Comparison

Academic Fish App vs Chinese@OU

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

Head to head
About

Academic Fish App

This app helps students understand and translate academic math language across English, Irish, and Chinese. It offers video, audio, and text resources for post-primary to university levels, developed by mathematicians.

Highlights
  • Academic math language translation
  • English, Irish, and Chinese support
  • Video, audio, and text resources
  • Curriculum-based content
  • Post-primary to university levels
Features
Read full description

An inclusive, curriculum-based, app for the understanding and translation of academic Math language in English, Irish and Chinese from post primary through to university level education; by mathematicians in education. Our app includes a Premium subscription that allows you to access all premium materials (thousands of maths terms in Chinese, Irish and English): in video, audio and text form. The subscription costs 3.99 GBP per month, is renewed monthly and can be cancelled anytime. Terms of Use (EULA): https://www.apple.com/legal/internet-services/itunes/dev/stdeula/ Privacy Policy: https://academicfish.com/terms-conditions/

About

Chinese@OU

Features
Read full description

This free, interactive and fun Chinese character learning app is developed by experienced Chinese language teaching academics at The Open University (UK). Learning to read and write Chinese characters presents three major challenges to both non-native learners as well as Chinese children who first start learning characters: - the complexity of characters as an average character consists of about 12 strokes; - matching character form with pronunciation, Pinyin form and the English meaning; - using characters to form sentences This app attempts to tackle these three challenges on one screen with interactive activities to help you write, recognise visually and aurally, and memorise some of the most frequently used characters in a systematic, friendly and fun way. Most importantly it helps you to form phrases and sentences with the limited characters learnt. The app contains 200 plus most frequently used characters taught at beginners’ level. By combining them, you will learn a further 200+ useful and essential words and phrases. For example, by combining η”΅ (electric; electricity) and 视 (viewing; sight)), you learn the word 甡视 (television). You will have the opportunity to search for some common words in the Word Search Activities. There are 16 lessons which chronologically build upon each other. Each of the 16 lessons has five interactive activities with audio embedded: Writing, Reading, Listening, Rearranging, and Identifying or Word Search. Writing: In this activity you can watch the animation of stroke-by-stroke drawing of each character, hear the pronunciation, learn Pinyin and its English meaning, and most importantly draw the character with or without the model with your finger. Reading: Here you can test yourself on recognising the characters you have learnt in the Writing Activity. Match the character with Pinyin or English, and you will get instant feedback. Listening: Here you can test your understanding of i) some characters you have learnt in the current lesson which are single character word (e.g. ζ—©: early); and ii) words consisting of two or more characters, which are made up of characters you have learnt in the current and previous lessons (e.g. ζ—©δΈŠ: morning). Instant feedback is provided. Rearranging: Here you get the opportunity to practise forming a sentence based on the audio you hear, using the characters provided, which you have already learnt. Instant feedback is provided. Identifying: Here you are presented with five groups of characters. Each group consists of four similar looking characters. You will need to choose the character that matches the English. The feedback provides a word/phrase that contains this character. Word Search: Here you have the opportunity to search for words/phrases that consist of the characters you have learnt up till that point. This activity not only helps to develop your character recognition skills but also to remember characters in context, and it is fun to play!

Screenshots

Academic Fish App4 screens
Chinese@OU4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is in-app purchases: Chinese@OU at none against Academic Fish App's 1. Chinese@OU also leads on iOS requirement (12.0 vs 15.6). Academic Fish App's advantage is update cadence (every 7 months vs every 16 months). On price, ads and device support there is nothing between them.

Scored on Price Β· Rating Β· Positive reviews Β· Number of ratings Β· Update frequency Β· Ads Β· In-app purchases Β· Monetization Β· Best chart rank Β· Devices Β· Requires iOS

CostPrice Β· In-app purchases Β· Ads Β· Monetization

Both are free to download. Academic Fish App sells 1 in-app purchase, starting at $3.99 per month. Chinese@OU asks for nothing beyond the download.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

Academic Fish App ships an update every 7 months, Chinese@OU every 16 months. The most recent releases landed on November 3, 2026 and October 27, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard3 real differences Β· 5 level
Academic Fish App versus Chinese@OU: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterAcademic Fish AppChinese@OU
PriceFreeFree
Positive reviews100.0% of reviewsβ€”
Update frequencyEvery 7 months β€” betterEvery 16 months
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesYesNo β€” better
MonetizationFree with in-app purchasesβ€”
DevicesiPhone, iPodiPhone, iPad, iPod β€” better
Requires iOS15.612.0 β€” better
Further details β€” not scored
Size19 MB533 MB
Age rating4+4+
DeveloperACADEMIC FISH LTDThe Open University

In-app purchases

1 purchases

Academic Fish App

Subscriptions1
  • Premium Subscription$3.991 Month
None

Chinese@OU

No in-app purchases

Questions

Is Academic Fish App free?
Academic Fish App is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Is Chinese@OU free?
Chinese@OU is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Do Academic Fish App or Chinese@OU have ads?
Neither Academic Fish App nor Chinese@OU shows ads.
Which is updated more often, Academic Fish App or Chinese@OU?
Academic Fish App ships an update every 7 months, and Chinese@OU every 16 months. Most recently, Academic Fish App was updated on November 3, 2026 and Chinese@OU on October 27, 2026.

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