Comparison

UpToDate vs Visualmed

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

Head to head
About

UpToDate

This clinical decision support tool provides healthcare professionals with evidence-based guidance to improve patient care. It features AI-powered conversational answers, continuously updated medical content, and tools for drug reference, calculations, and patient education.

Highlights
  • Expert AI conversational guidance
  • Gold standard clinical content
  • Practice-changing updates
  • Patient education materials
  • Drug reference and interactions
  • Clinical calculators
  • Kidney dosing guidance
Features
Currently charting
Read full description

UpToDate is the clinical decision support solution trusted by over 3M healthcare professionals to help improve care delivery and patient outcomes. Now powered by UpToDate Expert AI, a generative AI experience built on rigorously maintained UpToDate clinical intelligence to delivers fast, clinically grounded answers through a conversational interface. Expert AI, available in select packages and applications, brings together the latest evidence and real-world clinical expertise and provides transparent sourcing, embedded guardrails, and oversight, supporting clinical reasoning and helping clinicians make confident, informed decisions. Key features include: • Expert AI: Conversational guidance that mirrors how clinicians think. • Gold Standard Clinical Content: Clinician-authored clinical intelligence and graded recommendation, enriched with clinical algorithms, graphics, videos, and continuously updated to reflect the latest evidence and clinical care experience. • Practice-Changing Updates: Timely insights that reflect the latest evidence and how it impacts patient care. • Patient Education: Thousands of patient education leaflets in up to 19 different languages to improve patient understanding and support care plan adherence. • Key Points Panels: Quick, clinically actionable guidance to help clinicians avoid common diagnostic and treatment errors embedded in UpToDate search results. • Drug Reference & Interactions: Evidence-based drug monographs and interaction analysis to support safe and informed prescribing decisions. • Clinical Calculators: Over 200 tools to support dosing, risk scoring, and patient assessments. • Rx Transitions: Step-by-step support for switching antidepressants safely. • Kidney Dosing: Drug dosing guidance for patients with renal impairment. Available on mobile, desktop, and integrated into EHRs, ensuring you can access UpToDate’s trusted guidance where and when you need it. Access to features will vary depending on your UpToDate account. Expert AI is now available in personal trainee subscriptions and UpToDate Pro Plus subscriptions in the US, and through select Enterprise Edition accounts. To get access, explore personal subscription options on the UpToDate website or contact your Enterprise account lead. This app is designed for use by medical professionals. If you are not a medical professional, please consult a qualified healthcare provider before making any medical decisions.

About

Visualmed

Access over 1500 summarized clinical trials with visual abstracts for quick understanding. Stay updated on the latest medical evidence without reading lengthy research papers. Ideal for clinicians, students, and healthcare professionals.

Highlights
  • 1500+ summarized clinical trials
  • Visual abstracts of study design, intervention, outcomes
  • Search and filter by condition, trial name, specialty
  • Daily new trial additions
  • Mobile-optimized interface
Features
Currently charting
Read full description

Read less. Understand more. Visualmed turns landmark and newly published clinical trials into clear, high-yield visual abstracts designed for busy healthcare professionals and medical students. Instead of spending hours working through dense research papers, quickly understand the studies that are shaping modern medicine. WHY VISUALMED? • 2,000+ clinical trials across major medical specialties • Clear visual abstracts that make complex research easier to understand • Quickly review study design, patient population, interventions, outcomes, and key findings • Search by trial, disease, treatment, or specialty • Discover landmark studies that changed clinical practice • Stay current with newly published research • Designed for physicians, residents, fellows, medical students, and other healthcare professionals CLINICAL TRIALS — VISUALIZED Visualmed transforms important medical research into concise visual summaries that help you understand the evidence quickly. Whether you're preparing for rounds, reviewing evidence before clinic, studying for an exam, teaching trainees, or simply trying to stay current, Visualmed puts key clinical research at your fingertips. EXPLORE MEDICINE ACROSS SPECIALTIES Discover important studies across cardiology, internal medicine, oncology, neurology, endocrinology, nephrology, pulmonology, infectious disease, critical care, and more. BUILT FOR BUSY CLINICIANS Medical literature moves quickly. Visualmed helps you focus on the studies that matter and understand their key findings without having to read every paper from beginning to end. VISUALMED PRO Unlock full access to Visualmed's growing library of visual abstracts and newly added clinical trials with Visualmed Pro. Download Visualmed and make keeping up with medical evidence part of your daily routine. Visualmed is intended for educational and informational purposes only. It does not provide medical advice and is not a substitute for independent clinical judgment or review of the original research.

