Pastela vs Micapaint
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
Pastela
This app offers a seamless drawing and illustration experience with a spacious canvas, a wide variety of brushes, and cloud-based autosave. It features screen customization for iPad users and integrates with pixiv for easy sharing of your artwork.
- Spacious canvas
- Variety of brushes
- Cloud-based autosave
- iPad screen customization
- Pixiv integration
- Detailed brush customization
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− Enhance your drawing experience, day by day.− With a spacious canvas, a variety of brushes, and cloud-based autosave, Pastela has everything you need for a smooth illustration process. Draw freely, anytime, anywhere. ____ Pastela features ■ An experience tailored for iPad users - Screen customization options that suit your dominant hand - Move panels to fit your creative style ■ A wide range of illustration tools - An extensive collection of brushes, including pencils, G pens, round pens, watercolors, sprays, markers, and more - Detailed brush customization options - Bucket tool: fill closed path, lasso fill - Easily set layer names from a list with one tap - Many filters including chromatic aberration and Gaussian blur ■ Cloud storage (*1) - Automatically save your work to the cloud - Restore data to any previous version - 1 GB of cloud storage included * To learn more about Pastela, please check out the official website. ■ pixiv account integration (*2) - Post your work directly to pixiv - With Pastela Plus (*3), you can even update your pixiv posts with new versions of your art. (*1) To use cloud sync, you need to log in with your pixiv account. (*2) To post your work from Pastela to pixiv, you need to log in with your pixiv account. (*3) To learn more about Pastela Plus, please check out the official website.
Micapaint
This drawing application offers a fluid and intuitive painting experience with a focus on performance and a clean interface. It provides a wide array of free tools and features, with optional pro features available for purchase.
- 120fps smooth brush performance
- Slime Brush for precise filling
- Workspace-first UI
- Unlimited layers
- Filter layers for non-destructive adjustments
- Liquify tools
- PSD import/export
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Made with a love of painting, Micapaint puts a delightful drawing experience above everything else. Key Features - Smooth brush performance at 120fps: even 1000×1000 blending brushes run fluidly. - "Slime Brush" that fills regions without spilling outside broken lines. - A simple, workspace-first UI that maximizes your canvas. - No ads. Use most tools without limits, for free. Free Features - Pencil, G-pen, watercolor blending, blur - Lasso fill - Unlimited layers (as long as memory allows) - Layer folders - Clipping masks (yes, even for folders!) - Canvas flip for preview - Alpha lock - Filters (Hue/Saturation/Lightness, Brightness & Contrast, Tone Curve, Noise, Dither, Gradient Map, Blur, Chromatic Aberration) - Filter Layers (Non-destructive adjustment layers) - Saturation adjustment that preserves perceived brightness - Selection & transform - Liquify (push, expand, pinch, rotate, reset) - Paint bucket fill - Image import - Standard blend modes - Mini canvas view - Reference images displayed over the canvas - PSD import / export - Undo / redo - Adjustable stabilizer strength - Barrel roll support - Customizable toolbar (button count & layout) - Color history and swatches - Timelapse recording - Crop / resize the canvas you're editing (free up to 5 times) Pro Features (available with in-app purchase) - Canvas reordering - Brush export and import - Unlimited canvas crop / resize
Verdict
The clearest difference is ads: Micapaint at none against Pastela's shown. Micapaint also leads on review sentiment (100% vs 87%). Pastela's advantage is rating (4.6 vs 4.4) and ratings volume (100 vs 12). On price, update cadence, in-app purchases and monetization model 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. Pastela sells 4 in-app purchases, starting at $3.99 per month and Micapaint sells 1 one-off in-app purchase. Whichever you choose, the download price is not the number that matters.
Pastela holds the better App Store score, 4.6 against 4.4. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: Pastela has 100 ratings behind it against 12, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews complicate that: 87% of Pastela's written reviews are positive against 100% of Micapaint's, so the app with the better star average is not the one people write more warmly about.
Pastela ships an update every 10 days, Micapaint every 9 days. The most recent releases landed on November 4, 2026 and November 8, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | Pastela | Micapaint |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free |
| Rating | 4.6 (100 ratings) — better | 4.4 (12 ratings) |
| Positive reviews | 86.8% of reviews | 100.0% of reviews — better |
| Number of ratings | 100 — better | 12 |
| Update frequency | Every 10 days | Every 9 days — better |
| Ads | Yes | No — better |
| In-app purchases | Yes | Yes |
| Monetization | Free with in-app purchases | Free with in-app purchases |
| Devices | iPad | iPad |
| Requires iOS | 17.0 | 17 |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 203 MB | 13 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 4+ |
| Developer | pixiv Inc. | SHOGO SEKI |
Customer experience
Pastela
Micapaint
In-app purchases
Pastela
- Light plan$3.991 Month
- Standard plan$7.991 Month
- Advanced plan$15.991 Month
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- Deluxe plan$23.991 Month
Micapaint
- Micapaint Pro (Lifetime)$11.99









