Comparison

Drawing Box vs Animation Desk® Ultimate

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

Head to head
About

Drawing Box

Unleash your creativity with a comprehensive digital art studio. Explore a vast array of drawing and painting tools, special effects, and interactive features for both artistic expression and fun recreational activities. Share your masterpieces as images or animated movies.

Highlights
  • Extensive drawing and painting tools
  • Special effects and magic pens
  • Symmetry and duplication modes
  • Artwork movie recording and sharing
  • Whiteboard for presentations
  • Recreational activities like mazes and sudoku
Features
Read full description

Drawing Box is recommended by schools for their students for its creativity tools and recreational features. Bring a painting studio in your pocket, and enjoy unlimited painting activities. 1/ Creativity: painting tools are amazingly funny to use. Discover dozens of hidden features for drawing and painting. More than only painting with your device, you can automatically send a movie of your artwork. Drawing Box also includes a white board for tutorial and pitch recording. Eight symmetry and duplication painting modes will create drawings you never can only imagine. 2/ Leisure: practice painting with fun and pleasure. With a large choice of incredible magic pens and 3D clay pens, free your imagination. Stencils, stickers and other icons let you enjoy long quiet moments of recreational activities. 3/ Training: besides drawing lessons, you can use the color mixer to create your personal palette. The “crop and move” tool help you to resize properly your work. Apply photo effects to your creations. 4/ Share: save and send your artwork with or without background. Share a movie of your painting on social networks. What you will find: • Drawing tools: pencils, chalks, ink pens, Chinese brush, harmony pens, erasers. • Painting: air brush, watercolor, hair brushes, blending brushes, sand brush, grid paint roller, pattern paint roller, cloud paint roller, hair and cloud paint roller, splash paint roller, dry smudge, fill bucket, rainbow pens and brushes, light effect, single color brush. • Colors: 10 color palettes (pastel, oil, cool, warm, night, sky and earth, fire and water, skin), color wheel, light and dark color adjustment. Real color mixer for creation of personal color palette. • Magic pens: autumn leaves, spring leaves, color splash, animal foot prints, lips, cartoon drawings, bubbles, butterflies, random squares, diamonds, candies, planets, musical signs, flowers, snow flakes, numbers, random circles, 3 pens, flashing stars, local symmetry, alternated colors, 3D clay pens, 3D sand pens, 3D noodle pens. • Clip arts, decorative patterns. • Text editor • Stencils • Background selection from the photo library, camera, preset models (wood, wall, concrete, textile, wallpaper, colors, grids, music lines, post card. • Leisure: coloring pages, mazes, sudoku. • Photography: import image, puzzles, photo effects (gray, sepia, fax, tonal, vignette, lemo, radial) • White board tool: talk, draw and record your presentation. • Drawing lessons. • Symmetrical painting: horizontal, vertical, 4 corners symmetry, • Duplication: simultaneously duplicate all your strokes to 3 or 4 directions. • Auto record your work as a movie. Replay and send movies. • Other functions: baby mode, toolbar customization, full page zooming, crop image, hide toolbar, export paintings with or without background, small painting views, multi painting deletions, quick navigation in the paintings gallery, painting rotation in the gallery. ============================================================ * Fall 2012 Mobile Apps: winner of a Parents’ Choice Silver Honor (www.parents-choice.org) * Reviewed and rated 5 stars by the Multimedia Educational Resource for Learning and Online Teaching (www.merlot.org) * Rankings: France #1 Overall, China #2 Overall and #1 in Entertainment, Netherlands, Belgium and Luxembourg #1 in Entertainment * Top10 Entertainment in 12 countries

About

Animation Desk® Ultimate

Create frame-by-frame animations from scratch or over existing media. This app offers a robust set of drawing tools, layer support, and various export options for your animated projects. It's designed for both beginners and experienced animators.

Highlights
  • Frame-by-frame animation creation
  • Import Photoshop layers (PSD)
  • Animate over videos and images
  • Advanced drawing tools and brushes
  • Onion skinning with color-coding
  • Multiple export formats (video, GIF, PDF, PSD)
  • Add music to animations
Features
Read full description

Dream big with Animation Desk. Draw frame-to-frame animation from scratch, or create animations upon videos, images, Photoshop layers. Animation Desk supports multiple export formats. Create animation on your iPad and iPhone with Animation Desk. AWARDS - Featured in Top100 iPad Entertainment apps in 86 App Stores - Featured by Apple on iTunes Home Page - Featured by Yahoo Tech - Featured by TechCrunch - Recommended by EdTech Impact, Edshelf, EducationalAppStore.com, All about apps in YOUR classroom, iPad Educators CREATE ANIMATION • Import Photoshop layers (PSD) • Make animation over videos and pictures • Create animations with a different aspect ratio, FPS, and duration DRAWING TOOLS • Brushes and Erasers • Custom Brush • Onion skin • Color-coded onion skinning • Selection tools • Layers • Color palettes for developing and managing color schemes • Caption* • Perfect with Apple Pencil 1,2, Wacom and Adonit styli HELPFUL TOOLS • Frame tags • Ruler tools • Frame viewer and timeline • Zoom-in and zoom-out • Canvas rotation EXPORT • Export individual frame into image • Export videos • Export PSD layers, PDF, and GIF (up to 640x480 px), PDF* • Export video with different aspect of ratio • Add music to the animations • Combine multiple animation sequences into an animatic storyboard CAN WE GIVE A HAND? Got a question? Contact us at helpdesk@kdanmobile.com or check out http://support.kdanmobile.com Term of Use: https://www.kdanmobile.com/en/terms_of_service Privacy Policies: https://www.kdanmobile.com/en/privacy_policy

Screenshots

Animation Desk® Ultimate4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is review sentiment: Drawing Box at 94% against Animation Desk® Ultimate's 39%. Drawing Box also leads on rating (4.6 vs 4.0) and in-app purchases (none vs 10). Animation Desk® Ultimate's advantage is ratings volume (299 vs 30) and update cadence (monthly vs every 3 months). On ads and iOS requirement 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

Drawing Box costs $2.99 and Animation Desk® Ultimate $9.99 up front. Animation Desk® Ultimate sells 10 in-app purchases, starting at $2.99 per month. Drawing Box asks for nothing beyond the download.

