Comparison

iWriteMusic Pro SE vs capella score reader

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

Head to head
About

iWriteMusic Pro SE

Create beautiful, professional-quality sheet music with an intuitive interface. This app offers efficient input systems, comprehensive notation tools, and useful playback options for musicians of all levels.

Highlights
  • Intuitive user interface
  • Efficient input systems (One-Flick & Traditional)
  • Professional quality sheet music
  • Comprehensive notation elements
  • Useful playback options
  • Export to PDF, JPG, and MIDI
Features
Read full description

Music Writing is easy and fun when you use iWriteMusic! Experience the perfect harmony of ease and versatility in sheet music creation with iWriteMusic! Say goodbye to complicated notation apps and hello to intuitive design. Enjoy quick and beautiful sheet music creation with a comprehensive suite of essential tools for concerts, lessons, and music classes. Best fit for professional musicians, music teachers and students. For songwriters, composers and arrangers. For both singers and instrumentalists (piano, violin, cello, guitar, flute, saxophone, trumpet, drums, etc.). Great for writing down ideas, creating lesson materials, creating lead sheets, or creating scores and parts for chorus groups, choirs, chamber orchestras, jazz bands, Latin bands, orchestras, and more. For daily practice, rehearsals, concerts, iWriteMusic will help you enrich your musical life! Check out 8 reasons to choose iWriteMusic SE (Special Edition) 1. You can understand this app almost instantly! Because of Truly Intuitive and Extremely Simple user interface, you barely need to read pages of manuals nor watching numbers of instruction videos. Unlike Finale, Sibelius and other similar apps, you just have a few things to learn to be able to use this app pretty well. 2.Double your productivity with our Highly Efficient Input System. If you’re already familiar with notation apps and looking for faster & more efficient entry system, try our innovative One-Flick Entry System along with Traditional Entry System to get your job done in no time! What is Traditional Entry System? - The choices will appear with ToolBox. - Select a value and the location separately. - Recommended to those who are not yet familiar with any music notation apps. What is OneFlick Entry System? - The choices will appear when you touch the screen. - Select a location and the value at once. - The selection will change as you slide your finger to left/right. - Recommended to those who are familiar with music notation apps and looking for faster and more efficient entry system. 3. Creates beautiful sheet music / music score - absolutely professional quality! - rich options for page layout adjustment - easy parts creation - easy score/parts management - direct print-out via AirPrint 4. Supports most of major notation elements - multi-track writing - multi-voice writing - percussion/drums notation - chord symbols and lyrics - multi-bar rest - time change - key change - clef change - tempo change - grace note - articulations and dynamics marks - easy song transpose - partial transpose and many more! 5. Useful playback options for practice - mixer with solo, mute and voice select - loop and swing options 6. Data & sheet music sharing - exports/Imports iWriteMusic data file - exports PDF or JPG - exports Standard MIDI file which can be imported by other apps such as GarageBand 7. Extremely Compact Size (15 MB) You can save your device storage space for photos and other apps. 8. Best of all, it's Free! Yes, it's Free and Over 1.4 Million people all over the world has created music with this app family. Let's get started now! Note: This is for iPhone (iPad version sold separately) ATTENTION:  Latency during playback and drawing may occur by device capacity or number of tracks and background applications. Limitations on SE (Special Edition): 1. Water mark appears on page views and printouts. 2. Can’t save more than 5 songs. 3. Can't play more than 30 seconds at a time. 4. Can't import iWriteMusic data file. (export only) 5. Can't export Standard MIDI file.

About

capella score reader

This app allows musicians to read, listen to, and practice music scores on their mobile devices. It offers features like solo voice playback, voice muting, and tempo control for efficient practice and study.

Highlights
  • Read and listen to music scores
  • Practice individual parts
  • Mute specific voices
  • Extract single voices
  • Two-finger zoom for scores
  • One-finger page turning
  • Adjustable tempo control
Features
Read full description

