Comparison

Asketch vs Sketchbook®

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

Head to head
About

Asketch

A digital sketchpad designed for both beginners and advanced artists. It offers a focused drawing experience with intuitive gesture controls, powerful zooming for detail work, and image transformation capabilities. Capture your ideas anytime, anywhere with this versatile tool.

Highlights
  • Gesture-based drawing interface
  • Pressure-sensitive drawing support
  • High-quality image zooming
  • Image transformation (scale/rotate)
  • 50 levels of undo/redo
Features
Read full description

Asketch is a unique and versatile sketch pad. It allows creativity on the go, anytime, anywhere. Its deliberate simplicity makes it perfect for beginners who want to learn to draw; equally, advanced artists will find a wonderful buttery, tonal canvas for their life studies, cartoons, abstracts, landscapes and other subjects. The app is engineered to deliver rapid, but powerful image capture, facilitated by a great transform function that allows you to pick up the drawing, resize it and move it around the canvas, and a amazing zoom that lets you draw in minute detail. So if you want to put a traditional, but digital sketch pad in your pocket, this is the app for you. Features and functionality: Gesture based drawing interface: Changing the surface area of your finger on the screen controls the focus of the drawing. Supports pressure sensitive drawing on iPhones that support pressure sensitivity. Image zooming that actually works: Do amazing detail work when zoomed in. No pixelation of brushes while drawing. Image transformation: Scale/Rotate the image via a simple pinch gesture. 50 Levels of undo/redo. Swipe the undo/redo button to toggle back and forth. Hold down the button for rapid unwind/rewind.

About

Sketchbook®

This app provides a professional-grade drawing and painting experience for artists and illustrators. It offers a natural drawing feel with customizable tools, layers, and guides for precision. Unlock advanced features like custom brushes and canvas resizing with an optional premium purchase.

Highlights
  • Full complement of brush types
  • Highly customizable brushes
  • Guides, rulers, and stroke tools
  • Layers with blend modes
  • Clean and unobtrusive interface
  • Custom brush creation (premium)
  • Canvas resizing (premium)
Read full description

From quick sketches to fully finished artwork, Sketchbook goes where your creativity takes you. Sketchbook is an award-winning sketching, painting, and drawing app for anyone who loves to draw. Artists and illustrators love Sketchbook for its professional-grade feature set and highly customizable tools. Everyone loves Sketchbook for its elegant interface and natural drawing experience, free of distractions so you can focus on capturing and expressing your ideas. • A full complement of brush types: pencils markers, airbrushes, smear and more that look and feel just like their physical counterparts • Brushes are highly customizable so you can create just the look you want • Guides, rulers and stroke tools support precision when you need it • Layers with a full complement of blend modes deliver the flexibility to build up and explore drawings and color • Purpose-built for sketching, the interface is clean and unobtrusive so you can focus on drawing Purchase the Premium Bundle to unlock more... • Import and export brushes • Create your own custom brushes • Resize your canvas or image • Set canvas resolution in px/inch or px/cm • Clipping masks • Additional layer adjustments including blur, sharpen, brightness/contrast, greyscale, and invert • Additional color harmonies • Additional custom gradients • Select color from reference images • Extract color palettes from images • Import and export color palettes • Layer grouping • Layer masking Blend Modes • Draw Outline tool • Lasso Fill tool • Export to PDF • plus more to come!

Screenshots

Asketch4 screens
Sketchbook®4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is price: Sketchbook® at Free against Asketch's $1.99. Sketchbook® also leads on rating (4.8 vs 4.4) and ratings volume (220K vs 224). Asketch's advantage is in-app purchases (none vs 1). On update cadence, ads, chart position 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

Sketchbook® is free to download; Asketch costs $1.99 up front. Sketchbook® sells 1 one-off in-app purchase. Asketch asks for nothing beyond the download.

