Comparison

Pop Dot Comics vs Aftercut

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

Head to head
About

Pop Dot Comics

Transform your photos into vintage comic book illustrations with bold outlines, vibrant colors, and classic halftone dots. Add speech bubbles and sound effects to create fun, newspaper-worthy art.

Highlights
  • Create comic book style illustrations
  • Apply thick outlines and bold colors
  • Add benday dots and halftone effects
  • Include speech bubbles and sound effects
  • Choose from 5 comic styles
  • Adjust outlines, color, and borders
  • Save and share creations
Features
Read full description

Create a comic worthy of the Sunday newspaper or your favorite pulp-fiction cover. Pop Dot Comic is a fun way to create comic-book style illustrations from your snapshot or ones taken of your friends and family. Pop Dot Comic applies thick outlines, bold colors, and plenty of benday dots to newsprint or pulp papers to give every creation the look of one that’s been printed or published. In the past, halftones were tediously inked in by cartoon artists or created in darkrooms. With Pop Dot Comic you can easily and quickly convert your photo into a comic book drawing that’s worthy enough for the Sunday newspaper or your favorite pulp-fiction cover. With a library of included “Fun Stuff”, custom messages can be added to speech bubbles and sound effects will give your creation “POW”. When your finished creating a comic book photo save it to your library or post them to your friends and family for funny moments. 

COMIC STYLES
 • Sunday Comics — Creates a Cartoon Photo 
 • Halftone — Transforms a photo into a Halftone Newspaper Photo
 • Pop Comics — Converts photos into a bright Pop Art Lichtenstein-style Cartoon
 • Pulp Comics — Renders a Cartoon with Vintage Color on Aged Pulp Paper
 • Noir Comics — Creates a contrasted toned or blk/white Comic with selective color like those used in the Sin City series Pop Dot Comics is a professional cartoon effect that can be done directly on your iPhone, iPad and Mac. •Convert all your images and pictures into cartoon-style effect quickly •Choose a preset for a quick start •Use large photos for a high-end result! •Crop your photo to remove unwanted parts of an image •Choose between 5 comic styles: Sunday Comics, Halftone, Noir Comics, Pop Comics, Pulp Comics •Make adjustments to outlines, color, border width, border inset and pulp papers •Choose between Dots, Lines and Halftones •Edit and resize “Fun Stuff” and “Bubbles” with an easy one-finger gesture •Share via Email, Facebook, Twitter and Tumblr •Save to Camera Roll Easy to Use •Tap to edit type in speech & thought bubbles •Long Press to delete fun stuff and bubbles •Pull edges of fun stuff and speech bubbles to resize •Touch and hold center to move FEATURES
 Benday Dots — like those used in the traditional printing process. Benday Dots are two (or more) different small, colored dots combined to create a third color. Back in the day, pulp comic books used Benday Dots in primary colors to inexpensively create the secondary colors such as flesh tone.

 Fully adjustable control on all aspects of the process: Dot or Line size, Outline size, Color variation, Border: Width, Inset, Color & Corner Radius. 

INCLUDES
 Newsprint and Pulp Papers

 UNIVERSAL FEATURES 
All JixiPix Apps come with: Superior Customer Service, Support for High-Resolution Images & Output, Undo/Redo, Randomize Button, Quick Presets and the ability to create Custom Presets, Cropping with the ability to specify aspect ratio, Quick Preview, Email, Print, and the ability to post directly to Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and Tumblr. We also have an online art gallery and invite our user’s to display their artistic creations on it: http://www.flickr.com/groups/jixipixcreations/

 ***************

 “JixiPix turns any photo into a masterpiece. All that is required of you is the appreciation — we’ll take care of the rest!” JixiPix.com “Creative Tools for Creative People" Photography | Artistic | Graphic Apps
 MAC • iPad • iPhone

About

Aftercut

Easily cut out objects from photos and composite them with new backgrounds. Apply a wide range of unique filters and effects to your images in seconds. Supports transparent PNGs for advanced editing.

Highlights
  • 7 cut out tools (manual & smart selection)
  • 40+ filters & 300+ predefined effects
  • 21 blend modes
  • 7 selection adjustment tools
  • Transparent PNG support
Features
Read full description

The easiest way to cut out and composite photos. With AfterCut, you can select objects, change background and add effects to your photos in SECONDS. 7 CUT OUT TOOLS Both manually selection tools and smart selection tools are included. Selecting and extracting objects can be easily done by several simple taps. 40+ FILTERS & 300+ PREDEFINED EFFECTS You can create Shadow, Highlight, Border, Popart, Cartoon, Blur, Glass, Pencil, Comic Book, Mosaic and more effects to your selected objects. Most of the effects are unique! 21 BLEND MODES 7 SELECTION ADJUSTMENT TOOLS Selection area can be feathered, extended, resized, adjusted and saved. TRANSPARENT PNG SUPPORT Importing and exporting transparent PNG images are fully supported. RESOLUTIONS iPhone 5 and above: 12 MP iPhone 4 and 4S: 4 MP

Screenshots

Pop Dot Comics4 screens
Aftercut4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is review sentiment: Aftercut at 92% against Pop Dot Comics's 78%. Aftercut also leads on update cadence (every 2 months vs every 4 months) and iOS requirement (9.0 vs 15.0). Pop Dot Comics's advantage is rating (4.9 vs 4.7). On price, ratings volume, 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

Pop Dot Comics costs $2.99 and Aftercut $2.99 up front. Neither carries in-app purchases, so what you see is what you pay.

