Live Preview vs Hive
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
Live Preview
Wirelessly mirror your design artboards from Sketch to your iPad or iPhone. Experience pixel-perfect previews with automatic updates as you work, and quickly compare design iterations.
- Wireless mirroring
- Pixel-perfect @3x previews
- Automatic artboard updates
- Quick compare between artboards
- Works with local or cloud Sketch documents
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Live Preview makes it easy to mirror your Sketch designs on your iPad and iPhone. Using the same wireless technology as AirDrop, Live Preview works anywhere—even when your devices aren't connected to the internet. Live Preview features stunning pixel perfect @3x previews, as well as Automatic Update, which dynamically changes the preview, following you as you work. Quick Compare allows for instant switching between the last two artboards—very useful for proofing subtle design changes. Live Preview works with any Sketch document, stored locally or in the cloud.
Hive
This app helps designers, creators, and innovators organize and manage all their creative assets in one place. It offers smart photo organization, an integrated video player, and multiple ways to save inspirations, streamlining your creative process. Effortlessly sort, categorize, and find your ideas with advanced filtering and search capabilities.
- Organize creative assets
- Smart photo organizer
- Integrated video player
- Multiple save methods
- Web capture
- Multi-level folder system
- Advanced search and filter
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Hive is a private visual reference library for designers, illustrators, photographers, and creative teams. Save references the moment you find them—Share Sheet, clipboard, Safari, and links—then keep images, video, and files in one library you actually control. No feed. No tracking theater. Just a calm place to store and reopen what you need. Organize for real work • Folders, tags, filters, and search built for reference retrieval • Smart Folders to surface the set you need for a project • Mixed media in one place: images, video, links, and files Built for mobile creative workflows • Fast capture on iPhone and iPad • Browse and reuse references on the go • Works with an Eagle-compatible library workflow on mobile Privacy by default • Your library stays yours Hive is for people who already collect inspiration in Pinterest, moodboards, or Eagle on the desktop—and need a private, organized library on iOS. Download Hive and turn scattered references into a library you can find again. Privacy Policy: https://hive.ink/privacy-policy/ Terms of Use: https://www.apple.com/legal/internet-services/itunes/dev/stdeula/
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is price: Hive at Free against Live Preview's $1.99. Hive also leads on update cadence (every 4 days vs every 13 months) and ratings volume (39 vs 3). Live Preview's advantage is in-app purchases (none vs 3) and review sentiment (100% vs 79%). On rating, 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
Hive is free to download; Live Preview costs $1.99 up front. Hive sells 3 in-app purchases, starting at $3.99 per month. Live Preview asks for nothing beyond the download.
On the App Store both sit at effectively the same score — 5.0 for Live Preview against 4.9 for Hive. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: Hive has 39 ratings behind it against 3, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews are what separate them: 100% of Live Preview's written reviews are positive against 79% of Hive's.
Live Preview ships an update every 13 months, Hive every 4 days. The most recent releases landed on November 7, 2026 and November 8, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | Live Preview | Hive |
|---|---|---|
| Price | $1.99 | Free — better |
| Rating | 5.0 (3 ratings) — better | 4.9 (39 ratings) |
| Positive reviews | 100.0% of reviews — better | 78.8% of reviews |
| Number of ratings | 3 | 39 — better |
| Update frequency | Every 13 months | Every 4 days — better |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | No — better | Yes |
| Monetization | Paid | Free with in-app purchases — better |
| Devices | iPhone, iPad | iPhone, iPad, Mac — better |
| Requires iOS | 27.0 | 18.0 — better |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 8 MB | 186 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | +17 |
| Developer | Kyle Halevi | 易泓 刘 |
Customer experience
Live Preview
Hive
In-app purchases
Live Preview
No in-app purchases
Hive
- Monthly$3.991 Month
- Annually7 Days trial$19.991 Year
- Pro Lifetime$39.99