ReceptionRating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings

Drawing Box holds the better App Store score, 4.6 against 4.0. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: Animation Desk® Ultimate has 299 ratings behind it against 30, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews point the same way: 94% of Drawing Box's written reviews are positive against 39% of Animation Desk® Ultimate's.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

Drawing Box ships an update every 3 months, Animation Desk® Ultimate monthly. The most recent releases landed on August 14, 2026 and September 24, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard8 real differences · 2 level
Drawing Box versus Animation Desk® Ultimate: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterDrawing BoxAnimation Desk® Ultimate
Price$2.99 — better$9.99
Rating4.6 (30 ratings) — better4.0 (299 ratings)
Positive reviews93.7% of reviews — better39.4% of reviews
Number of ratings30299 — better
Update frequencyEvery 3 monthsMonthly — better
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesNo — betterYes
MonetizationFree — betterFree with in-app purchases
DevicesiPadiPhone, iPad, iPod — better
Requires iOS9.0 — better10.0
Further details — not scored
Size122 MB374 MB
Age rating4+4+
DeveloperEtienne Nguyen Tan HonKdan Mobile Software LTD

Customer experience

Drawing Box

All ratings30 ratings
Positive90.0%
Neutral3.3%
Negative6.7%
Written reviews254 reviews
Positive93.7%
Neutral3.9%
Negative2.4%

Animation Desk® Ultimate

All ratings299 ratings
Positive74.2%
Neutral9.0%
Negative16.7%
Written reviews160 reviews
Positive39.4%
Neutral16.9%
Negative43.8%

User reviews

Drawing Box

From 30 App Store ratings

What we love

  • 👍 Easy to use
  • 🎨 Lots of tools and features
  • 💡 Great for all skill levels
  • 🎨 Versatile drawing capabilities
  • 🎨 Impressive color palette

Room to improve

  • 🐛 Occasional crashes and bugs
  • 🔍 Navigation and UI can be confusing
  • 🔍 Lack of clear instructions
  • 🔍 Missing some advanced features
  • 🐛 Undo/redo functionality issues

Animation Desk® Ultimate

From 299 App Store ratings

What we love

  • 👍 Good for beginners/amateurs
  • 🎨 Decent set of brushes and tools
  • 💯 Excellent for frame-by-frame animation
  • 🎥 Useful for creating storyboards and rough animations

Room to improve

  • 🐛 Frequent crashes and bugs
  • 🔍 Laggy and unresponsive at times
  • 🎨 Drawing tools lack precision and smoothness
  • 🔀 Issues with layer management and frame duplication
  • 💰 Expensive for the current feature set

Bugs and requests

Drawing Box

Reported bugs

3 issues
  • Crashes when using undo/redo
  • Disappearing drawings after updates
  • Inconsistent performance on older devices

Requested features

5 requests
  • Add layers feature
  • Improve sharing and export options
  • Implement a color picker tool
  • Provide more customization options
  • Add an eraser that is always accessible

Animation Desk® Ultimate

Reported bugs

4 issues
  • Frames randomly disappearing or getting corrupted
  • Layers merging unexpectedly or not behaving as expected
  • Crashes when trying to import certain media files
  • Onion skin and playback issues causing problems

Requested features

5 requests
  • Add more brush customization options
  • Improve the timeline and layer management tools
  • Implement a better undo/redo system
  • Allow importing and syncing of audio for lip-syncing
  • Provide more export options beyond just video

In-app purchases

None

Drawing Box

No in-app purchases

10 purchases

Animation Desk® Ultimate

Subscriptions5
  • Kdan Cloud$2.991 Month
  • All Access Pack-1 Month3 Days trial$9.991 Month
  • Kdan Cloud$9.991 Year
Show 2 more
  • All Access Pack-3 Months3 Days trial$19.993 Months
  • All Access Pack - 1 Year7 Days trial$59.991 Year
One-time5
  • 10 Kdan Credits$0.99
  • 100 Kdan Credits$7.99
  • 200 Kdan Credits$15.99
Show 2 more
  • 500 Kdan Credits$37.99
  • 1000 Kdan Credits$59.99

Questions

Is Drawing Box free?
Drawing Box costs $2.99, with no in-app purchases.
Is Animation Desk® Ultimate free?
Animation Desk® Ultimate costs $9.99, and also offers in-app purchases.
Which has better reviews, Drawing Box or Animation Desk® Ultimate?
Drawing Box is rated higher. Drawing Box averages 4.6 out of 5 from 30 ratings, while Animation Desk® Ultimate averages 4.0 from 299 ratings.
Do Drawing Box or Animation Desk® Ultimate have ads?
Neither Drawing Box nor Animation Desk® Ultimate shows ads.
Which is updated more often, Drawing Box or Animation Desk® Ultimate?
Drawing Box ships an update every 3 months, and Animation Desk® Ultimate monthly. Most recently, Drawing Box was updated on August 14, 2026 and Animation Desk® Ultimate on September 24, 2026.

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