Comparison

Unicode Pad vs Symbols

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

Head to head
About

Unicode Pad

Access and copy thousands of Unicode characters to use in any app. Create custom keyboards for frequently used symbols and share them with friends. Search characters by name, codepoint, or glyph, and view detailed descriptions.

Highlights
  • Copy characters to clipboard
  • Customizable keyboards
  • Share custom keyboards
  • Search characters by name/codepoint/glyph
  • View extended character descriptions
  • Thousands of symbols available
Read full description

Note: This app supports only in-app custom keyboards! For a fancier version which also supports iOS 8 and later custom keyboards, check out the Unicode Pad Pro app! • Tested on latest iOS 11 • Support for Unicode 11 standard • Copy characters to clipboard for use in other apps, like web, mail, chat, notes… practically any iOS app! • Notepad with customizable keyboards, for your often-used characters and for copying several characters at once. Great for casual writing, too! • Share your custom keyboards with your friends! • Send mail and tweets right from within the app! • Huge selection of symbols (thousands), in fact all that are available on your device. Database itself actually contains data for all Unicode characters (over 100,000), but only glyphs available in iOS system font are actually visible. • Quick acces to many groups of commonly used symbols! • Search for characters by name, hexadecimal codepoint or glyph! Find similar and related characters instantly! • Streamlined design, specifically optimized for each device. Support for all device orientations and Retina display. • Support for Backspace, New line, Shift and Alternate special keys on custom keyboards. • Custom keyboard sizes up to 6x16=96 keys. • View extended character descriptions on Wikipedia, right inside the app! This works particularly great for emoticons! • One universal application works on iPhone, iPod and iPad! • Reference booklet of characters available on modern computers! Paper Unicode maps are over 1000 pages long! • Developers: see which characters are available on your iOS device! • Great for scientific, mathematical and physics notation, handles many superscripts, subscripts and other symbols! • Excellent for phonetic notation! • Perfect for writing Unicode poetry! • Awesome for making interesting app names! • HTML entity names for relevant characters • UNIHAN english definitions for CJK ideograms for many characters • Flick left and right for next and previous characters in detail view • Affordable price!

About

Symbols

Access and discover a vast collection of Unicode characters. Find specific symbols, view their HTML and Unicode information, and save frequently used characters to a favorites list for quick access.

Highlights
  • Access all Unicode characters
  • View HTML and Unicode info
  • Search for specific characters
  • Add characters to Favorites
  • Copy characters easily
Features
Read full description

Fancy fonts for your bio, posts and messages, and every symbol one tap away. Turn any text into cool, aesthetic letters: bold, italic, cursive, gothic, Ⓒⓘⓡⓒⓛⓔⓓ and more, frame your name with decorations, and add cute kaomoji text faces. Then search, copy and paste more than 26,000 special characters: arrows, hearts, stars, check marks, math signs, currency signs, letters from every script and more, straight from the Unicode 18 standard. FANCY TEXT • Type anything and copy it as fancy letters in Ⓒⓘⓡⓒⓛⓔⓓ and more • 23 text styles: bold, italic, script, gothic, double-struck, circled, squared, wide, small caps, upside down, strikethrough and more • Paste it anywhere: bios, messages, posts and notes • Bold, Italic and Strikethrough are free; every style comes with Symbols Pro DECORATIONS AND KAOMOJI • Frame your name with more than 30 decorations: stars, hearts, sparkles, brackets and more • Over 80 kaomoji text faces for every mood: happy, love, sad, angry, shy, animals and more • Tap to copy, then paste into your bio, nickname or chat • A few decorations and faces in every group are free; all of them come with Symbols Pro FIND ANY CHARACTER • Search by name ("arrow", "check mark", "degree") or by hex code ("2192") • Browse all 249 Unicode blocks, or group by category • Filter by letters, marks, numbers, punctuation, symbols or spaces COPY IT YOUR WAY • Tap any character to copy it instantly, with optional sound and haptic feedback • Long-press to copy its code: Unicode (U+2192), HTML (→), HTML hex, CSS, Swift or JavaScript • Share characters to any app SYMBOLS KEYBOARD • Type any character in any app with the Symbols keyboard • Characters are grouped into symbols, punctuation, numbers, letters, marks and spaces • Symbols never records what you type FAVORITES AND HISTORY • Save the characters you use most to Favorites • Every character you copy is kept in History, ready to use again SYMBOLS PRO • No ads • All 23 Fancy Text styles • Every decoration and kaomoji • Home Screen and Lock Screen widgets with your favorite and recent characters • Your Favorites and Recents inside the Symbols keyboard Symbols Pro is available as a weekly or monthly auto-renewable subscription, or as a one-time lifetime purchase. Prices are shown in the app and may vary by country. Payment is charged to your Apple Account when you confirm the purchase. A subscription renews automatically unless it is cancelled at least 24 hours before the end of the current period, and your account is charged for renewal within 24 hours before the period ends. You can manage or cancel your subscription in your App Store account settings at any time after purchase. Any unused part of a free trial, if offered, is forfeited when you purchase a subscription. Terms of Use (EULA): https://www.apple.com/legal/internet-services/itunes/dev/stdeula/ Privacy Policy: https://kreatimont.com/apps/symbols/privacy.html

