Comparison

iWriteMusic vs Maestro

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

Head to head
About

iWriteMusic

Create professional-quality sheet music efficiently on your smartphone. This app offers an intuitive interface and a powerful input system designed for small screens, making music notation accessible for musicians of all levels. Share your compositions as PDFs, JPGs, or MIDI files.

Highlights
  • Intuitive and simple user interface
  • Efficient One-Flick Entry System
  • Professional quality sheet music creation
  • Supports major notation elements
  • Useful playback options
  • Export to PDF, JPG, and MIDI
Features
Read full description

Music Writing is easy and fun when you use iWriteMusic! Ever wished you could quickly create sheet music in your small free time? Ever thought smartphones were too small to create sheet music? iWriteMusic enables efficient sheet music creation even on small smartphone screens. Unlike other cramped and cumbersome apps, it is designed meticulously for small screens,comprehensive suite of essential tools for concerts, lessons, and music classes! Best fit for professional musicians, music teachers and students. For songwriters, composers and arrangers. For both singers and instrumentalists (piano, violin, cello, guitar, flute, saxophone, trumpet, drums, etc.). Great for writing down ideas, creating lesson materials, creating lead sheets, or creating scores and parts for chorus groups, choirs, chamber orchestras, jazz bands, Latin bands, orchestras, and more. For daily practice, rehearsals, concerts, iWriteMusic will help you enrich your musical life! Check out 7 reasons to choose iWriteMusic. 1. You can understand this app almost instantly! Because of Truly Intuitive and Extremely Simple user interface, you barely need to read pages of manuals nor watching numbers of instruction videos. Unlike Finale, Sibelius and other similar apps, you just have a few things to learn to be able to use this app pretty well. 2.Double your productivity with our Highly Efficient Input System. If you’re already familiar with notation apps and looking for faster & more efficient entry system, try our innovative One-Flick Entry System along with Traditional Entry System to get your job done in no time! What is Traditional Entry System? - The choices will appear with ToolBox. - Select a value and the location separately. - Recommended to those who are not yet familiar with any music notation apps. What is OneFlick Entry System? - The choices will appear when you touch the screen. - Select a location and the value at once. - The selection will change as you slide your finger to left/right. - Recommended to those who are familiar with music notation apps and looking for faster and more efficient entry system. 3. Creates beautiful sheet music - absolutely professional quality! - rich options for page layout adjustment - easy parts creation - easy score/parts management - direct print-out via AirPrint 4. Supports most of major notation elements - multi-track writing - multi-voice writing - percussion/drums notation - chord symbols and lyrics - multi-bar rest - time change - key change - clef change - tempo change - grace note - articulations and dynamics marks - easy song transpose - partial transpose and many more! 5. Useful playback options for practice - mixer with solo, mute and voice select - loop and swing options 6. Data & sheet music sharing - exports/Imports iWriteMusic data file - exports PDF or JPG - exports Standard MIDI file which can be imported by other apps such as GarageBand 7. Extremely Compact Size (15 MB) You can save your device storage space for photos and other apps. ATTENTION: Latency during playback and drawing may occur by device capacity or number of tracks and background applications.

About

Maestro

Compose music quickly and easily with a comprehensive set of tools for writing musical notations, including notes, chords, articulations, and accidentals. Supports over 100 instruments for playback and allows export to image and audio files.

Highlights
  • Write musical notations
  • Supports over 100 instruments
  • Unlimited staves and music length
  • Export to image and audio files
  • Write lyrics and chord texts
  • Change clef, tempo, and key signature
Features
Read full description