ReceptionRating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings

Pop Dot Comics holds the better App Store score, 4.9 against 4.7. Both are backed by a comparable volume of ratings — 177 and 202 respectively. Written reviews complicate that: 78% of Pop Dot Comics's written reviews are positive against 92% of Aftercut's, so the app with the better star average is not the one people write more warmly about.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

Pop Dot Comics ships an update every 4 months, Aftercut every 2 months. The most recent releases landed on October 8, 2026 and June 26, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard4 real differences · 6 level
Pop Dot Comics versus Aftercut: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterPop Dot ComicsAftercut
Price$2.99$2.99
Rating4.9 (177 ratings) — better4.7 (202 ratings)
Positive reviews77.7% of reviews91.9% of reviews — better
Number of ratings177202 — better
Update frequencyEvery 4 monthsEvery 2 months — better
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesNoNo
MonetizationFreeFree
DevicesiPhone, iPad, iPodiPhone, iPad, iPod
Requires iOS15.09.0 — better
Further details — not scored
Size68 MB121 MB
Age rating4+4+
DeveloperJixiPix, LLC丽譞 牛

Customer experience

Pop Dot Comics

All ratings177 ratings
Positive97.7%
Neutral1.1%
Negative1.1%
Written reviews269 reviews
Positive77.7%
Neutral8.2%
Negative14.1%

Aftercut

All ratings202 ratings
Positive93.1%
Neutral2.5%
Negative4.5%
Written reviews406 reviews
Positive91.9%
Neutral3.4%
Negative4.7%

User reviews

Pop Dot Comics

From 177 App Store ratings

What we love

  • 👍 Easy to use and intuitive interface
  • 🎨 Wide variety of artistic filters and effects
  • ✨ High-quality output results
  • 🎭 Great for pop art and comic-style transformations
  • ⚙️ Highly customizable with many adjustment options

Room to improve

  • 🐛 Frequent crashes, especially when editing text
  • ⏱️ Slow processing times between effect previews
  • 📉 Quality degradation when saving to camera roll
  • 🖼️ Results don't always match preview thumbnails
  • 💾 Loss of work when app crashes before saving

Aftercut

From 202 App Store ratings

What we love

  • 👍 Intuitive and easy-to-use interface
  • ✂️ Excellent background removal and image cutout capabilities
  • 🎨 Extensive filters and special effects
  • 💰 No subscription required, one-time purchase
  • ⚡ Fast and efficient processing

Room to improve

  • 🐛 App crashes and stability issues on some devices
  • 📐 Limited to portrait orientation (iPhone only, no iPad landscape)
  • 🖌️ Lacks manual eraser and fine-tuning tools
  • 💾 Image compression reduces quality on save
  • 🔧 Limited customization for selection refinement

Bugs and requests

Pop Dot Comics

Reported bugs

12 issues
  • App crashes frequently during text editing
  • App crashes when saving or rendering images
  • Photos fail to load from gallery on some devices
  • High-resolution export produces pixelated images
  • Saved images appear different from in-app preview
Show 7 more
  • App crashes when adding and moving text elements
  • Rendering hangs or gets stuck
  • Crashes on iPhone 5 and older devices
  • Text editing causes app to close unexpectedly
  • Stability issues on iPhone 4S
  • Gallery import functionality broken on some devices
  • Occasional freezing during effect application

Requested features

17 requests
  • More speech bubble and caption options
  • Ability to adjust colors in specific areas (e.g., faces, lips)
  • Multi-cell page layouts and storyboard creation
  • Vaporwave aesthetic filter option
  • Text without word bubbles option
Show 12 more
  • Ability to rotate paper textures
  • Easier text size and rotation controls
  • Zoom capabilities
  • Brightness, saturation, and contrast user controls
  • Ability to import custom elements
  • Double dialogue bubbles
  • Direction control for speech bubbles
  • Larger halftone dot options
  • More varied caption directions
  • Simultaneous editing of multiple photos
  • Storyboard functionality
  • Better style preview with consistent sample images

Aftercut

Reported bugs

10 issues
  • App incompatible with latest iOS versions (iOS 14+)
  • Custom fonts not visible or usable after iOS updates
  • Unable to import photos from library on some devices
  • Position and scale changes lost when pasting cutouts
  • Saved images not appearing in photo library
Show 5 more
  • App crashes when applying certain effects
  • Interface text too small on some devices
  • Language settings reverting to Chinese unexpectedly
  • Blurry output despite sharp preview
  • Selection tool selecting entire image instead of subject

Requested features

15 requests
  • iPad landscape orientation support
  • Higher resolution export (beyond 4096x4096 pixels)
  • Manual eraser and rubber tool for precise editing
  • Feathering and edge refinement controls
  • Clipping masks with geometric shapes
Show 10 more
  • Layer support for multiple images
  • More font options and variety
  • Offset settings for eraser tool
  • Color-based selection tool
  • Apple Pencil support with better line quality
  • Sticker library management/cleanup
  • Recent updates after years of stagnation
  • Landscape view option
  • Font import from browser
  • Improved documentation and manual

In-app purchases

None

Pop Dot Comics

No in-app purchases

None

Aftercut

No in-app purchases

Questions

Is Pop Dot Comics free?
Pop Dot Comics costs $2.99, with no in-app purchases.
Is Aftercut free?
Aftercut costs $2.99, with no in-app purchases.
Which has better reviews, Pop Dot Comics or Aftercut?
Pop Dot Comics is rated higher. Pop Dot Comics averages 4.9 out of 5 from 177 ratings, while Aftercut averages 4.7 from 202 ratings.
Do Pop Dot Comics or Aftercut have ads?
Neither Pop Dot Comics nor Aftercut shows ads.
Which is updated more often, Pop Dot Comics or Aftercut?
Pop Dot Comics ships an update every 4 months, and Aftercut every 2 months. Most recently, Pop Dot Comics was updated on October 8, 2026 and Aftercut on June 26, 2026.

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