ReceptionRating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings

Sketchbook® holds the better App Store score, 4.8 against 4.4. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: Sketchbook® has 220K ratings behind it against 224, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews point the same way: 65% of Asketch's written reviews are positive against 77% of Sketchbook®'s.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

Asketch ships an update every 2 months, Sketchbook® every 6 weeks. The most recent releases landed on September 25, 2026 and September 27, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard6 real differences · 5 level
Asketch versus Sketchbook®: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterAsketchSketchbook®
Price$1.99Free — better
Rating4.4 (224 ratings)4.8 (220K ratings) — better
Positive reviews65.3% of reviews76.7% of reviews — better
Number of ratings224220K — better
Update frequencyEvery 2 monthsEvery 6 weeks — better
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesNo — betterYes
MonetizationPaidFree with in-app purchases — better
Best chart rank#79#35 — better
DevicesiPhone, iPad, iPodiPhone, iPad, iPod
Requires iOS13.0 — better14
Further details — not scored
Size3 MB142 MB
Age rating4+4+
DeveloperAndrew KernSketchbook, Inc

Customer experience

Asketch

All ratings224 ratings
Positive81.7%
Neutral9.4%
Negative8.9%
Written reviews314 reviews
Positive65.3%
Neutral8.6%
Negative26.1%

Sketchbook®

All ratings220,344 ratings
Positive95.8%
Neutral2.4%
Negative1.8%
Written reviews1,673 reviews
Positive76.7%
Neutral7.0%
Negative16.3%

User reviews

Asketch

From 224 App Store ratings

What we love

  • 👍 Simple and easy to use
  • ✨ Produces beautiful sketches
  • 🎨 Realistic charcoal-like effect
  • 🚀 Smooth and responsive
  • 🔒 No data collection

Room to improve

  • 🐛 Crashes and stability issues
  • 🔍 Lack of instructions/tutorials
  • 🎨 Limited customization options
  • 💾 No save/export options
  • 🔀 Confusing gesture controls

Sketchbook®

From 220K App Store ratings

What we love

  • 🚀 Amazing, free, and no ads
  • 👍 Lots of brushes and customization options
  • 👍 Intuitive and easy to use
  • 👍 Great for beginners and professionals
  • 👍 Smooth performance and no lag

Room to improve

  • 🐛 Occasional freezing and crashing issues
  • 🐛 Blurry or corrupted images when saving or copying
  • 🐛 Glitches with color selection and layers
  • 🐛 Inability to rotate canvas or access gallery easily
  • 🐛 Lack of blurring and clipping mask tools

Bugs and requests

Asketch

Reported bugs

3 issues
  • Crashes on startup
  • Eraser not working as expected
  • Brush strokes moving to unexpected locations

Requested features

5 requests
  • Ability to save and export drawings
  • More brush/pencil options
  • Color support
  • Layers and blending tools
  • Background/paper texture options

Sketchbook®

Reported bugs

4 issues
  • Layers randomly deleted or corrupted
  • Freezing when using certain tools like the eyedropper
  • Saving issues leading to loss of progress
  • Incompatibility with newer iPad Pro devices

Requested features

7 requests
  • Add blurring and clipping mask tools
  • Improve gallery and canvas rotation functionality
  • Allow custom font import
  • Add effects like glow, stroke, and drop shadow
  • Implement layer grouping and organization
Show 2 more
  • Add real-time collaboration features
  • Improve time-lapse recording and saving

In-app purchases

None

Asketch

No in-app purchases

1 purchases

Sketchbook®

One-time1
  • Premium Bundle$2.99

Questions

Is Asketch free?
Asketch costs $1.99, with no in-app purchases.
Is Sketchbook® free?
Sketchbook® is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Which has better reviews, Asketch or Sketchbook®?
Sketchbook® is rated higher. Asketch averages 4.4 out of 5 from 224 ratings, while Sketchbook® averages 4.8 from 220K ratings.
Do Asketch or Sketchbook® have ads?
Neither Asketch nor Sketchbook® shows ads.
Which is updated more often, Asketch or Sketchbook®?
Asketch ships an update every 2 months, and Sketchbook® every 6 weeks. Most recently, Asketch was updated on September 25, 2026 and Sketchbook® on September 27, 2026.
Which is more popular, Asketch or Sketchbook®?
Asketch currently peaks at #79 in the App Store charts, and Sketchbook® at #35. Chart position reflects recent download velocity rather than total install base.

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