Screenshots

UpToDate4 screens
Visualmed4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is rating: Visualmed at 4.5 against UpToDate's 3.6. Visualmed also leads on review sentiment (62% vs 28%) and iOS requirement (15.6 vs 18.0). UpToDate's advantage is in-app purchases (none vs 2). On price, ratings volume, update cadence and ads 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. Visualmed sells 2 in-app purchases, starting at $4.99 per month. UpToDate asks for nothing beyond the download.

ReceptionRating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings

Visualmed holds the better App Store score, 4.5 against 3.6. Both are backed by a comparable volume of ratings — 579 and 196 respectively. Written reviews point the same way: 28% of UpToDate's written reviews are positive against 62% of Visualmed's.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

UpToDate ships an update every 5 weeks, Visualmed every 2 months. Both last shipped on September 22, 2026.

Scorecard4 real differences · 7 level
UpToDate versus Visualmed: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterUpToDateVisualmed
PriceFreeFree
Rating3.6 (579 ratings)4.5 (196 ratings) — better
Positive reviews28.3% of reviews62.3% of reviews — better
Number of ratings579 — better196
Update frequencyEvery 5 weeks — betterEvery 2 months
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesNo — betterYes
MonetizationSubscriptionSubscription
Best chart rank#169#152 — better
DevicesiPhone, iPadiPhone, iPad, iPod — better
Requires iOS18.015.6 — better
Further details — not scored
Size56 MB28 MB
Age rating17+17+
DeveloperUpToDate, Inc.Usama Nasir

Customer experience

UpToDate

All ratings579 ratings
Positive60.4%
Neutral10.4%
Negative29.2%
Written reviews381 reviews
Positive28.3%
Neutral9.7%
Negative61.9%

Visualmed

All ratings196 ratings
Positive87.8%
Neutral0.5%
Negative11.7%
Written reviews69 reviews
Positive62.3%
Neutral2.9%
Negative34.8%

User reviews

UpToDate

From 579 App Store ratings

What we love

  • 💎 Invaluable medical resource
  • 🚀 Quick and easy to use
  • 🔍 Comprehensive and up-to-date content

Room to improve

  • 🐛 Frequent crashes and freezing issues
  • 🔌 Unreliable offline functionality
  • 💰 Expensive subscription cost

Visualmed

From 196 App Store ratings

What we love

  • ✨ Concise summaries of trials
  • 🚀 Efficient information access
  • 👍 Easy to use interface
  • 💡 Visual abstracts and infographics
  • 📚 Vast database of studies

Room to improve

  • 💸 Shift to subscription model
  • 😠 Feeling of being ripped off
  • 📉 Decreased graphic quality (recent)
  • ❌ Content paywalled for old users
  • 👎 Unreasonable subscription fees

Bugs and requests

UpToDate

Reported bugs

3 issues
  • Inability to download offline content
  • Constant need to re-authenticate
  • Incompatibility with recent iOS updates

Requested features

3 requests
  • Highlight and annotate content
  • Improved institutional login support
  • Dark mode and font size options

Visualmed

Reported bugs

8 issues
  • App crashes on opening
  • Visual summaries not loading
  • Only cardiology content showing up
  • App keeps shutting down
  • Cannot pass the logo screen
Show 3 more
  • App doesn't fit the screen
  • Technical problems after updates
  • Typographical errors in AI-generated content

Requested features

5 requests
  • Consider grandfathering in users who paid previously
  • Refund for users who paid and now can't access content
  • Improve app structure and layout
  • Department-specific approach (medicine, critical care, etc.) instead of disease-specific
  • Developer response to user comments about issues

In-app purchases

None

UpToDate

No in-app purchases

2 purchases

Visualmed

Subscriptions2
  • Pro Monthly3 Days trial$4.991 Month
  • Pro Yearly3 Days trial$29.991 Year

Questions

Is UpToDate free?
UpToDate is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Is Visualmed free?
Visualmed is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Which has better reviews, UpToDate or Visualmed?
Visualmed is rated higher. UpToDate averages 3.6 out of 5 from 579 ratings, while Visualmed averages 4.5 from 196 ratings.
Do UpToDate or Visualmed have ads?
Neither UpToDate nor Visualmed shows ads.
Which is updated more often, UpToDate or Visualmed?
UpToDate ships an update every 5 weeks, and Visualmed every 2 months. Most recently, UpToDate was updated on September 22, 2026 and Visualmed on September 22, 2026.
Which is more popular, UpToDate or Visualmed?
UpToDate currently peaks at #169 in the App Store charts, and Visualmed at #152. Chart position reflects recent download velocity rather than total install base.

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