Maestro - Music Composer Write sheet music with a wide range of notations and symbols. Compose music easily. Maestro is a next-generation music composition app. Hello, Maestro! We hope this is the perfect app for composers, songwriters, music students, and anyone who wants to write music with ease. Compose quickly and easily, like a maestro! Write and Learn Musical Notation - Notes, chord notes, and layered notes - Rests and multi-measure rests - Barlines - Repeat signs, Da Capo, Dal Segno, Segno, Coda, Fine, and alternate endings - Staccato, staccatissimo, accent, tenuto, fermata, trill, tremolo, mordent, and more articulations - Dots, double dots, beams, ties, slurs, duplets, triplets, quintuplets, grace notes, and more - Accidentals and quarter tones - Dynamics - Shift octaves up and down: 8va, 8vb, 15ma, 15mb, 22va, 22vb - Transpose - Change clef: treble, bass, alto, soprano, mezzo-soprano, tenor, baritone, drums, and monotone percussion - Change tempo - Change time signature - Change key signature - Write lyrics, chord symbols, and finger numbers Many Instruments - Play your music with over 100 instruments - Piano, organ, violin, cello, and other strings, guitar, brass, reed, pipe, drums, and percussion - Fun sound effects too, such as birdsong, helicopter, gunshot, seashore, telephone ring, scream, and more Unlimited Staves - Write orchestral music - Show or hide staves to manage many parts, or print each part on its own Unlimited Length - No limit on the number of measures or the length of the music Listen to Your Masterpiece - Play your music instantly - Set a playback section and repeat the parts Export Images and Print Your Sheet Music - Zoom in or out to fit more or fewer notes on a line - Save exactly what you see on the screen as an image - Save as JPG, PNG, or PDF - Change the page orientation Export to an Audio File - Send your music to friends - Set your composition as a ringtone Works on tablets, iPads, and devices of every size. We value your feedback and suggestions! - We are keen to make Maestro better - You are an artist creating music with Maestro, and we are digital artists creating Maestro We will do our best to keep improving Maestro. Happy composing!

Screenshots

iWriteMusic4 screens
Maestro4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is price: Maestro at Free against iWriteMusic's $9.99. Maestro also leads on device support (3 vs 1). iWriteMusic's advantage is ads (none vs shown) and rating (4.5 vs 4.3). On review sentiment, ratings volume, 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

CostPrice · In-app purchases · Ads · Monetization

Maestro is free to download; iWriteMusic costs $9.99 up front. iWriteMusic sells 1 one-off in-app purchase and Maestro sells 1 one-off in-app purchase. Whichever you choose, the download price is not the number that matters.

ReceptionRating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings

iWriteMusic holds the better App Store score, 4.5 against 4.3. Both are backed by a comparable volume of ratings — 181 and 283 respectively. Written reviews split almost evenly too, at 73% and 73% positive.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

iWriteMusic ships an update every 4 weeks, Maestro every 2 months. The most recent releases landed on October 29, 2026 and October 30, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard5 real differences · 5 level
iWriteMusic versus Maestro: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameteriWriteMusicMaestro
Price$9.99Free — better
Rating4.5 (181 ratings) — better4.3 (283 ratings)
Positive reviews73.3% of reviews73.4% of reviews — better
Number of ratings181283 — better
Update frequencyEvery 4 weeks — betterEvery 2 months
AdsNo — betterYes
In-app purchasesYesYes
MonetizationFree with in-app purchasesFree with in-app purchases
DevicesiPhoneiPhone, iPad, iPod — better
Requires iOS16.015.0 — better
Further details — not scored
Size19 MB139 MB
Age rating4+4+
DeveloperiWriteMusicProjectFuture Sculptor Pty Ltd

Customer experience

iWriteMusic

All ratings181 ratings
Positive90.1%
Neutral4.4%
Negative5.5%
Written reviews150 reviews
Positive73.3%
Neutral8.0%
Negative18.7%

Maestro

All ratings283 ratings
Positive83.4%
Neutral6.7%
Negative9.9%
Written reviews372 reviews
Positive73.4%
Neutral9.4%
Negative17.2%

Bugs and requests

iWriteMusic

Not enough reviews yet to summarise bugs or requests.

Maestro

Reported bugs

3 issues
  • Beam note function not working
  • Playback cursor glitches when using short note setting
  • Unable to save or export compositions in some cases

Requested features

6 requests
  • Add more percussion instruments (e.g., cymbals, snare, tambourine)
  • Implement swing rhythm and advanced tuplets
  • Allow multiple articulations on a single note
  • Add support for grace notes and pedal effects
  • Improve MIDI export and import functionality
Show 1 more
  • Implement a Concert Hall feature to share compositions

In-app purchases

1 purchases

iWriteMusic

One-time1
  • Advanced File Management$0.99
1 purchases

Maestro

One-time1
  • Ad Free Licence & Tickets$9.99

Questions

Is iWriteMusic free?
iWriteMusic costs $9.99, and also offers in-app purchases.
Is Maestro free?
Maestro is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Which has better reviews, iWriteMusic or Maestro?
iWriteMusic is rated higher. iWriteMusic averages 4.5 out of 5 from 181 ratings, while Maestro averages 4.3 from 283 ratings.
Do iWriteMusic or Maestro have ads?
Maestro shows ads; iWriteMusic does not.
Which is updated more often, iWriteMusic or Maestro?
iWriteMusic ships an update every 4 weeks, and Maestro every 2 months. Most recently, iWriteMusic was updated on October 29, 2026 and Maestro on October 30, 2026.

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