Comparison

Showbie vs Birdathon

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

Head to head
About

Showbie

This app facilitates paperless learning by allowing teachers to personalize assignments and provide detailed feedback on student work. It supports various feedback methods, including digital ink, text, and voice annotations, and enables the creation of digital portfolios for students. Parents can also be invited to view student progress.

Highlights
  • Personalize assignments and feedback
  • Digital ink, text, and voice annotations
  • Create digital student portfolios
  • Share work from compatible apps
  • Real-time class assessment
  • Private student chat
  • Parental access to student work
Features
Read full description

Used by over 3 million teachers and students worldwide, Showbie is the easiest and most effective digital learning app to personalise assignments and feedback on iPad. DNA of Learning: Your Foundation for Student Success Showbie supports the improvement of everyday teaching and learning by elevating four essential strands of effective classroom practice - direct instruction, independent practice, personalised feedback and real-time assessment - all in one platform. Find out how easy it is to assign, collect and review student work from thousands of compatible iPad apps, or have your students complete assignments with Showbie’s built in tools. Provide rich feedback using digital ink, text and voice annotations right on images and PDFs, and then add your students’ best work to personalized digital portfolios that can be securely shared with parents. WHAT EDUCATORS ARE SAYING “Showbie is my number one can't live without app! It makes the iPad workflow process a breeze! I especially love how it works seamlessly with so many other apps.” — Kristen Paino, Lead Technology Integrator at Avenues: The World School “I don't need to convince my colleagues that they need to use this app — it sells itself. I like that it gives me the flexibility in how I choose to grade my student's work, especially with the voice notes feature. There is no single third party app that I would rather champion.” — Suzanne Lustenhouwer, Teacher and iPad Coordinator, Apple Distinguished Educator “I love that Showbie is so versatile that the youngest of students can use it independently, yet it is appropriate for older grades as well. The ease of use makes it a great workflow solution for classes with iPads.” — Kristi Meeuwse, Kindergarten Teacher, Apple Distinguished Educator KEY FEATURES FOR TEACHERS & STUDENTS • Share work from thousands of compatible iPad apps in a few taps • Use the pen tool and pin text notes directly on any PDF or image • Gauge class understanding in real-time with minute-by-minute assessment • Instantly differentiate assignments and materials to specific students • Quickly distribute instructions and materials to your whole class • Chat privately with individual students to provide timely feedback • Record voice notes for verbal feedback or language exercises • Quickly review and assess batches of student work and provide rich, valuable feedback • Add student work to individual digital portfolios, or enable students to curate their own portfolios • Invite parents to view their student’s work and keep them informed of classroom activity • Can be used with any classroom subject • Available in 18 languages ENHANCED SHOWBIE PRO FEATURES • Record and track grades as numeric scores or letter grades, along with qualitative feedback • Provide richer feedback with more pen colours and line thicknesses, by typing on the page, or by pinning voice notes directly to student work • Record longer voice notes and videos and upload larger files • Lock assignments to control student access to documents and feedback • Give parents complete access to assignments in the classes you choose

About

Birdathon

This app helps birdwatchers create and organize detailed checklists of their observations. It automatically records time and location, allowing for easy editing and customization. Users can visualize their sightings on maps, add field notes, and export data for sharing or further analysis.

Highlights
  • Observation-centric checklists
  • Automatic time and location recording
  • Customizable maps with boundary overlays
  • Field notes for additional observations
  • Multiple checklist sorting options
  • Data export to CSV and other formats
  • Create checklist templates
Features
Read full description