capella score reader Read and listen to music scores anywhere at any time Open your scores and read, listen, practice, study, perform when and where you like. Practice your part for choir or orchestra. As choir director or conductor study scores. Use capella score reader as digital music stand. capella score reader is the most recent offshoot of the capella family. With many practicing musicians, capella is known to be THE notation software which has been around for more than 25 years. capella is available for Windows and for Mac. Several additional programs, for example for scanning sheet music, complement the capella family – and now it’s capella score reader. Solo - tutti Select the Solo button to listen to one single voice. Solo on/off – this can be done during playback at any position in the piece. This way you learn your part efficiently. Voice filter When you’re almost there: Mute one or several voices to sing or play along yourself. Voice extraction Select a voice extraction for one or several voices – all others are hidden. Two-finger zoom With two-finger scroll zoom single spots or get an overview of the entire page. Page turning with one finger Slide across the screen as if you would turn pages – the notes will follow. Change tempo Control the tempo according to your needs for rehearsal: Slower at the beginning, next time faster. Navigation Open your own files. The last used files will be displayed. Exchange of scores Receive scores from other musicians, for example via WhatsApp or eMail. Share your scores with other musicians as capella file or PDF. capella score reader reads these score formats: - capXML (capella format) - cap (older capella format) - MusicXML - MIDI Video introduction A short video introduction shows the most important features. It’s really simple! We are looking forward to your feedback. Please use the feedback button in the help menu for questions about the app or error reports.

Screenshots

capella score reader4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is review sentiment: iWriteMusic Pro SE at 53% against capella score reader's 0%. iWriteMusic Pro SE also leads on rating (4.5 vs 2.2) and update cadence (every 5 weeks vs every 18 months). capella score reader's advantage is device support (3 vs 1) and iOS requirement (11.0 vs 16.0). 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

CostPrice · In-app purchases · Ads · Monetization

Both are free to download. Neither carries in-app purchases, so what you see is what you pay.

ReceptionRating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings

iWriteMusic Pro SE holds the better App Store score, 4.5 against 2.2. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: iWriteMusic Pro SE has 207 ratings behind it against 5, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews point the same way: 53% of iWriteMusic Pro SE's written reviews are positive against 0% of capella score reader's.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

iWriteMusic Pro SE ships an update every 5 weeks, capella score reader every 18 months. The most recent releases landed on October 19, 2026 and October 17, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard6 real differences · 4 level
iWriteMusic Pro SE versus capella score reader: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameteriWriteMusic Pro SEcapella score reader
PriceFreeFree
Rating4.5 (207 ratings) — better2.2 (5 ratings)
Positive reviews53.2% of reviews — better0.0% of reviews
Number of ratings207 — better5
Update frequencyEvery 5 weeks — betterEvery 18 months
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesNoNo
MonetizationFreeFree
DevicesiPadiPhone, iPad, iPod — better
Requires iOS16.011.0 — better
Further details — not scored
Size19 MB59 MB
Age rating4+4+
DeveloperiWriteMusicProjectcapella-software AG

Customer experience

iWriteMusic Pro SE

All ratings207 ratings
Positive89.4%
Neutral5.3%
Negative5.3%
Written reviews111 reviews
Positive53.2%
Neutral10.8%
Negative36.0%

capella score reader

All ratings5 ratings
Positive20.0%
Neutral20.0%
Negative60.0%
Written reviews3 reviews
Positive0.0%
Neutral66.7%
Negative33.3%

Bugs and requests

iWriteMusic Pro SE

Reported bugs

5 issues
  • Incorrect transposition of notes
  • Inability to save compositions
  • Overlapping/unreadable menu text
  • Freezing when trying to copy/paste
  • Inconsistent behavior when adding new measures

Requested features

5 requests
  • Add more music notation options (e.g. glissando, ghost notes)
  • Improve playback to follow dynamics and expressions
  • Allow multiple key signatures in the same piece
  • Provide an undo/redo function
  • Implement a chord entry mode for guitarists

capella score reader

Not enough reviews yet to summarise bugs or requests.

In-app purchases

None

iWriteMusic Pro SE

No in-app purchases

None

capella score reader

No in-app purchases

Questions

Is iWriteMusic Pro SE free?
iWriteMusic Pro SE is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Is capella score reader free?
capella score reader is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Which has better reviews, iWriteMusic Pro SE or capella score reader?
iWriteMusic Pro SE is rated higher. iWriteMusic Pro SE averages 4.5 out of 5 from 207 ratings, while capella score reader averages 2.2 from 5 ratings.
Do iWriteMusic Pro SE or capella score reader have ads?
Neither iWriteMusic Pro SE nor capella score reader shows ads.
Which is updated more often, iWriteMusic Pro SE or capella score reader?
iWriteMusic Pro SE ships an update every 5 weeks, and capella score reader every 18 months. Most recently, iWriteMusic Pro SE was updated on October 19, 2026 and capella score reader on October 17, 2026.

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