Screenshots

Unicode Pad4 screens
Symbols4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is price: Symbols at Free against Unicode Pad's $2.99. Symbols also leads on rating (4.5 vs 3.5) and update cadence (every 3 days vs every 3 months). Unicode Pad's advantage is in-app purchases (none vs 3) and ads (none vs shown). On review sentiment, ratings volume 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

Symbols is free to download; Unicode Pad costs $2.99 up front. Symbols sells 3 in-app purchases, starting at $0.99 per 7 days. Unicode Pad asks for nothing beyond the download.

ReceptionRating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings

Symbols holds the better App Store score, 4.5 against 3.5. Both are backed by a comparable volume of ratings — 8 and 11 respectively. Written reviews point the same way: 74% of Unicode Pad's written reviews are positive against 75% of Symbols's.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

Unicode Pad ships an update every 3 months, Symbols every 3 days. The most recent releases landed on October 15, 2026 and October 19, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard7 real differences · 3 level
Unicode Pad versus Symbols: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterUnicode PadSymbols
Price$2.99Free — better
Rating3.5 (8 ratings)4.5 (11 ratings) — better
Positive reviews73.7% of reviews75.0% of reviews — better
Number of ratings811 — better
Update frequencyEvery 3 monthsEvery 3 days — better
AdsNo — betterYes
In-app purchasesNo — betterYes
MonetizationPaidFree — better
DevicesiPhone, iPad, iPod — betteriPhone, iPad
Requires iOS11.0 — better17.0
Further details — not scored
Size140 MB19 MB
Age rating4+4+
DeveloperZiga KranjecAlexandr Nadtoka

Customer experience

Unicode Pad

All ratings8 ratings
Positive62.5%
Neutral12.5%
Negative25.0%
Written reviews171 reviews
Positive73.7%
Neutral7.6%
Negative18.7%

Symbols

All ratings11 ratings
Positive81.8%
Neutral9.1%
Negative9.1%
Written reviews12 reviews
Positive75.0%
Neutral16.7%
Negative8.3%

Bugs and requests

Unicode Pad

Reported bugs

17 issues
  • App crashes when selecting notepad
  • App crashes on startup
  • Scrolling is laggy
  • Custom keyboards take time to load
  • Characters not appearing on keyboard after adding
Show 12 more
  • Some symbols don't copy properly (show as boxes)
  • App won't update
  • App becomes very slow after updates
  • Custom keyboards are hard to see after update
  • Buttons disappear
  • Detail window cannot be closed
  • Glyph description length exceeds screen
  • App freezes and requires device reset
  • Favorites/copy buttons sometimes go invisible
  • Cannot get to clipboard to post to other apps
  • App doesn't work with Facebook
  • Characters not displayed (show as squares)

Requested features

15 requests
  • Ability to add keyboards to other apps
  • More space for custom keyboards
  • Integration with iOS keyboard
  • Add backspace/delete/return keys to custom keyboards
  • Ability to rearrange keys on custom keyboards
Show 10 more
  • Ability to remove custom keys while on the keyboard
  • Sort Unicode blocks numerically
  • Save/swap out keyboards from within the app
  • Option to hide iOS incompatible characters
  • Add space bar to custom keyboard layouts
  • Copy as HTML option
  • Precise selection and editing features
  • Macros for multiple keystrokes
  • Dark mode option
  • Advanced analytics dashboard

Symbols

Not enough reviews yet to summarise bugs or requests.

In-app purchases

None

Unicode Pad

No in-app purchases

3 purchases

Symbols

Subscriptions2
  • Pro Weekly$0.997 Days
  • Pro7 Days trial$2.991 Month
One-time1
  • Pro Lifetime$29.99

Questions

Is Unicode Pad free?
Unicode Pad costs $2.99, with no in-app purchases.
Is Symbols free?
Symbols is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Which has better reviews, Unicode Pad or Symbols?
Symbols is rated higher. Unicode Pad averages 3.5 out of 5 from 8 ratings, while Symbols averages 4.5 from 11 ratings.
Do Unicode Pad or Symbols have ads?
Symbols shows ads; Unicode Pad does not.
Which is updated more often, Unicode Pad or Symbols?
Unicode Pad ships an update every 3 months, and Symbols every 3 days. Most recently, Unicode Pad was updated on October 15, 2026 and Symbols on October 19, 2026.

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