Comparison

Bagpipes Pro vs Oriental Strings

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

Head to head
About

Bagpipes Pro

Experience five realistic bagpipe simulations on your iPad. Learn authentic Scottish piping fingerings and explore various traditional and folk instruments from Scotland, Ireland, and Sweden. Adjust transposition and tuning for a personalized musical experience.

Highlights
  • Five realistic bagpipe simulations
  • Authentic Scottish piping fingerings
  • Adjustable transposition and tuning
  • Scottish, Irish, and Swedish instrument sets
  • iPad optimized interface
Read full description

Bagpipes Pro is five extremely realistic sounding sets of bagpipes for the iPad that are played using standard Scottish piping fingerings. The instrument may be transposed up to +/- one octave in semitone increments as well as tuned up to +/- 50 cents. It includes five authentic sounding sets of Scottish, Irish, and Swedish bagpipes. The five sets of bagpipes are: Great Highland Scottish Bagpipes - The most popular Scottish marching pipes, in the traditional key of Bb. Scottish Border Pipes - A Scottish smallpipe in the key of A with a sound distinctly different from but similar to the Highland pipes. Scottish Smallpipes - A Scottish smallpipe in the key of A, one octave lower than the Border Pipes, and has a rounder, bubbly sound. Irish Uillean Pipes - Bellows blown pipes in the key of D Swedish Säckpipa - A set of Swedish bagpipes in E, with a very haunting sound. All of the instruments use fingerings based on the standard Scottish Highland bagpipes chanter. IMPORTANT: Since this app requires as many as 8 fingers on the screen at the same time, before playing, disable "Multitasking Gestures" on your iPad (in the Settings app, under the General section, turn the Multitasking Gestures switch to the off position). Start/stop the drones playing by touching the drone puck. Select standard or alternate drone note from the controls. Use the Transpose slider to set the overall instrument transposition in semitones. Touch the transpose value to the left of the slider to reset the transposition to zero. Use the Tuning slider to set the overall instrument tuning offset in cents. Touch the tuning value to the left of the slider to reset the tuning offset to zero. To play the chanter, touch the bar at the top left with your left thumb. This bar is the hole normally on the back of a real chanter and must be covered for the lower notes to play. Next, touch the top three holes of the chanter starting with the tips of your left index, middle, and ring fingers. Finally, touch the bottom four holes of the chanter with the tips of your right index, middle, ring, and little fingers. Touch the "i" to show/hide the live performance controls. Touch the "?" for on-screen help. Audio samples for the Säckpipa provided by Jonathan Parker from an instrument made in 1986 by Leif Eriksson. Drone puck image courtesy of Mike DeSmidt.

About

Oriental Strings

This professional sound module app provides authentic oriental and Arabian string instrument sounds for musicians. It offers high-quality stereo samples, master tune, scale tuning, and integrated effects. Connect via Bluetooth MIDI or use it as a virtual instrument within your favorite DAW.

Highlights
  • Authentic oriental and Arabian string sounds
  • High-quality stereo samples
  • Master Tune & Scale Tuning
  • Integrated effects with 18 presets
  • MIDI velocity response curve editor
  • Audio Unit, Audiobus, and Inter-App Audio support
  • MIDI Player/Recorder
Read full description

