Air Pipes vs Ultimate Piper
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
Air Pipes
Experience the authentic sound of bagpipes on your iPhone. Learn to play classic tunes by blowing into your device's microphone or using the hold button. Compete with others and customize your sound with various effects and instruments.
- Authentic Scottish bagpipe sound
- Microphone input for blowing
- Learn classic bagpipe tunes
- Timing and accuracy scoring
- Game Center competition
- Customizable instrument packs
- Adjustable drone and chanter volume
Read full descriptionHide full description
Play the bagpipes on your iPhone! FUN and EASY for anyone to play. “... the bagpipes app that certainly stirs the soul” — NZ Herald Blow into the microphone to start piping like a true highlander. LEARN TO PLAY the bagpipe classics: • Amazing Grace • Auld Lang Syne • Scotland the Brave • Flower of Scotland • Highland Cathedral • The Rowan Tree • Yankee Doodle • God Save The Queen ... and more! FEATURES • Authentic Scottish sound sampled from real Great Highland Bagpipes. • Blow into the microphone to top up the air, or tap the "hold" button to keep level constant. • Step-up your skills with timing and accuracy scores. • Test your talent by competing with others on Game Center. • Scottish Small Pipes and Uilleann pipes instrument packs. • Customise the look of your Air Pipes. • Enjoy lush reverb effects for a big, full sound. • Adjust the volume of the drone and chanter. • AutoBlow function if you're feeling out of breath :) Keep an eye out for future updates - more tunes and features to come!
Ultimate Piper
This music app helps bagpipers of all levels improve their playing. It features score scanning, practice tools with performance feedback, and composition capabilities. It also includes a tuner, metronome, and audio playback for practice and sharing.
- Scan bagpipe scores from photos or PDFs
- Progress tracking with missed bar highlighting
- Play along with scrolling score and note lighting
- Practice loop with auto tempo adjustment
- Compose and edit bagpipe music with embellishments
- Realistic audio playback and recording
- Integrated tuner and metronome
Read full descriptionHide full description
Ultimate Piper is the complete music app for bagpipers – whether you're learning on a practice chanter or performing with a full pipe band. SCAN ANY SCORE Point your camera at a printed bagpipe score – or import a PDF or photo – and Ultimate Piper reads it into a playable tune, all on-device: in seconds for a typical tune, a little longer for a long or busy one. Several pages scan in one go, and braced harmony comes in as harmony parts. SEE THE BARS YOU MISS MOST Progress shades every bar of a tune by how your last five runs went, from green for the bars you play solidly to red for the ones you miss. Most Missed Bars lists them; tap one to select it for the Practice Loop. Say yes to recording your runs and you can listen back to any of them. PLAY ALONG Follow Along hears your playing through the microphone or a MIDI chanter and scrolls the score, lighting each note as you play it. Runs on the pipes are scored like runs on the chanter, gracenotes included, against your chanter's tuning on the day. Connect a Blair Digital Chanter or Fagerström Technopipes for precise detection. Turn your iPhone sideways and the score fills the screen. PRACTICE Mark the tunes you're working on as Focus and they join every session, longest-neglected first, with a Tune of the Week and warm-ups from tunes you know. A calendar and streak show your practice; log band practice too. Rate every tune from Want to Learn to Mastered. Loop any bars and let Auto + raise the tempo each time round. COMPOSE & EDIT Complete scores for light music and piobaireachd, with reactive grace notes and an embellishment wheel – doublings, grips, taorluaths and more. Mixed-value triplets play as written. Select notes to raise, lower, lengthen or copy them into another tune. Add rests, 1st/2nd time bars, harmonies, notes on the score, and tempo changes that speed up or slow down across a run of bars. LISTEN & SHARE AUDIO Hear any tune on realistic chanter or pipes – or record your own instrument and hear every tune on it – with each idiom's own timing, from strathspey snap to piobaireachd's held close. Render a tune or set, with harmonies and drones, to an audio file to send to a pupil or bandmate. TUNE UP The tuner hears bass, tenors and chanter at once, with a beat meter for the tenors and drones tuned to your chanter, not a number, on