ePipes Drones vs Braw Tunes
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
ePipes Drones
This app provides tunable, authentic-sounding drones for Scottish Highland, Border, and Smallpipes. It's designed for musicians learning bagpipes, offering high-fidelity studio recordings for practice. Adjust volume, pitch, tuning, and reverb to enhance your playing experience.
- Authentic drone sounds
- Tunable pitch and tuning
- Adjustable volume and reverb
- Multiple pipe types (Highland, Border, Smallpipes)
- MIDI chanter testing
- Settings saved on exit
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ePipes Drones is a tunable, authentic sounding set of Scottish Highland, Border Pipes, and Smallpipes drones. This app is for musicians who are learning to play the Scottish bagpipes and want high-quality sets of tunable drones to play along with on their practice chanters. The sounds are provided by ePipes.co.uk in Glasgow, Scotland, from extremely high-fidelity studio recordings of three very fine instruments. Touch the ePipes logo to switch the drones on and off. Select the drone type using the drone selector. Available drone types are Great Highland, Border, and Smallpipes. Set the volume using the Drone Volume slider. The pitch may be transposed in semitone increments +/- one octave in using the Tranpose slider. Additionally, the Tuning slider may be used to fine-tune the drone +/- 50 cents in one-cent increments The Reverb slider sets how much reverb effect is added to the sound. All settings are saved when the app exits and restored the next time it is run. MIDI Chanter Test Features: Test your MIDI Chanter by setting the MIDI channels for the chanter and drones channels. Any MIDI Note-On message note numbers received on those channels will be displayed at the bottom of the screen. This value can be used to determine the MIDI offset value from 67 for the chanter in my other MIDI-enabled apps that default to the Fagerstrom Technopipes standard of the bottom note being MIDI note 67 (G3) as a zero offset.
Braw Tunes
This app listens to bagpipe music and displays the sheet music in real-time. It helps organize tunes into sets, track practice progress, and collaborate with band members. Access a large library of bagpipe tunes or upload your own.
- Real-time music recognition
- Automatic sheet music display
- Set planning and auto-transition
- Organize personal music library
- Band collaboration and sharing
- Practice analytics and statistics
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Braw Tunes is the app you open every time you practise your pipes. It's where you keep your music: the tunes you play, your sets, your practice history. And it stays yours, on any phone. Free, for everyone in your band Braw Tunes is free, on any phone. Everyone in your band can use it with a Piper's Account, and the free level is sized so a band or a tutor can put their sets on it and every member has them. No account is needed to try it: open the app, search, play, and your music appears. Pro, a paid yearly subscription, is space as your library grows. New in version 2: sharing, done properly Your Pipe Major shares the set. One tap, and it's in your app. Sharing tunes used to mean emailing files around and hoping everyone could open them. Now you send a link or a short code, and whoever you send it to taps it and the set appears in their app. Build an address book of contacts and groups. Shares are live, you control who has access, and you can revoke a share at any time. Got your music as PDFs? Add them. Photos of a page and recordings too. Attach them to a tune, a set or a collection. Your music doesn't have to be a BWW file. Your library • Your tunes, your sets, your collections, organised the way you play them. Import BWW and MusicXML files, or start from the 7,000 bagpipe tunes that come with the app, with the full music for the public-domain ones. • Saved to your Piper's Account, so it comes back if you reinstall, and it syncs between your devices. With you as you play • Play, and your sheet music appears. Braw Tunes listens, works out which tune you're playing, and shows the music, then the opening bars of the next tune in your set. • Remember a tune but not its name? Play it, and Braw Tunes will tell you. Keeps you at it • Every practice session is tracked automatically: your history, stats on what you play, and a weekly streak. I'm Bruce. I've made the Braw apps for pipers for ten years: the Braw Bagpipe Tuner, Piper's Metronome, and Braw Tunes. If you've used Piper's Metronome, your Piper's Account already works here. Questions, problems, ideas: bruce@brawsound.com. It comes straight to me, and I read every one.
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is in-app purchases: ePipes Drones at none against Braw Tunes's 3. ePipes Drones also leads on review sentiment (63% vs 50%) and iOS requirement (10.0 vs 17.0). Braw Tunes's advantage is update cadence (monthly vs every 4 months). On price, ads 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
Both are free to download. Braw Tunes sells 3 in-app purchases, starting at $1.99 per month. ePipes Drones asks for nothing beyond the download.
ePipes Drones ships an update every 4 months, Braw Tunes monthly. The most recent releases landed on October 21, 2026 and October 24, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | ePipes Drones | Braw Tunes |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free |
| Rating | 2.0 (4 ratings) — better | — |
| Positive reviews | 62.5% of reviews — better | 50.0% of reviews |
| Number of ratings | 4 — better | — |
| Update frequency | Every 4 months | Monthly — better |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | No — better | Yes |
| Monetization | Free — better | Free with in-app purchases |
| Devices | iPhone, iPod | iPhone, iPad |
| Requires iOS | 10.0 — better | 17.0 |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 5 MB | 49 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 4+ |
| Developer | Michael Eskin | Avoir Technology |
Customer experience
ePipes Drones
Braw Tunes
In-app purchases
ePipes Drones
No in-app purchases
Braw Tunes
- Braw Tunes Monthly$1.991 Month
- Braw Tunes Yearly Subscription$19.991 Year
- Supporters edition upgrade$79.99
Questions
Is ePipes Drones free?
Is Braw Tunes free?
Do ePipes Drones or Braw Tunes have ads?
Which is updated more often, ePipes Drones or Braw Tunes?
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