI clock, or let Circa set the tempo from your first loop. As an AUv3 plugin, it lives inside your host and syncs to its transport. -- Designed To Be Touched And Played Circa's user interface is made for tactile manipulation, with touch strips for speed and position (including dedicated pages). The position strip can be further subdivided with slices. All this works together to turn a looping effect into a playable instrument. -- Easy To Get Along With Circa's layers each have an undo for destructive edits like recording, overdubbing, and erasing. -- Controllability And Modulation Circa has 30 modulation slots. Each one can map a MIDI controller to any of Circa's looping functions, or run an LFO: seven shapes, free-running or tempo-synced, with rate, phase and level, modulating speed, start and end position, level, panning, delay and reverb sends, filter frequency and resonance, or the slice the play head is on. LFOs swing around wherever each control is set, so the knobs stay in charge. -- Self-Contained Circa has a full internal mixer, filtering on each layer, and studio-quality send reverb, send delay, parametric EQ and compressor taken directly from Audio Damage's extensive effect library. -- Expandable And Performance-Ready Circa has 7 outputs in all: six assignable stereo outputs and a cue output for monitoring. Send any layer to any of the six stereo outputs, while keeping the cue for soloing, recording, and editing, unheard by the audience. In the standalone app, each output can go to its own pair of outputs on your audio interface. -- Ecosystem-Aware Circa's user presets are cross-platform compatible, and work on any instance of Circa, whether on macOS, Windows, Linux, or iOS. In addition, sessions created in GarageBand or Logic on iOS will open in the desktop version on macOS if you have purchased a license to that version.
Screenshots
Verdict
Radio Unit and Circa Looper both sit at 4.6 stars, but that hides the real split: 81% of Radio Unit's written reviews are positive against 33% of Circa Looper's. Radio Unit also leads on ratings volume (59 vs 10) and device support (4 vs 1). Circa Looper's advantage is update cadence (every 3 weeks vs every 2 months). On rating, ads, in-app purchases 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
Radio Unit costs $6.99 and Circa Looper $7.99 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 — 4.6 for Radio Unit against 4.6 for Circa Looper. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: Radio Unit has 59 ratings behind it against 10, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews are what separate them: 81% of Radio Unit's written reviews are positive against 33% of Circa Looper's.
Radio Unit ships an update every 2 months, Circa Looper every 3 weeks. The most recent releases landed on October 12, 2026 and September 29, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | Radio Unit | Circa Looper |
|---|---|---|
| Price | $6.99 — better | $7.99 |
| Rating | 4.6 (59 ratings) | 4.6 (10 ratings) |
| Positive reviews | 81.5% of reviews — better | 33.3% of reviews |
| Number of ratings | 59 — better | 10 |
| Update frequency | Every 2 months | Every 3 weeks — better |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | No | No |
| Monetization | Free — better | Paid |
| Devices | iPhone, iPad, iPod, Mac — better | iPad |
| Requires iOS | 15.6 — better | 16.0 |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 2 MB | 66 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 4+ |
| Developer | BeepStreet | Audio Damage, Inc. |
Customer experience
Radio Unit
Circa Looper
Bugs and requests
Radio Unit
Reported bugs
17 issues- Cannot remove recognized songs
- Cannot remove favorite saved songs (Mac)
- Last update ruined experience with loading times and connection issues
- Sadé channel frequently disconnects
- Some stations don’t connect at all
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- Cannot see song title/artist
- Seamless integration with GarageBand and Logic Pro doesn't work
- Cannot change station with MIDI, LFOs etc. after update
- Cubasis 3 can’t find app
- BBC streams no longer play
- Cannot edit user slots after adding of link
- Links not working
- Cannot add user slots ('see the developer to unlock slots')
- Adding stations near impossible
- Failed URL slot flashes red and is inaccessible
- Cannot paste other URLs
- Cannot record and sample the feed into DAW
Requested features
13 requests- Option to remove or filter hostile nations
- Add more stations (Golha radio, IRIB radio)
- Ability to organize, tag, and edit stream specifications
- Ability to use with CarPlay
- Pitch slider within the app to slow down radio in real time
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- More user presets/slots
- iCloud sync for recently played stations and discovered pieces
- Ability to change station with MIDI, LFOs etc. (post-update issue)
- More exposed parameters for tweaking
- Greater resources for slots (folders/sections)
- Import/export presets list
- Assign MIDI CC to volume knob and channel switch buttons
- Support for streams in OGG container format
Circa Looper
Not enough reviews yet to summarise bugs or requests.
In-app purchases
Radio Unit
No in-app purchases
Circa Looper
No in-app purchases









