Comparison

iComic vs Live Translate

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

Head to head
About

iComic

Read high-resolution comic pages from zip or cbz archives on your device. Enjoy seamless navigation and zooming with multi-touch gestures. Download comics from the internet or personal servers for offline reading.

Highlights
  • High-resolution comic page display
  • Supports JPG, TIF, PNG in ZIP/CBZ
  • Multi-touch page navigation
  • Pinch-to-zoom functionality
  • Built-in download manager
  • Offline comic access
Features
Read full description

Welcome to iComic, the premier application for reading comics on your iPhone or iPod Touch. iComic makes great use of the multi-touch function for simple and effective page navigation and zooming to provide the best portable comic book read you will find. iComic displays high resolution comic pages (jpg, tif, or png image files) contained inside compressed zip or cbz format archives. Using the built-in download function, comics can be downloaded from the internet or from a personal server and stored locally on your iPhone or iPod Touch. Your downloaded comics are stored on your device and so are always available for reading, even when you have no internet connection. As iTunes resizes images to a compressed format, iComic is also useful for displaying images for other uses e.g. maps, high detailed photos and ebooks (convert your pdf books to jpeg and you have a perfect reader for those large pdf files, normally unreadable due to the high memory requirement). iComic currently provides three methods for turning pages: swiping your finger on the screen; by taps in the screen corners using the Corner-Tap method; or by Multi-Touch (tap once to page forward, twice to page back). Zooming is by the familiar pinch method used in Safari and other applications or by double tapping the screen when in Corner-Tap mode. The application is very stable and can easily handle zip files up to 60MB with infrequent problems observed with files of much larger size. Individual image files inside the zip files are constrained to a maximum 3 million pixels (e.g. 3,000 pixels high x 1,000 pixels wide or equivalent) though for the sake of battery conservation much smaller sizes (~1000 pixels high) are generally used. A manual for setting up and using iComic can be downloaded from http://red.halfmoon.jp/AppStore_iComic_V1.3_FAQ.pdf The author of this application is Japanese so for excellent community support and discussion in English please visit the helpful and friendly ~*~ Ultimate icomic Thread ~*~ at www.ipodtouchfans.com/forums/showthread.php?t=23759

About

Live Translate

Features
Read full description

Understand videos, meetings, live streams and more with real-time translated captions in Picture in Picture. Live Translate listens to system audio through an iOS system broadcast, transcribes speech and translates it into your chosen language. Captions remain visible in a floating Picture in Picture window while you use other apps. FEATURES • Real-time transcription and translation • Microphone translation with saved translation history • Fullscreen captions in portrait or landscape • Floating Picture in Picture captions • Bilingual, translated-only and original-only display modes • Support for English, Simplified Chinese, Traditional Chinese, Japanese, Korean, French, German, Spanish and Brazilian Portuguese • On-device transcription and translation, with language resources managed by iOS • 60 minutes of free use, with optional weekly, annual or lifetime access PRIVACY BY DESIGN Audio, transcription and translation are processed locally on your device. Subtitle content is not uploaded to our servers. HOW TO USE 1. Choose the spoken and translation languages. 2. Prepare the required on-device language models. 3. Start Picture in Picture. 4. Start the iOS system broadcast. 5. Open the video or app you want to understand. Availability and performance depend on iOS language model support, device capability, audio quality and the source app. Some protected content or audio may not be available to screen broadcasting. Terms of Use (EULA): https://www.apple.com/legal/internet-services/itunes/dev/stdeula/

Screenshots

iComic1 screens
Live Translate4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is price: Live Translate at Free against iComic's $0.99. Live Translate also leads on update cadence (every 4 days vs monthly). iComic's advantage is in-app purchases (none vs 3) and iOS requirement (16.6 vs 26.0). On 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

Live Translate is free to download; iComic costs $0.99 up front. Live Translate sells 3 in-app purchases, starting at $1.99 per month. iComic asks for nothing beyond the download.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

iComic ships an update monthly, Live Translate every 4 days. The most recent releases landed on October 22, 2026 and October 9, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard4 real differences · 6 level
iComic versus Live Translate: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameteriComicLive Translate
Price$0.99Free — better
Rating3.1 (7 ratings) — better—
Positive reviews66.2% of reviews—
Number of ratings7 — better—
Update frequencyMonthlyEvery 4 days — better
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesNo — betterYes
MonetizationPaid—
DevicesiPhone, iPadiPhone, iPad
Requires iOS16.6 — better26.0
Further details — not scored
Size3 MB4 MB
Age rating17+4+
DeveloperY.Yamamoto乘黄 李

Bugs and requests

iComic

Reported bugs

17 issues
  • App crashes when opening large comic files
  • Rotation mode becomes stuck after using 'fix right' option
  • Status bar doesn't disappear despite settings
  • Bookmark settings not saved in iOS 4.x
  • FTP upload fails with permission errors
Show 12 more
  • File numbering displays out of order (01 after 1)
  • Nested folder structures not readable
  • Landscape mode rendering issues with black space
  • Memory leaks causing frequent warnings
  • CBR files with newer RAR compression show blank pages
  • Swipe navigation not working properly
  • App crashes after finishing a comic
  • Cannot save rotation preferences
  • Crashes on iOS 5+ with certain devices
  • FTP connection issues on Windows 7
  • Blank 'read error' pages in some CBR files
  • App installs multiple times causing file confusion

Requested features

18 requests
  • CBR/RAR format support (added in later versions)
  • iTunes file transfer integration
  • Lock rotation option for reading
  • Auto-rotate to landscape for 2-page spreads
  • Improved file management and deletion from app
Show 13 more
  • Better bookmark functionality with persistent storage
  • Thumbnail previews of comics
  • Directory/folder organization system
  • Password protection for app
  • Batch file import capability
  • Page slider for quick navigation
  • Support for PDF files
  • Retina-friendly app icon
  • Improved file sorting (alphanumeric)
  • In-app FTP file pulling from servers
  • Gesture controls for chapter navigation
  • Reset read status for re-reading
  • Automatic chapter continuation

Live Translate

Not enough reviews yet to summarise bugs or requests.

In-app purchases

None

iComic

No in-app purchases

3 purchases

Live Translate

Subscriptions2
  • Monthly Premium$1.991 Month
  • Annual Premium$4.991 Year
One-time1
  • Lifetime Premium$9.99

Questions

Is iComic free?
iComic costs $0.99, with no in-app purchases.
Is Live Translate free?
Live Translate is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Do iComic or Live Translate have ads?
Neither iComic nor Live Translate shows ads.
Which is updated more often, iComic or Live Translate?
iComic ships an update monthly, and Live Translate every 4 days. Most recently, iComic was updated on October 22, 2026 and Live Translate on October 9, 2026.

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