Chaos Lab vs MARVLS
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
Chaos Lab
Explore the beauty of chaos through interactive simulations of mathematical objects, chemical reactions, and celestial mechanics. Manipulate parameters with device tilt and touch to create stunning visual art and understand complex scientific principles.
- Interactive strange attractors
- Chemical oscillator simulations
- 3-body chaos simulation
- Julian fractal morphing
- Real-time parameter control
- Multiple attractors included
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Chaos Lab puts the beauty of chaos in your hands. With a tilt of your device, you control the parameters of beautiful mathematical objects called strange attractors, the reaction rates of a chemical oscillator, the position of two stars in a 3-body chaos simulation, and the shape of the Julian fractal. Now you can be an experimentalist and an artist. Using real-time integration of over 6,000 points for the attractors whose parameters are tied to your motion, over 7,000 data points for a fractal which morphs at your command, ten "asteroids" demonstrating chaotic sensitivity to initial conditions in a jittering twin-star system where the stars move with your tilt (can you keep them from escaping?), and a real-time BZ-reaction simulation which you control by both tilt and touch, this is chaos as you've never seen it before. Chaos Lab comes loaded with four of the most stunning attractors in chaos theory. The Rössler and Lorenz attractors are well known, but the Thomas and Newton-Leipnik attractors are relatively new and quite amazing! This work has been supported in part by grant PHY-0754081 from the U.S. National Science Foundation, the Nonlinear Dynamics Research Group at Drexel University (directed by Dr. Robert Gilmore), and the Department of Physics at Drexel University. Please note, some of these experiments will run slower on the older models of iPhones and iPod touch devices. Find the beauty in the chaos!
MARVLS
Explore quantum computing concepts through interactive augmented reality models. Requires a Merge Cube to visualize and manipulate topics like superposition and entanglement. Navigate through various educational modules to deepen your understanding.
- Augmented reality visualization
- Interactive quantum concepts
- Merge Cube integration
- Topics: superposition, entanglement, qubits
- Logic gates visualization
- Nuclear and electron spin models
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View augmented reality models of quantum computing concepts through your phone. You'll need a Merge Cube (link included to download). Click on different button to navigate to different topics. Tap the camera icon and point your camera towards the Merge Cube to visualize and interact with our MARVLS. Topics include observer dependency, superposition, entanglement, bits, qubits, nuclear and electron spin, logic gates, and trapped ions. Developer support provided by Leo Vanderlofske.
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is rating: Chaos Lab at 4.9 against MARVLS's 1.0. Chaos Lab also leads on update cadence (every 3 days vs every 4 weeks) and ratings volume (7 vs 1). On price, review sentiment, 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
Both are free to download. Neither carries in-app purchases, so what you see is what you pay.
Chaos Lab holds the better App Store score, 4.9 against 1.0. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: Chaos Lab has 7 ratings behind it against 1, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews point the same way: 69% of Chaos Lab's written reviews are positive against 67% of MARVLS's.
Chaos Lab ships an update every 3 days, MARVLS every 4 weeks. The most recent releases landed on June 1, 2026 and September 9, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | Chaos Lab | MARVLS |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free |
| Rating | 4.9 (7 ratings) — better | 1.0 (1 ratings) |
| Positive reviews | 68.8% of reviews — better | 66.7% of reviews |
| Number of ratings | 7 — better | 1 |
| Update frequency | Every 3 days — better | Every 4 weeks |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | No | No |
| Monetization | Free | Free |
| Devices | iPhone, iPad — better | iPhone |
| Requires iOS | 18.0 | 18.0 |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 7 MB | 168 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 4+ |
| Developer | Timothy D. Jones | Michele McColgan |
Customer experience
Chaos Lab
MARVLS
In-app purchases
Chaos Lab
No in-app purchases
MARVLS
No in-app purchases









