Comparison

Pipilo vs Beluga Social

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

Head to head
About

Pipilo

Experience a unique social media feed with a horizontally scrolling timeline that displays posts within their conversation context. Easily follow discussions, manage notifications, and enjoy rich media previews. Offers premium features for enhanced posting and account management.

Highlights
  • Horizontally scrolling conversation timelines
  • Collapsible threads with follow-only option
  • Grouped daily notifications
  • Rich link and video previews
  • Home, local, and federated timelines
  • Keyword filters for content moderation
  • Advanced media viewer with gestures
Features
Read full description

Pipilo is a unique Fediverse app that lets you browse posts on a horizontally scrolling timeline. Each post is displayed within the context of its conversation with replies from people you follow. This results in an elegant, distraction-free interface, making it easy to follow various conversation threads. Pipilo works with Mastodon, Pixelfed, Pleroma, Akkoma, Friendica, Firefish, Catodon, Iceshrimp, and GoToSocial. Features: - Horizontally scrolling timeline with each post appearing in the context of its conversation - Clean, collapsible threads showing only posts from people you follow, with an option to view replies from everyone - Notifications grouped by day - Quote posts - Rich previews for mentioned links and videos - Home, local, and federated timelines - Followed hashtags and custom lists - Quick search of posts, hashtags, and users - Full iPad support, with multiple windows allowing you to display different timelines side by side - Smooth media viewer with intuitive gestures, alt-text descriptions, share functionality, live text selection, and subject lifting - Advanced video player with native system interface for play/pause, time scrubbing, volume control, and full-screen or PIP mode viewing - Keyword filters to hide posts behind a warning or remove them from your timelines completely Premium Features: - Submit posts with images, videos, media descriptions, and content warnings - Sync reading position across multiple devices - Follow new hashtags and users - Create and edit custom lists - Add multiple accounts from all supported servers - Enable push notifications - Create and edit filters - Bookmark posts - Pin timelines - Create hashtag groups and follow remote instances Unlock all premium features with: - One-time purchase - Monthly subscription - Yearly subscription Privacy Policy: https://pipilo.thanel.me/privacy/ Terms of Use: https://www.apple.com/legal/internet-services/itunes/dev/stdeula/

About

Beluga Social

Share your thoughts and updates with friends and followers through a "tweet-like" feed. It generates a mini-website for easy sharing, even with non-users, and supports RSS feed readers for broader reach. This decentralized app ensures you own your data.

Highlights
  • Tweet-like content publishing
  • Personalized mini-website generation
  • JSON Feed compatibility
  • Decentralized data ownership
  • RSS feed reader integration
  • Multiple S3-compatible storage support
Read full description

Publish your thoughts and keep your friends and followers informed of what you are up to. This app is ideal for publishing "tweet-like" content. All your posts are added to your Beluga feed, and a mini-website is generated and published so you can easily share with everyone, even people that don't use the app. You can think of Beluga as a feed reader/writer. All Beluga feeds are JSON Feed compatible, so your friends can follow you on many popular RSS feed reader apps like NetNewsWire and others available on iOS. Beluga is decentralized. We don't have any servers. So you are the owner of your data, and you can host it wherever you like. To publish your Beluga feed and mini-website, you must have an S3-compatible object storage provider account. We currently support Amazon Web Services S3, Wasabi, Digital Ocean Spaces, Linode Objects, Backblaze B2, and DreamHost, with more to come soon.

Screenshots

Pipilo4 screens
Beluga Social4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is in-app purchases: Beluga Social at none against Pipilo's 3. Beluga Social also leads on rating (5.0 vs 4.6). Pipilo's advantage is ratings volume (5 vs 1). On price, update cadence, 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

Both are free to download. Pipilo sells 3 in-app purchases, starting at $0.99 per month. Beluga Social asks for nothing beyond the download.

ReceptionRating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings

Beluga Social holds the better App Store score, 5.0 against 4.6. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: Pipilo has 5 ratings behind it against 1, so its average is the more settled of the two.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

Pipilo ships an update every 3 weeks, Beluga Social monthly. The most recent releases landed on November 7, 2026 and November 3, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard4 real differences · 6 level
Pipilo versus Beluga Social: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterPipiloBeluga Social
PriceFreeFree
Rating4.6 (5 ratings)5.0 (1 ratings) — better
Positive reviews75.0% of reviews—
Number of ratings5 — better1
Update frequencyEvery 3 weeks — betterMonthly
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesYesNo — better
MonetizationFree with in-app purchasesFree — better
DevicesiPhone, iPadiPhone, iPod
Requires iOS16.415.4 — better
Further details — not scored
Size78 MB2 MB
Age rating17+4+
DeveloperLukasz RutkowskiBlimp, LLC

Customer experience

Pipilo

All ratings5 ratings
Positive100.0%
Neutral0.0%
Negative0.0%
Written reviews8 reviews
Positive75.0%
Neutral0.0%
Negative25.0%

Beluga Social

All ratings1 ratings
Positive100.0%
Neutral0.0%
Negative0.0%

In-app purchases

3 purchases

Pipilo

Subscriptions2
  • Monthly Pipilo Premium7 Days trial$0.991 Month
  • Yearly Pipilo Premium7 Days trial$9.991 Year
One-time1
  • Lifetime Pipilo Premium$29.99
None

Beluga Social

No in-app purchases

Questions

Is Pipilo free?
Pipilo is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Is Beluga Social free?
Beluga Social is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Which has better reviews, Pipilo or Beluga Social?
Beluga Social is rated higher. Pipilo averages 4.6 out of 5 from 5 ratings, while Beluga Social averages 5.0 from 1 ratings.
Do Pipilo or Beluga Social have ads?
Neither Pipilo nor Beluga Social shows ads.
Which is updated more often, Pipilo or Beluga Social?
Pipilo ships an update every 3 weeks, and Beluga Social monthly. Most recently, Pipilo was updated on November 7, 2026 and Beluga Social on November 3, 2026.

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