Oriental Strings is a professional sound module app for oriental keyboard players and for musicians who simply want to resemble the typical sound of the Orient and Middle East in their songs. Connect an external MIDI keyboard to your iPad, iPhone or iPod touch by using Bluetooth MIDI or by using the Apple USB camera adapter or another adapter supported by Apple, or launch Oriental Strings as virtual instrument directly within your favourite DAW app on your iOS device!¹ Watch and listen to the demo video on our product website! This app supports "Audio Unit", "Audiobus" and Apple's "Inter-App Audio" System for audio & MIDI connections from/to other audio apps, as well as Bluetooth LE MIDI ! The sounds of Oriental Strings were exclusively recorded with players who are professionally dedicated to oriental style of music. Typical string instrument sounds for the Arabian genre are covered by this app. Besides rather exotic instruments like the Chinese erhu, typical western string instruments were used as well, but since the players of the recording sessions are focused on oriental music, those western instruments sound completely different than you might be used to from western orchestra players. The sounds of this app were once again created by Kurt Ader, winner of the NAMM 2015 "Best Sound Designer of the Year" award. 32 Sounds are included with this App: • Chinese Erhu 1 - 3 • Chinese Erhu Trill • Turkish Strings 1 - 4 • Arabian Strings 1 - 3 • Tremolo Strings 1 - 5 • Spiccato Strings • Oriental Spiccato Strings • Oriental String Quartet 1 - 3 • Oriental Staccato Strings • Arabian Solo Strings 1 - 3 • String Quartet • Oriental String Ensemble 1 - 5 • Slow Oriental Strings There is no in-app purchase in this app. So all sounds and all app features are immediately available to you as one buy. General Features: • Sounds based on high quality stereo sample set. • Master Tune & Scale Tuning (including factory presets for common Arabian & Turkish scales). • Low latency disk streaming. • Configurable audio latency down to 1 ms. • Polyphony up to several hundred stereo voices.² • Integrated effects with 18 presets. • 16 parts. • App States: Save app's entire state as user presets. • MIDI velocity response curve editor to fine tune the feeling of your MIDI keyboard. • App can keep running in the background, so you can play on your keyboard while e.g. using Safari or another app to display scores or surfing the Internet. • Audio Unit plugin version of this app, to be used as virtual instrument directly within third-party multi-track DAW apps. • Audiobus support. • Supports Apple's "IAA" system for audio & MIDI streaming between other apps. • Virtual on-screen piano keyboard with velocity support, scalable & scrollable. MIDI Player / Recorder: • Record, save and load your songs in standard MIDI file format. • Share your songs easily as audio file. • Unlimited amount of tracks. • Configurable target MIDI channel per track. • Unlimited recording and playback length. • Open MIDI (.mid) files directly from other apps (i.e. from Safari, Mail). • Download or upload MIDI files with iTunes. • Load your favorite songs as MIDI files from the Internet, and watch at the virtual keyboard how to play it. • Metronome. • Use the "Tempo Zoom" dial knob to i.e. slow down playback at any time and learn your favorite songs more easily. ¹ For more information about adapters and connecting external MIDI keyboards: https://doc.crudebyte.com/iOS/External_MIDI_devices/ ² Some sounds are using several voices per note. Polyphony depends on the exact device model being used. You find a polyphony table on our product website.

Screenshots

Oriental Strings4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is rating: Bagpipes Pro at 4.8 against Oriental Strings's 4.2. Bagpipes Pro also leads on price ($2.99 vs $7.99). Oriental Strings's advantage is review sentiment (69% vs 46%) and device support (3 vs 1). 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

Bagpipes Pro costs $2.99 and Oriental Strings $7.99 up front. Neither carries in-app purchases, so what you see is what you pay.

ReceptionRating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings

Bagpipes Pro holds the better App Store score, 4.8 against 4.2. Both are backed by a comparable volume of ratings — 4 and 11 respectively. Written reviews complicate that: 46% of Bagpipes Pro's written reviews are positive against 69% of Oriental Strings's, so the app with the better star average is not the one people write more warmly about.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

Bagpipes Pro ships an update every 5 months, Oriental Strings every 2 months. The most recent releases landed on October 24, 2026 and October 20, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard5 real differences · 5 level
Bagpipes Pro versus Oriental Strings: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterBagpipes ProOriental Strings
Price$2.99 — better$7.99
Rating4.8 (4 ratings) — better4.2 (11 ratings)
Positive reviews46.2% of reviews69.0% of reviews — better
Number of ratings411 — better
Update frequencyEvery 5 monthsEvery 2 months — better
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesNoNo
MonetizationPaidPaid
DevicesiPadiPhone, iPad, iPod — better
Requires iOS16.012.0 — better
Further details — not scored
Size102 MB1.9 GB
Age rating4+4+
DeveloperMichael EskinChristian Schoenebeck d/b/a Crudebyte

Customer experience

Bagpipes Pro

All ratings4 ratings
Positive100.0%
Neutral0.0%
Negative0.0%
Written reviews13 reviews
Positive46.2%
Neutral7.7%
Negative46.2%

Oriental Strings

All ratings11 ratings
Positive81.8%
Neutral0.0%
Negative18.2%
Written reviews29 reviews
Positive69.0%
Neutral3.4%
Negative27.6%

In-app purchases

None

Bagpipes Pro

No in-app purchases

None

Oriental Strings

No in-app purchases

Questions

Is Bagpipes Pro free?
Bagpipes Pro costs $2.99, with no in-app purchases.
Is Oriental Strings free?
Oriental Strings costs $7.99, with no in-app purchases.
Which has better reviews, Bagpipes Pro or Oriental Strings?
Bagpipes Pro is rated higher. Bagpipes Pro averages 4.8 out of 5 from 4 ratings, while Oriental Strings averages 4.2 from 11 ratings.
Do Bagpipes Pro or Oriental Strings have ads?
Neither Bagpipes Pro nor Oriental Strings shows ads.
Which is updated more often, Bagpipes Pro or Oriental Strings?
Bagpipes Pro ships an update every 5 months, and Oriental Strings every 2 months. Most recently, Bagpipes Pro was updated on October 24, 2026 and Oriental Strings on October 20, 2026.

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