Mic Spectrum Analyzer vs MuVis
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
Mic Spectrum Analyzer
Visualize sound from your phone's microphone with various shapes and effects. Customize sensitivity, choose between dark and light themes, and explore 18 presets, custom shaders, and over 16 different effects for advanced users.
- 18 predefined presets
- Load custom photos
- Adjustable sensitivity
- Dark and light UI themes
- Over 16 different effects
- Custom shaders
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Mic Spectrum Analyzer is a music visualization tool. You can visualize sound coming from phone's microphone in variety of shapes and effects. Features: - 18 predefined presets! - Ability to load your own photos (make sure to select Blending mode to "Texture") - Sensitivity can be adjusted - Dark and light UI theme - 8 basic preset types - Over 16 different effects - Custom shaders (for advanced users)
MuVis
This app creates dynamic, real-time visual representations of music being played from files or a device's microphone. Users can cycle through numerous visualizations and options, control playback, and switch between audio sources.
- Real-time audio visualization
- Music file playback
- Microphone input
- 34+ visualizations
- 8 visualization options
- Customizable toolbars
- iCloudDrive music selection
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MuVis is an open-source macOS & iOS app for music visualization. It renders informative (and musically useful) graphical displays in real time from music files being played - or from the device's microphone. Real-time music visualization is an exciting endeavor - providing the user with dynamic visual and aural stimulation and edification. When the MuVis app first opens, the on-screen display should look somewhat like the first screenshot shown above and the computer's speakers should be playing music from a pre-loaded royalty-free music file. (Currently, the song file is "The Elevator Bossa Nova" from Bensound.com.) The on-screen display shows a real-time dynamic visual representation of the audio that you are hearing. The top and bottom toolbars contains buttons and sliders to allow you to control what you see. Triple-tap your screen to show/hide these toolbars. At the bottom left are two buttons labelled by left- and right-chevrons. Clicking the left one changes the display to the previous visualization, and clicking the right one changes the display to the next visualization - which allows you to cycle through the thirty-four visualizations currently provided by the app. Also, you can simply swipe left or right to change the visualization. Adjacent to these Visualization chevrons are two Option chevrons. When programming these visualization algorithms, there are numerous variations and options available to the developer. These buttons allow the user to select to see any of eight variations. The particular variation rendered is different for each visualization. Also, you can simply swipe up or down to change the option rendered. Adjacent to these Option chevrons is a “Pause” button. When clicked, it stops the music playback and freezes the visualization display. The button label changes to “Play” which, when clicked, causes the music playback and the visualization display to continue. The adjacent button has a "Microphone" icon. When pressed it stops playing the audio from the selected song file (and also stops it's visualization), and starts playing the live audio from the microphone (and starts it's visualization). The label then becomes a slashed microphone - which, when pressed, performs the reverse actions and changes the icon back to "Microphone". The next button has a "Music List" icon. It allows you to select whatever songs you want from your own iCloudDrive folder. Selecting a song causes that song to play - and the visualization to render its dynamic attributes. The adjacent button has a “Waveform” icon with a minus sign. When clicked, it passes the audio signal through a “spectral enhancer” filter which reduces the display of noise (usually percussive effects which smear spectral energy over a large frequency range), and enhances the display of spectral lines (usually the harmonics of musical notes). Finally, at the right end of the bottom toolbar are two buttons labelled UserG (for User Guide) and VisG (for Visualization Guide). Clicking either button activates a “Quick Look” popup window to display the app's documentation. The top toolbar contains two sliders - one controlling "Visualization Gain" and the other controlling "Visualization Treble Boost". As their names imply, sliding them adjusts the gain and slope of the visual data representation. The source code for this app is posted at www.github.com/Keith-43
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is review sentiment: MuVis at 100% against Mic Spectrum Analyzer's 38%. MuVis also leads on rating (5.0 vs 3.0) and update cadence (every 3 months vs every 51 months). Mic Spectrum Analyzer's advantage is iOS requirement (9.0 vs 17.0). 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
Both are free to download. Neither carries in-app purchases, so what you see is what you pay.
MuVis holds the better App Store score, 5.0 against 3.0. Both are backed by a comparable volume of ratings — 19 and 8 respectively. Written reviews point the same way: 38% of Mic Spectrum Analyzer's written reviews are positive against 100% of MuVis's.
Mic Spectrum Analyzer ships an update every 51 months, MuVis every 3 months. The most recent releases landed on October 22, 2026 and October 24, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | Mic Spectrum Analyzer | MuVis |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free |
| Rating | 3.0 (19 ratings) | 5.0 (8 ratings) — better |
| Positive reviews | 37.5% of reviews | 100.0% of reviews — better |
| Number of ratings | 19 — better | 8 |
| Update frequency | Every 51 months | Every 3 months — better |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | No | No |
| Monetization | Free | Free |
| Devices | iPhone, iPad, iPod | iPhone, iPad, Mac |
| Requires iOS | 9.0 — better | 17.0 |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 115 MB | 18 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 4+ |
| Developer | Adrian Ross | Keith Bromley |
Customer experience
Mic Spectrum Analyzer
MuVis
In-app purchases
Mic Spectrum Analyzer
No in-app purchases
MuVis
No in-app purchases
Questions
Is Mic Spectrum Analyzer free?
Is MuVis free?
Which has better reviews, Mic Spectrum Analyzer or MuVis?
Do Mic Spectrum Analyzer or MuVis have ads?
Which is updated more often, Mic Spectrum Analyzer or MuVis?
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