Apple Watch too. A guided tune-up takes the tenors one at a time. Four tuning schemes. Blowing mode scores your bag's steadiness out of 100. METRONOME Pipe band side, bass and tenor drums, tuned to your Low A, with accents, subdivisions and tap tempo. Also on Apple Watch, with haptic taps. JUST ASK SIRI "Tune my pipes in Ultimate Piper." "Start the metronome at 84 in Ultimate Piper." "Play Scotland the Brave in Ultimate Piper." Your library is in Spotlight, and every command is a Shortcut. HISTORY, SHARING & LIBRARY Every save is kept as a version, with colour-coded diffs; compare two tunes note by note and merge them. Export to PDF, send .pipescore to the PipeScore web editor, or share folders that keep your band on the latest music, choosing who can edit. Import BWW and PipeScore files into nested folders, and search by title, composer, genre or time signature. FOR EVERY PIPER VoiceOver reaches every note in the editor and tells you where playback is. Resize the score without a pinch. Works on iPhone, iPad, Mac and Apple Watch. Ready for iPhone Duo. SUBSCRIPTION INFORMATION Ultimate Piper Premium is a monthly or yearly auto-renewable subscription with a 7-day free trial, and Family Sharing lets up to five family members use it. After the trial, payment is charged to your Apple ID account and recurs each billing period; it renews automatically unless cancelled at least 24 hours before the period ends. Manage or cancel subscriptions in your Account Settings. Privacy Policy: https://ultimatepiper.com/privacy.html Terms of Use (EULA): https://www.apple.com/legal/internet-services/itunes/dev/stdeula/
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is rating: Air Pipes at 4.9 against Ultimate Piper's 4.0. Air Pipes also leads on ratings volume (14 vs 1) and iOS requirement (18.0 vs 26.0). Ultimate Piper's advantage is update cadence (every 10 days vs every 2 months) and device support (4 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. Air Pipes sells 8 one-off in-app purchases and Ultimate Piper sells 2 in-app purchases, starting at $5.99 per month. Whichever you choose, the download price is not the number that matters.
Air Pipes holds the better App Store score, 4.9 against 4.0. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: Air Pipes has 14 ratings behind it against 1, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews complicate that: 93% of Air Pipes's written reviews are positive against 100% of Ultimate Piper's, so the app with the better star average is not the one people write more warmly about.
Air Pipes ships an update every 2 months, Ultimate Piper every 10 days. The most recent releases landed on November 1, 2026 and November 9, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | Air Pipes | Ultimate Piper |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free |
| Rating | 4.9 (14 ratings) — better | 4.0 (1 ratings) |
| Positive reviews | 93.0% of reviews | 100.0% of reviews — better |
| Number of ratings | 14 — better | 1 |
| Update frequency | Every 2 months | Every 10 days — better |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | Yes | Yes |
| Monetization | Free with in-app purchases | Freemium |
| Devices | iPhone | iPhone, iPad, Mac, Apple Watch — better |
| Requires iOS | 18.0 — better | 26.0 |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 65 MB | 217 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 4+ |
| Developer | Tim Ross | Mixolydian Limited |
Customer experience
Air Pipes
Ultimate Piper
Bugs and requests
Air Pipes
Reported bugs
2 issues- Crashes or sound cutouts on some devices
- Issues with autoblow/microphone functionality
Requested features
4 requests- More song options and ability to add custom tunes
- Ability to change key or pitch
- Improved finger positioning guidance
- Integration with real-world bagpipe learning
Ultimate Piper
Not enough reviews yet to summarise bugs or requests.
In-app purchases
Air Pipes
- Flower of Scotland$0.99
- Highland Cathedral$0.99
- The Dark Island$0.99
Show 5 moreShow fewer
- Braveheart (Love Theme)$0.99
- Last of the Mohicans$0.99
- Star Wars Theme$0.99
- Mull of Kintyre$0.99
- Unlock All Tunes$4.99
Ultimate Piper
- Ultimate Piper Premium Monthly7 Days trial$5.991 Month
- Ultimate Piper Premium Yearly7 Days trial$49.991 Year
Questions
Is Air Pipes free?
Is Ultimate Piper free?
Which has better reviews, Air Pipes or Ultimate Piper?
Do Air Pipes or Ultimate Piper have ads?
Which is updated more often, Air Pipes or Ultimate Piper?
Other comparisons















