Comparison

iWriteMusic vs Notion

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

Notion

Create dynamic musical compositions using traditional notation or guitar tablature. This app offers an intuitive touch-based interface, realistic playback with orchestral samples, and cross-platform syncing. Share or export your creations in various formats.

Highlights
  • Traditional musical notation
  • Guitar tablature
  • Intuitive touch interface
  • Realistic audio playback
  • Cross-platform syncing
  • Multiple export formats
Features
Read full description

With over 15 years in the App Store, Notion is a free, award-winning music composition tool for iOS, iPadOS, macOS and more! You’ll effortlessly create dynamic compositions in traditional musical notation or guitar tablature with its intuitive touch-based interface and incredibly broad editing capabilities. With a user-friendly interface and simple interactive piano keyboard, fretboard, drum pad, and even optional Handwriting Recognition, Notion makes it easy to get started composing your music. You can also hear your music performed with the most realistic playback possible, using real audio samples recorded by the London Symphony Orchestra at Abbey Road Studios. Notion is a native cross-platform app, meaning you can write anywhere on any device without requiring a constant Internet connection. And when you’re back online, you’ll be able to sync your work across multiple devices through your preferred cloud provider. Start your work on one device and finish it on another. Once you are happy with your creation you can share the Notion file, or export as MIDI, MusicXML, PDF or as an audio file. You can even optionally transmit scores across a network with other instances of Notion, or between Notion and the Fender Studio Pro DAW. Compose, edit, and play back your music performed with real piano and orchestral samples recorded by the London Symphony Orchestra at Abbey Road Studios — along with outstanding sampled guitar, bass, drums and other popular instruments. And when you’re ready for more sounds, you’ll find the extensive library of Notion Add-on Soundsets to purchase as part of the Feature Bundle. To save space, the initial app download contains just piano — you can then manage which of the bundled Soundsets to have on your device or keep in the cloud, just tap on Sound Installation. Notion has been featured in various Apple campaigns including the Apple YourVerse television commercials, and has won several awards including a prestigious music industry NAMM TEC Award for Best Smartphone/Tablet App. What you get: Notion includes unlimited staves, comprehensive editing features and core orchestral and rhythm section Soundsets — all for free. You can optionally register (also for free!) to unlock an additional Soundset (containing Solo Strings, Classical Saxophones and Glockenspiel), and the multivoice function that allows writing in up to 4 voices per staff. Then for the full experience, either sign in with your Fender Studio Pro+ membership or purchase the Notion Feature Bundle. This unlocks Handwriting Recognition, Layout Controls, all the Expansion Soundsets (including many auxiliary instruments and additional articulations and effects), additional audio export formats (m4a, OPUS, FLAC), and direct score transfer with Notion and Fender Studio Pro running on the same network. Free: Unlimited staves All editing features Core Soundsets Export as MusicXML, Compressed MusicXML, MIDI, PDF, wav, mp3 Welcome Pack (register for free): Soundset including Solo Strings, Glockenspiel, Classical Saxophones Additionally write for voices 3 and 4 in a single staff Feature Bundle (in-app purchase or sign in with Fender Studio Pro+): Handwriting Recognition, powered by MyScript Available on iPhone, iPad and macOS (macOS with supporting graphics tablet or using Sidecar with compatible iPad) Automatic pen vs. finger recognition to switch between handwriting and edit mode Pressure-sensitive support for Apple Pencil Adjustable timer for Handwriting Recognition Override handwriting timer by double tapping Apple Pencil (2nd Gen) Layout Control All Expansion Soundsets Additional audio export formats (m4a, OPUS, FLAC) Transmit scores across a network with other instances of Notion, or between Notion and Fender Studio Pro

Screenshots

iWriteMusic4 screens
Notion4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is price: Notion at Free against iWriteMusic's $9.99. Notion also leads on device support (4 vs 1). iWriteMusic's advantage is rating (4.5 vs 3.1) and review sentiment (73% vs 42%). On ratings volume, update cadence, ads and in-app purchases 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

Notion is free to download; iWriteMusic costs $9.99 up front. iWriteMusic sells 1 one-off in-app purchase and Notion sells 10 one-off in-app purchases. 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 3.1. Both are backed by a comparable volume of ratings — 181 and 72 respectively. Written reviews point the same way: 73% of iWriteMusic's written reviews are positive against 42% of Notion's.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

iWriteMusic ships an update every 5 weeks, Notion every 6 weeks. The most recent releases landed on October 20, 2026 and October 22, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard4 real differences · 6 level
iWriteMusic versus Notion: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameteriWriteMusicNotion
Price$9.99Free — better
Rating4.5 (181 ratings) — better3.1 (72 ratings)
Positive reviews73.2% of reviews — better42.3% of reviews
Number of ratings181 — better72
Update frequencyEvery 5 weeks — betterEvery 6 weeks
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesYesYes
MonetizationFree with in-app purchasesFree with in-app purchases
DevicesiPhoneiPhone, iPad, iPod, Mac — better
Requires iOS16.015 — better
Further details — not scored
Size19 MB146 MB
Age rating4+4+
DeveloperiWriteMusicProjectFender Digital

Customer experience

iWriteMusic

All ratings181 ratings
Positive90.1%
Neutral4.4%
Negative5.5%
Written reviews149 reviews
Positive73.2%
Neutral8.1%
Negative18.8%

Notion

All ratings68 ratings
Positive45.6%
Neutral11.8%
Negative42.6%
Written reviews508 reviews
Positive42.3%
Neutral15.9%
Negative41.7%

Bugs and requests

iWriteMusic

Not enough reviews yet to summarise bugs or requests.

Notion

Reported bugs

5 issues
  • Inability to change key signatures mid-piece
  • Incorrect transposition of notes and chords
  • Text formatting and positioning issues
  • Unreliable MIDI file import/export
  • Playback distortion and timing issues

Requested features

5 requests
  • Ability to customize note beaming and stem direction
  • Option to display note letter names
  • Improved handwriting recognition for complex rhythms
  • Folder organization for better file management
  • Keyboard shortcuts for power users

In-app purchases

1 purchases

iWriteMusic

One-time1
  • Advanced File Management$0.99
10 purchases

Notion

One-time10
  • Classical guitar$0.99
  • Harp$0.99
  • Jazz Alto Sax$0.99
Show 7 more
  • Vibraphone$0.99
  • Marimba$0.99
  • Jazz Bass$0.99
  • Percussion Bundle$4.99
  • Handwriting$7.99
  • Feature Bundle$14.99
  • All Sounds Bundle$29.99

Questions

Is iWriteMusic free?
iWriteMusic costs $9.99, and also offers in-app purchases.
Is Notion free?
Notion is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Which has better reviews, iWriteMusic or Notion?
iWriteMusic is rated higher. iWriteMusic averages 4.5 out of 5 from 181 ratings, while Notion averages 3.1 from 72 ratings.
Do iWriteMusic or Notion have ads?
Neither iWriteMusic nor Notion shows ads.
Which is updated more often, iWriteMusic or Notion?
iWriteMusic ships an update every 5 weeks, and Notion every 6 weeks. Most recently, iWriteMusic was updated on October 20, 2026 and Notion on October 22, 2026.

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