Comparison

Tortuba vs Subsurface

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

Head to head
About

Tortuba

Log your underwater adventures and identify marine species with this playful and simple app. It offers an offline species database, allows you to record dive details, and helps you share your experiences to raise ocean awareness.

Highlights
  • Offline species database
  • Log dive parameters
  • Identify marine species
  • Add dive photos
  • Share dive stories
  • Team member signatures
Features
Read full description

Tortuba is a logbook you will love to fill, with its playful and simple design. More than a logbook, it helps you identify marine species and tell your stories of underwater encounters, whether you were snorkeling or scuba diving. You can even keep your paper logbook along with this one if you don’t feel like replacing it just yet and use it for the offline species database. We want you to keep beautiful memories of those fascinating marine species, have fun collecting them, and be proud to share them. Why? Because that’s the best way to inspire people, bring the Ocean to them, and raise awareness about the marine species you so dearly care about. You can make a difference with your dives. We’ll help you. Don’t just keep your dive number growing; keep the number of people you inspired growing too. FEATURES - Simple and playful design - Works offline - Lots of parameters: duration, depth, air, site, buddies, conditions, and much more - Ask teammates/instructors to sign your logbook and take a picture of their stamp - Identification of 10 000 species per type/body shape, scientific or common name - photos that you can use to illustrate your logbook and always remember the species you encountered - Writing coach - let the toothy William Shakespeare help you remember and put together your memories - Always remember the fish you saw and where you saw it - you can even give them nicknames if you got really familiar (well, we often do… are we crazy?) - Add teammates (or anyone really) to your dive - even if it’s just a nickname DID YOU EVER… - meet the writer’s block, or entirely give up writing your logbook? - forget what the fish you enjoyed so much was called, or even looked like? - want to take a short break at work and immerse yourself in your last souvenirs? - come back with 10.000 photos & videos without knowing what to do with them? - wish you didn’t have to carry 10kg of books to identify fishes? - want to know where to spot a given fish? If you answered yes to any of these questions, you should give Tortuba a try :)

About

Subsurface

This application allows divers to manage their dive logs on their mobile devices. It supports editing dive data and downloading new information from compatible dive computers. Optional cloud synchronization is available for seamless data transfer with desktop versions.

Highlights
  • Mobile dive log management
  • Edit dive data
  • Download from Bluetooth LE dive computers
  • Optional cloud synchronization
  • Open-source and free
Read full description

Subsurface-mobile is an iOS dive log application based on Subsurface, the best free open source dive log application available on Windows, Mac and Linux. Subsurface-mobile allows you to access your dive log on your tablet or phone, edit the data and even download new dive information from many Bluetooth LE enabled dive computers. Using a free Subsurface Cloud Storage account you can synchronize your dive data with the Subsurface desktop application (while significantly increasing the usefulness, the cloud account is not required to use Subsurface-mobile). To get support from the developers, please use the in-app menu entry "Ask for support" Please check out the Subsurface-mobile user manual: https://subsurface-divelog.org/documentation/subsurface-mobile-v3-user-manual (also available from within the app) Subsurface-mobile is free and open source. No ads, no commercial anything. And it comes with free cloud storage (if you decide to use that - it's optional). Your data aren't used for anything, nothing gets monetized.

Screenshots

Tortuba4 screens
Subsurface4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is review sentiment: Tortuba at 100% against Subsurface's 63%. Tortuba also leads on rating (5.0 vs 4.5) and iOS requirement (14.0 vs 17). Subsurface's advantage is in-app purchases (none vs 10) and ratings volume (48 vs 1). On price, update cadence, ads and device support 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. Tortuba sells 10 one-off in-app purchases. Subsurface asks for nothing beyond the download.

ReceptionRating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings

Tortuba holds the better App Store score, 5.0 against 4.5. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: Subsurface has 48 ratings behind it against 1, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews point the same way: 100% of Tortuba's written reviews are positive against 63% of Subsurface's.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

Both ship on a similar rhythm, roughly every 2 months. The most recent releases landed on September 26, 2026 and September 27, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard6 real differences · 4 level
Tortuba versus Subsurface: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterTortubaSubsurface
PriceFreeFree
Rating5.0 (1 ratings) — better4.5 (48 ratings)
Positive reviews100.0% of reviews — better63.3% of reviews
Number of ratings148 — better
Update frequencyEvery 2 monthsEvery 2 months
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesYesNo — better
MonetizationFree with in-app purchasesFree — better
DevicesiPhone, iPad, iPod — betteriPhone, iPad
Requires iOS14.0 — better17
Further details — not scored
Size93 MB52 MB
Age rating4+4+
DeveloperGoodwhaleDirk Hohndel

Customer experience

Tortuba

All ratings1 ratings
Positive100.0%
Neutral0.0%
Negative0.0%
Written reviews4 reviews
Positive100.0%
Neutral0.0%
Negative0.0%

Subsurface

All ratings48 ratings
Positive89.6%
Neutral2.1%
Negative8.3%
Written reviews30 reviews
Positive63.3%
Neutral6.7%
Negative30.0%

In-app purchases

10 purchases

Tortuba

One-time10
  • Bunaken$9.99
  • Roatan-Bays island$9.99
  • Komodo Creatures$9.99
Show 7 more
  • Lembeh Strait$9.99
  • Komodo with Siren Fleet$9.99
  • Galapagos with Master Liveaboards$9.99
  • Fiji with Siren Fleet$9.99
  • Raja Ampat with Siren Fleet$9.99
  • Basking Shark Scotland$9.99
  • Bunaken with Siladen$9.99
None

Subsurface

No in-app purchases

Questions

Is Tortuba free?
Tortuba is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Is Subsurface free?
Subsurface is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Which has better reviews, Tortuba or Subsurface?
Tortuba is rated higher. Tortuba averages 5.0 out of 5 from 1 ratings, while Subsurface averages 4.5 from 48 ratings.
Do Tortuba or Subsurface have ads?
Neither Tortuba nor Subsurface shows ads.
Which is updated more often, Tortuba or Subsurface?
Tortuba ships an update every 2 months, and Subsurface every 2 months. Most recently, Tortuba was updated on September 26, 2026 and Subsurface on September 27, 2026.

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