Comparison

MLC Chat vs Relayboard

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

Head to head
About

MLC Chat

Engage in conversations with open language models directly on your iPad or iPhone. Once a model is downloaded, all interactions occur locally, ensuring privacy and offline functionality without internet access. This app is designed for non-commercial use, allowing you to run various open-source language models on your device.

Highlights
  • Local AI model chat
  • Offline functionality
  • No internet required
  • Privacy-focused
  • Open-source project integration
  • Downloadable language models
Features
Read full description

MLC Chat lets users chat with open language models locally on ipads and iphones. After a model is downloaded to the app, everything runs locally without server support, and it works without internet connections do not record any information. Because the models run locally, it only works for the devices with sufficient VRAM depending on the models being used. MLC Chat is part of open source project MLC LLM, with allows any language model to be deployed natively on a diverse set of hardware backends and native applications. MLC Chat is a runtime that runs different open model architectures on your phone. The app is intended for non-commercial purposes. It allows you to run open-language models downloaded from the internet. Each model can be subject to its respective licenses.

About

Relayboard

Features
Read full description

Relayboard is a privacy-first clipboard sync app for your Apple devices. Copy on your iPhone, paste on your Mac. Share a link from Safari to your iPad. Your recent clips stay easy to find, and device trust stays explicit. KEY FEATURES • Recent clips first, with history and search available when enabled • End-to-end encrypted sync over local Wi-Fi (Bonjour) • Optional iCloud sync for cross-network delivery • Explicit peer approval for local network trust • Sensitivity detection: OTP codes, credit cards, and API keys handled automatically • Never-sync, expiry, and redaction rules for sensitive content • Share extension — ingest from any app directly • Home screen and Lock Screen widgets for your recent clips PRIVACY BY DESIGN Relayboard never sends your clipboard data to third-party servers. All local sync is encrypted peer-to-peer over your own network. Cloud sync goes through your private iCloud container, under your control. Sensitive content — one-time passwords, credit card numbers, API keys — is detected and handled according to rules you control.

Screenshots

MLC Chat2 screens
Relayboard4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is update cadence: Relayboard at every 5 days against MLC Chat's every 2 months. Relayboard also leads on device support (4 vs 2). MLC Chat's advantage is iOS requirement (17.0 vs 26.0). On price, 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

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

UpkeepUpdate frequency

MLC Chat ships an update every 2 months, Relayboard every 5 days. Both last shipped on October 6, 2026.

Scorecard3 real differences · 7 level
MLC Chat versus Relayboard: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterMLC ChatRelayboard
PriceFreeFree
Rating4.2 (78 ratings) — better—
Positive reviews68.3% of reviews—
Number of ratings78 — better—
Update frequencyEvery 2 monthsEvery 5 days — better
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesNoNo
MonetizationFree—
DevicesiPhone, iPadiPhone, iPad, Mac, Apple TV — better
Requires iOS17.0 — better26.0
Further details — not scored
Size1.7 GB6 MB
Age rating17+4+
DeveloperTianqi ChenWai Hei Lam

Bugs and requests

MLC Chat

Reported bugs

17 issues
  • Phi model crashes on iOS 26.0.1 17 Pro Max
  • App crashes on iPad Pro 4th Gen, iPadOs 17.7
  • RedPajama model crashes app on initialization
  • Update is extremely slow
  • Download model button disabled in new version
Show 12 more
  • RedPajama model crashes, custom model download removed
  • App closes when hitting send on iPhone 13
  • Conversation resets when app is backgrounded
  • Vicuna and Mistral 7B models cause crashes
  • Some 7b q4f16/q4f32 models crash on iPhone 15 Pro
  • App crashes on iPhone 13 mini
  • Cannot load other models from URL
  • Crash on iPhone 12
  • Severe heating and frequency reduction on A15
  • Low VRAM failed initialization on 3GB LP DDR4X phone
  • Cannot run 4bit model on iPhone 15 with 8GB RAM
  • Loading models from HF MLC official Repo causes crashes

Requested features

14 requests
  • Ability to import custom models (from URL/Hugging Face)
  • Support for more specific models (DeepSeek, Phi-2, Gemma 2B/7B, MoE Mixtral 8x7B, LLaVA)
  • History of conversations
  • iOS shortcuts support
  • Ability to export entire responses
Show 9 more
  • Information on VRAM requirements per phone/model
  • Ability to change system message/create custom profiles
  • Ability to edit responses and system prompt
  • Add coffee support
  • Delete downloaded models
  • Change settings per model (repetition penalties, temperature)
  • How-to guide for importing/recompiling LLMs
  • Estimate model compatibility before download
  • Support for CN and ZH languages

Relayboard

Not enough reviews yet to summarise bugs or requests.

In-app purchases

None

MLC Chat

No in-app purchases

None

Relayboard

No in-app purchases

Questions

Is MLC Chat free?
MLC Chat is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Is Relayboard free?
Relayboard is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Do MLC Chat or Relayboard have ads?
Neither MLC Chat nor Relayboard shows ads.
Which is updated more often, MLC Chat or Relayboard?
MLC Chat ships an update every 2 months, and Relayboard every 5 days. Most recently, MLC Chat was updated on October 6, 2026 and Relayboard on October 6, 2026.

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