iWriteMusic vs Sight Reading Machine
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
iWriteMusic
Create professional music notation efficiently with intuitive tools. Quickly enter notes, arrange pages, and export your compositions in various formats. Ideal for composers, teachers, and musicians of all levels.
- Easy to master notation interface
- Fast note entry with OneFlick or traditional methods
- Flexible page layout tools
- Support for multi-track, multi-voice scores
- Integrated playback and mixer
- Export to PDF, MIDI, MusicXML, and audio
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Less learning. More music. Professional notation without the lengthly learning process. Whether you are capturing a musical idea, preparing lesson material or a lead sheet, or completing a large score, iWriteMusic helps you turn inspiration into finished notation efficiently. 7 reasons to choose iWriteMusic. 1. Easy to master. Essential controls are organized clearly, so even if notation apps are new to you, you can get started without relying on a thick manual or a long series of tutorial videos. 2. Enter notes faster, your way. With OneFlick, you can combine choices such as pitch and note value into a single gesture. Traditional Entry lets you choose the notation item and its position separately. Use either method to match the task and the way you prefer to work. 3. Create polished, professional scores. Flexible page-layout tools help you prepare music for practice, lessons, rehearsals, performance, and distribution. Create individual parts from a score and print directly with AirPrint. 4. Use the notation your music requires. Create multi-track, multi-voice scores with lyrics, chord symbols, percussion, drum notation, and multi-bar rests. Add key, time, clef, and tempo changes within a piece, along with grace notes, articulations, dynamics, and full or partial transposition. 5. Keep scores and parts organized. Manage scores and their individual parts together, and use folders to organize a growing collection of compositions and teaching materials. 6. Listen, check, and practice. Play your score while you work. Use the mixer, solo, mute, instrument selection, loop playback, and swing playback to check your music or support daily practice. 7. Export and share for any purpose. Export PDF, image, Standard MIDI, MusicXML, and audio files (WAV). Share editable iWriteMusic files and continue working on another device. For composers, arrangers, songwriters, music teachers, students, singers, and instrumentalists. Use iWriteMusic for musical sketches, lead sheets, chord charts, lesson materials, choral and ensemble scores, chamber music, band music, orchestral scores, and individual parts. iWriteMusic is free to download. Some features require one-time in-app purchases.
Sight Reading Machine
This music practice app generates personalized sight-reading exercises for various instruments. Customize rhythm, key, and complexity to suit your skill level and musical preferences. Practice offline with clear notation and adjustable tempo.
- Customizable musical exercises
- Graded levels (1-8)
- Adjustable rhythm, key, and complexity
- Offline practice mode
- Clear, responsive notation
- Metronome and tempo control
- Save and share presets
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Fresh music to read. Practice that fits you. Sight Reading Machine creates short, musical exercises for piano and other instruments. Choose a graded starting point or shape the music around what you want to practise. Read with your instrument, sing in your head or follow the score wherever you are. START AT YOUR LEVEL Grades 1–8 for piano and selected instruments offer progressively more demanding keys, rhythms, ranges and textures. Choose within each level’s limits, or make a custom copy to explore every option. Each exercise is newly generated for core sight-reading practice. MAKE IT YOURS Choose Classical, Film or Robot, then adjust rhythm, note density, movement and note choices. Simplify the melody, stay in key, follow chords or add chromatic colour. Set note values, range, keys and time signatures. Shuffle your chosen keys and meters for a fresh challenge. NEW FOR PIANO Practise both hands with shared harmony and separate settings. Give each hand its own rhythm, density, movement and pitch range. Explore block chords, broken chords and melodic lines, then listen to either hand or both together. KEEP YOUR PLACE Clear, responsive notation works on iPhone and iPad. Optional beat markers and a pulse help you follow the meter without highlighting every note. Adjust tempo, add a count-in and use the metronome. Larger notation and an upcoming-score preview make small screens easier to read. KEEP WHAT WORKS Save music and playback settings together, favourite the presets you use and return to your last settings with Continue. Exchange .srmpreset files with students, teachers or friends. PRACTISE ANYWHERE Exercises, notation and instrument playback work offline. Choose from 29 instrument and clef setups, plus treble- and bass-clef reading modes. No microphone or account is required. FREE TO START Create five new exercises a day and save one custom preset per instrument. Musical customisation and preset-file import and export stay free. Replay your last exercise without using another daily exercise. SRM PLUS A single, one-time purchase unlocks unlimited new exercises, unlimited saved presets and optional iCloud preset sync. No subscription. Previous buyers of the paid SRM app receive Classic access, with the same full features, when their original purchase is verified. The app interface and screenshots are currently in English. SRM provides generated practice music and playback; it does not listen to or grade your performance.
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is rating: iWriteMusic at 4.5 against Sight Reading Machine's 3.6. iWriteMusic also leads on update cadence (every 2 weeks vs every 3 months) and review sentiment (74% vs 63%). On price, ads, 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
Both are free to download. iWriteMusic sells 5 one-off in-app purchases and Sight Reading Machine sells 1 one-off in-app purchase. Whichever you choose, the download price is not the number that matters.
iWriteMusic holds the better App Store score, 4.5 against 3.6. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: iWriteMusic has 181 ratings behind it against 25, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews point the same way: 74% of iWriteMusic's written reviews are positive against 63% of Sight Reading Machine's.
iWriteMusic ships an update every 2 weeks, Sight Reading Machine every 3 months. Both last shipped on November 13, 2026.
| Parameter | iWriteMusic | Sight Reading Machine |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free |
| Rating | 4.5 (181 ratings) — better | 3.6 (25 ratings) |
| Positive reviews | 73.5% of reviews — better | 62.5% of reviews |
| Number of ratings | 181 — better | 25 |
| Update frequency | Every 2 weeks — better | Every 3 months |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | Yes | Yes |
| Monetization | Free with in-app purchases | Free with in-app purchases |
| Devices | iPhone | iPhone, iPad — better |
| Requires iOS | 16.0 — better | 17.0 |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 19 MB | 47 MB |
| Age rating | +4 | 4+ |
| Developer | iWriteMusicProject | Kai Wa Cheng |
Customer experience
iWriteMusic
Sight Reading Machine
In-app purchases
iWriteMusic
- Advanced File Management$0.99
- Audio Export$0.99
- MIDI Export$0.99
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- MusicXML Export$0.99
- Basic Features$9.99
Sight Reading Machine
- SRM Plus$4.99
Questions
Is iWriteMusic free?
Is Sight Reading Machine free?
Which has better reviews, iWriteMusic or Sight Reading Machine?
Do iWriteMusic or Sight Reading Machine have ads?
Which is updated more often, iWriteMusic or Sight Reading Machine?
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