Comparison

Halcyon Calc vs Plus42

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

Head to head
About

Halcyon Calc

A powerful calculator app for students, engineers, and scientists. It handles complex numbers, symbolic expressions, unit conversions, and matrix operations, with advanced plotting and programming capabilities.

Highlights
  • Complex number calculations
  • Symbolic expression manipulation
  • Unit conversion with custom units
  • Matrix and vector operations
  • Symbolic plotting
  • Programming of custom operations
  • Statistical data analysis
Features
Read full description

For students, engineers, scientists or people who fondly remember classic calculators, Halcyon Calc is a great application for manipulating numbers and even symbolic expressions. Features: - Use this calculator on an iPhone, iPod Touch or an iPad - Use your finger to quickly scroll through the stack to review intermediate results - Copy and paste support - Over 225 built-in operations, including trig, logarithms, real functions, complex operations and more - Allows you to work with real, complex and integer numbers. - Real and complex numbers can be displayed in standard, fixed, scientific and engineering format - Use over 120 built-in units to perform unit conversion or create your own units if the one you want is not already there - Integer numbers can be displayed in decimal, hexadecimal, octal and binary bases - Work with real and complex matrices and vectors. - Enter symbolic expressions and solve them for different values. Even better, solve quadratic formulas, collect and expand factors and terms, find minima, maxima and roots of any expression. - Plot symbolic expressions in X/Y coordinates. Pan the coordinate space by dragging the plot in any direction. Zoom in and out using a pinch gesture. - Determine symbolic derivative, taylor series or numeric integral of an expression. - Store numbers, lists, strings and expressions in symbols. Create hierarchies of symbols to allow you to organize your calculations. - Create sequences of calculator commands into programs, creating your own operations which you can then include in expressions. - Store statistical data and calculate totals, averages, standard deviations, linear regressions, etc over that data. - Calculate the probabilities associated with standard distributions like the normal, F and T distributions.

About

Plus42

This advanced scientific calculator simulates the classic HP-42S RPN calculator with enhanced features. It offers algebraic expressions, unit conversions, directories for storage, a larger resizable display, financial functions, and 2D plotting with integral and root finding.

Highlights
  • HP-42S RPN calculator simulation
  • Algebraic expressions
  • Attached units and conversions
  • Program and variable directories
  • Resizable 8-row, 22-column display
  • Time value of money and amortization
  • 2D function plotting with zoom and pan
Features
Currently charting
Read full description

Plus42 is an advanced scientific programmable calculator, based on Free42. Free42, in turn, is a complete re-implementation of the HP-42S scientific programmable RPN calculator, which was made from 1988 until 1995 by Hewlett-Packard. Free42 is a complete rewrite and contains no HP code whatsoever. Plus42 builds on Free42 and adds: Algebraic expressions modeled after those used on the HP-27S and HP-17B/19B; attached units and unit conversions modeled after those used on the HP-48/49/50 series; directories for more organized storage of programs and variables; a larger display, with 8 rows and 22 columns (131x64 pixels) by default, which the user may resize at will; time value of money and amortization schedules; and two-dimensional plotting of functions, with ability to zoom and pan, and find integrals and roots from points in the plot.

Screenshots

Halcyon Calc4 screens
Plus424 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is update cadence: Plus42 at weekly against Halcyon Calc's every 4 months. Plus42 also leads on chart position (#96 vs unranked) and ratings volume (79 vs 18). Halcyon Calc's advantage is price ($4.99 vs $9.99). On rating, review sentiment, ads and in-app purchases 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

Halcyon Calc costs $4.99 and Plus42 $9.99 up front. Neither carries in-app purchases, so what you see is what you pay.

ReceptionRating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings

On the App Store both sit at effectively the same score — 4.9 for Halcyon Calc against 4.9 for Plus42. Both are backed by a comparable volume of ratings — 18 and 79 respectively. Written reviews are what separate them: 100% of Halcyon Calc's written reviews are positive against 92% of Plus42's.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

Halcyon Calc ships an update every 4 months, Plus42 weekly. Both last shipped on September 22, 2026.

Scorecard6 real differences · 5 level
Halcyon Calc versus Plus42: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterHalcyon CalcPlus42
Price$4.99 — better$9.99
Rating4.9 (18 ratings)4.9 (79 ratings)
Positive reviews100.0% of reviews — better92.3% of reviews
Number of ratings1879 — better
Update frequencyEvery 4 monthsWeekly — better
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesNoNo
MonetizationPaidFree — better
Best chart rank—#96 — better
DevicesiPhone, iPadiPhone, iPad, iPod — better
Requires iOS16.612.0 — better
Further details — not scored
Size10 MB11 MB
Age rating4+4+
DeveloperHalcyon Touch SoftwareThomas Okken

Customer experience

Halcyon Calc

All ratings18 ratings
Positive100.0%
Neutral0.0%
Negative0.0%
Written reviews6 reviews
Positive100.0%
Neutral0.0%
Negative0.0%

Plus42

All ratings79 ratings
Positive97.5%
Neutral0.0%
Negative2.5%
Written reviews39 reviews
Positive92.3%
Neutral2.6%
Negative5.1%

In-app purchases

None

Halcyon Calc

No in-app purchases

None

Plus42

No in-app purchases

Questions

Is Halcyon Calc free?
Halcyon Calc costs $4.99, with no in-app purchases.
Is Plus42 free?
Plus42 costs $9.99, with no in-app purchases.
Which has better reviews, Halcyon Calc or Plus42?
Halcyon Calc and Plus42 are both rated 4.9 out of 5 on the App Store, from 18 and 79 ratings respectively.
Do Halcyon Calc or Plus42 have ads?
Neither Halcyon Calc nor Plus42 shows ads.
Which is updated more often, Halcyon Calc or Plus42?
Halcyon Calc ships an update every 4 months, and Plus42 weekly. Most recently, Halcyon Calc was updated on September 22, 2026 and Plus42 on September 22, 2026.

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