Phonal Tonal vs Blue Box
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
Phonal Tonal
Explore the history of phone phreaking with this app. It generates classic phone tones like Blue Box and Red Box for nostalgic, fun, or educational experiences. Discover a variety of tones used in the past.
- Generates historical phone tones
- Includes Blue Box, Red Box, Green Box tones
- Supports Special Information Tones
- DTMF tone generation
- Nostalgic and educational purposes
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Back in the day, phreaks had phun on the phone, using colored boxes to get free phone calls. Of course, none of those tricks work anymore. Phonal Tonal generates a variety of phone tones for nostalgia, fun, and educational purposes. Blue Box, Red Box, Green Box, Special Information Tones, DTMF, and more.
Blue Box
Encode and decode DTMF signals using your device's microphone or keypad. Play back tone sequences with adjustable settings, and save them for easy recall. Explore various tone systems, including trunk control and coin signals, for educational and utility purposes.
- Encode/decode DTMF signals
- Adjustable tone, delay, and volume
- US, UK, and European tone systems
- Multi-frequency and trunk control tones
- Coin tone sequences (Red Box mode)
- Custom tone creation
- Save and organize sequences
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Blue Box is utility for encoding and decoding DTMF (Dual-Tone Multi-Frequency) or Touch Tone signals. Generate tones by using the phone style keypad or decipher tones using the device’s microphone. Tone combinations can be played back with adjustable tone, delay and pause lengths and volume. Choose from US, UK and Europe based systems. Enable Multi-frequency tones, which were a precursor to DTMF. Additional trunk control signals will be available including KP, ST1, ST2, ST3, KP/ST2. Additional tones include the Dial Tone, Ring Back Tone, Busy Signal and 2600Hz. A comma can be used as a pause character to provide extra time between tones during playback. Save and organize any number of sequences for easy recall using the Favorites feature. Choose numbers from your contacts to display and play back tones. Share an encoded or decoded number with the Phone, FaceTime or Messages app. Use Red Box mode to play coin tone sequences, including 5¢, 10¢ and 25¢ for the US system and 10p and 50p for European systems. Create a custom tone with control over individual frequencies and volumes. The custom tone can consist of any number of on and off pulses and can optionally be continuous. Record interactions with the encoder and play them back with the same timing. The recording feature works with all tones, including the dial tone, busy signal, ring back tone, 2600Hz and coins and trunk control tones. A help manual is including, with step-by-step instructions for all features. When the app is first run, pop-ups will be displayed indicating what the controls are used for. Warning: Blue Box is designed as an educational tool and utility. Do not attempt to use Blue for any illegal or malicious purposes. Blue Box can be used to assist in dialing numbers, but can not be used to manipulate digital telephone utility services. Limitations: Blue Box is software based decoding and is processor intensive. Performance may vary between devices. Tones that are less than 100 ms with pauses that are less than 100 ms are difficult to process in software. Future versions and processors may increase the reliability of faster tone sequences. If you need touch tone decoding for higher speeds, a hardware solution is recommended. Blue Box can not play tones into the iPhone phone feature while in a call. Blue Box is useful for entering numbers into touch tone operated systems such as an answering machine passcode or a dial-up service that requires the entering of several touch tones to navigate a menu system. Simply enter the numbers once and then play back the numbers into the phone's microphone with a touch.
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is review sentiment: Phonal Tonal at 83% against Blue Box's 56%. Phonal Tonal also leads on price ($0.99 vs $4.99) and ratings volume (23 vs 3). Blue Box's advantage is rating (5.0 vs 4.8) and chart position (#192 vs unranked). On update cadence, ads, in-app purchases and monetization model 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
Phonal Tonal costs $0.99 and Blue Box $4.99 up front. Neither carries in-app purchases, so what you see is what you pay.
Blue Box holds the better App Store score, 5.0 against 4.8. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: Phonal Tonal has 23 ratings behind it against 3, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews complicate that: 83% of Phonal Tonal's written reviews are positive against 56% of Blue Box's, so the app with the better star average is not the one people write more warmly about.
Phonal Tonal ships an update every 11 months, Blue Box every 7 months. The most recent releases landed on September 17, 2026 and September 11, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | Phonal Tonal | Blue Box |
|---|---|---|
| Price | $0.99 — better | $4.99 |
| Rating | 4.8 (23 ratings) | 5.0 (3 ratings) — better |
| Positive reviews | 83.3% of reviews — better | 55.6% of reviews |
| Number of ratings | 23 — better | 3 |
| Update frequency | Every 11 months | Every 7 months — better |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | No | No |
| Monetization | Paid | Paid |
| Best chart rank | — | #192 — better |
| Devices | iPhone, iPad, iPod | iPhone, iPad, iPod |
| Requires iOS | 14.0 — better | 15.0 |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 3 MB | 2 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 4+ |
| Developer | Kelvin Sherlock | Sunshine Valley Systems |
Customer experience
Phonal Tonal
Blue Box
In-app purchases
Phonal Tonal
No in-app purchases
Blue Box
No in-app purchases
Questions
Is Phonal Tonal free?
Is Blue Box free?
Which has better reviews, Phonal Tonal or Blue Box?
Do Phonal Tonal or Blue Box have ads?
Which is updated more often, Phonal Tonal or Blue Box?
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