Birdathon is an observation-centric tool for creating birding checklists. It helps you organize your checklists and share them with others. Use Birdathon in the field to quickly record whether and where a bird is seen or heard and the number observed. The time and location of each observation is automatically recorded. You can adjust the location, time entries and the count of birds observed at any time to ensure your records are accurate. You can add breeding codes to your observations. Checklist maps display the locations of your observations. You can overlay county boundaries for every US state. You can add a range circle such as a 5MR (5-mile Radius) to your maps. You can import and overlay custom kml/kmz files onto your maps. An Overview feature lets you see your combined observations for any time period, and displays a map showing any boundaries you have selected, so you can utilize the map feature even when you are not actively checklisting. You can export Overview data into a csv text file or create a new checklist template from the Overview. Your checklists can be viewed in taxonomic order, alphabetically, by rarity or as a timeline of species. You can enrich your checklist with field notes and add observations such as mammals, butterflies, wildflowers, etc., to make it a more complete record of your experience. You can organize your checklists into categories such as Day List, Year List, County List, Life List, etc., and assign color themes to your lists. Bird species may be added and deleted from your lists at any time. You can create new checklist templates from your previous lists or import templates created by others. You can change which template is being used. You can import text files into Birdathon, making them into templates or new checklists. Different export options for your checklists allow you to import into eBird or another copy of Birdathon. The bird species source data and other resources used in this app come from the following sources: AviList, a unified global checklist of birds, is the core data set used for Birdathon. https://www.avilist.org. Some data has been integrated from the following sources: The eBird/Clements checklist of birds of the world (https://www.birds.cornell.edu/clementschecklist/download/), the American Ornithological Society's (AOS) Checklist of North and Middle American Birds (https://checklist.americanornithology.org), and the American Birding Association's (ABA) checklist of North American Birds (https://www.aba.org/listing-taxonomy/) Alpha codes come from The Institute for Bird Populations’ Standardized 4- and 6-letter Bird Species Codes. https://www.birdpop.org/pages/birdSpeciesCodes.php. County boundary data is from the United States Geological Survey (USGS) TIGER/Line 2019 Shapefiles found on the United States Census Bureau's website at https://www.census.gov/geographies/mapping-files/time-series/geo/tiger-line-file.2019.html. Boundaries should be used as general guidelines and not be considered precise. Note especially where county boundaries follow creeks, rivers, ridge lines and other natural features, and so are of much finer resolution than can be shown on Birdathon’s maps. California breeding bird atlas blocks come from the California Bird Atlas, https://www.californiabirdatlas.org. California Bird Atlas logo and breeding code descriptions used with permission.

Screenshots

Showbie4 screens
Birdathon4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is review sentiment: Birdathon at 100% against Showbie's 37%. Birdathon also leads on rating (4.7 vs 3.7) and monetization model (free vs free with in-app purchases). Showbie's advantage is update cadence (fortnightly vs every 4 months) and ratings volume (237 vs 15). On price, ads, in-app purchases 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. Showbie sells 1 one-off in-app purchase and Birdathon sells 4 one-off in-app purchases. Whichever you choose, the download price is not the number that matters.

ReceptionRating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings

Birdathon holds the better App Store score, 4.7 against 3.7. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: Showbie has 237 ratings behind it against 15, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews point the same way: 37% of Showbie's written reviews are positive against 100% of Birdathon's.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

Showbie ships an update fortnightly, Birdathon every 4 months. The most recent releases landed on September 24, 2026 and September 19, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard6 real differences · 4 level
Showbie versus Birdathon: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterShowbieBirdathon
PriceFreeFree
Rating3.7 (237 ratings)4.7 (15 ratings) — better
Positive reviews36.7% of reviews100.0% of reviews — better
Number of ratings237 — better15
Update frequencyFortnightly — betterEvery 4 months
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesYesYes
MonetizationFree with in-app purchasesFree — better
DevicesiPhone, iPadiPhone, iPad
Requires iOS18.016.1 — better
Further details — not scored
Size294 MB192 MB
Age rating4+4+
DeveloperShowbie Inc.Barry Langdon-Lassagne

Customer experience

Showbie

All ratings237 ratings
Positive65.8%
Neutral4.6%
Negative29.5%
Written reviews458 reviews
Positive36.7%
Neutral5.5%
Negative57.9%

Birdathon

All ratings15 ratings
Positive93.3%
Neutral0.0%
Negative6.7%
Written reviews11 reviews
Positive100.0%
Neutral0.0%
Negative0.0%

Bugs and requests

Showbie

Reported bugs

4 issues
  • Text boxes disappearing or moving unexpectedly
  • Notifications not working correctly
  • Assignments not uploading or disappearing
  • Compatibility issues on older devices

Requested features

4 requests
  • Calendar view for assignments
  • More annotation tools and customization
  • Offline mode for accessing content
  • Better integration with other apps

Birdathon

Not enough reviews yet to summarise bugs or requests.

In-app purchases

1 purchases

Showbie

One-time1
  • Showbie Pro$239.99
4 purchases

Birdathon

One-time4
  • Good Tip$0.99
  • Great Tip$1.99
  • Amazing Tip$2.99
Show 1 more
  • Incredible Tip$4.99

Questions

Is Showbie free?
Showbie is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Is Birdathon free?
Birdathon is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Which has better reviews, Showbie or Birdathon?
Birdathon is rated higher. Showbie averages 3.7 out of 5 from 237 ratings, while Birdathon averages 4.7 from 15 ratings.
Do Showbie or Birdathon have ads?
Neither Showbie nor Birdathon shows ads.
Which is updated more often, Showbie or Birdathon?
Showbie ships an update fortnightly, and Birdathon every 4 months. Most recently, Showbie was updated on September 24, 2026 and Birdathon on September 19, 2026.

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