Emphasized vs IWL
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
Emphasized
Effortlessly capture and organize important text from any webpage. Save, edit, and export your highlights as a PDF without needing an account. Boost your research and study sessions with this intuitive tool.
- Highlight text on webpages
- Multiple color options
- Auto-save highlights locally
- Organize by webpage
- Export highlights to PDF
- Undo/delete highlights
- Character and word selection modes
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Whether you're cramming for a test, diving deep into research, or just collecting great quotes, this highlighter's got your back. Highlight text on any webpage—no sign-in, no fuss. Everything's saved automatically on your device and neatly grouped by page or tag, so you can always pick up where you left off. Change colors, tweak and tag highlights, and export them all when you're ready to share or review. Highlighting • Highlight text on webpages • Use multiple colors • Change the color of existing highlights • Delete highlights you no longer need • Split or merge existing highlights • Easily undo highlighted text with a single tap Tags • Create tags with custom colors to categorize your highlights • Assign or change tags on any existing highlights • Select an active tag to automatically apply it while highlighting Selection Modes • Characters: grab just the letters you want • Words: select full words even if selecting mid-word • None: disable highlighting while keeping existing highlights visible Auto-Save • Highlights are saved locally on your device • Automatically restored when you revisit the same webpage • No account or sign-in required Organized View • Browse highlights by webpage • Browse all highlights by tag across every website • Quickly find and review your saved content Exporting • Export highlights as a clean, shareable PDF • Export as plain text or JSON • Share directly via the system share sheet Other Features • Reposition the toolbar if it gets in the way • Boost productivity with keyboard shortcuts for highlighting and switching tags (requires physical keyboard) • See your active highlight settings, all keyboard shortcuts, and support links in the Settings page Works on iPhone, iPad, and Mac.
IWL
This app is a distraction-free Markdown editor with intelligent writing tools. It offers features like style analysis, goal tracking, and AI-powered editing to help users improve their prose and understand their writing style.
- Distraction-free writing environment
- Style analysis against famous authors
- Writing goal tracking and progress monitoring
- NLP-based word count and statistics
- Readability scores and estimated reading time
- AI-powered editing for grammar and rephrasing
- Word frequency and keyword analysis
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IWL is a beautiful Markdown text editor designed to help you write with focus, powered by a suite of intelligent tools that elevate your writing to a professional level. Whether you’re a novelist, journalist, academic, or creator, IWL gives you more than just a blank page. It gives you insight. It’s the only writing app that helps you understand your writing. # Why Writers Love IWL - Distraction-free by design: A clean, fast editor that lets you think on the page. - Toolbox, not clutter: Open only the tools you need, when you need them. - Smarter than your average text editor: Many tools are powered by natural language models for deep, accurate insights. - Markdown native: No weird formats. Just clean text that goes anywhere. - Offline-friendly: tools work without internet. Your words stay yours. # Writer's Toolbox ## Style Analyzer Find your voice—and who it sounds like. The iconic "I Write Like" style analyzer uses a custom English linguistic fingerprinting model to compare your writing with that of famous authors. It provides a lens into your style, tone, and rhythm. Perfect for learning and sharpening your voice. ## Track Your Writing Goals Set targets and watch your progress. Stay motivated by setting custom word or character goals for your project. IWL tracks your progress in real-time and celebrates with you when you hit your target. Whether you're aiming for a 500-word blog post or a 50,000-word novel, you'll always know exactly how close you are to completion. ## NLP-based Word Count More than just a number. Unlike basic byte-based counters in most text editors, IWL uses a natural language processing (NLP) model to parse text and give you accurate word, sentence, and character stats. Perfect for authors, copywriters, and students who need precision. ## Readability Know how it feels to read. Instantly get readability scores—with estimated reading time and reading level. ## Edit with AI An intelligent editing partner, built right in. Rewrite, rephrase, correct grammar, and polish your prose with our smart AI editor. No chatting—just click and improve. Choose from top AI models from leading developers. (Requires an API key.) ## Word Frequency Find patterns you didn’t know were there. See which words dominate your writing—or which ones you’re underusing. Filter by common or rare words. ## Keywords IWL displays the most semantically important words in your document. Great for SEO, summaries, or finding the hidden themes in your drafts. ## Sentence Rank Spotlight your strongest lines. Using vector analysis, IWL ranks your sentences by informational weight—so you can find the most important lines fast. Ideal for editing, summarizing, or structuring arguments. ## Outline IWL auto-generates outlines from your headings and structure, giving you instant navigation and a birds-eye view of your doc. ## Links Every link, one view. See all your hyperlinks extracted from the document in a single glance. Useful for checking sources, citations, or cleaning up drafts. ## Comments All your side notes in one place. Inline TODOs, comments, and side notes are automatically detected and displayed. Stay organized while staying in the flow. ## Dictionary Know exactly what you mean. Look up word definitions, synonyms, and usage without breaking your writing flow. It’s fast, built-in, and never intrusive. It also shows pictures. ## Read Aloud - Let your writing speak. IWL’s text-to-speech helps you catch awkward phrases and polish your rhythm by hearing your text performed aloud. Choose from a variety of voices. ## Export Beautiful output in every format. Export to PDF, styled HTML, or Word documents with zero formatting headaches. ## Markdown Preview No more guessing what your Markdown will look like. IWL renders your document with elegant typography and layout—automatically. It’s fast, accurate, and great for checking blog posts, docs, and articles.
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is price: Emphasized at $2.99 against IWL's $29.99. IWL's advantage is rating (5.0 vs 4.0) and update cadence (fortnightly vs every 4 months). On review sentiment, 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
Emphasized costs $2.99 and IWL $29.99 up front. Neither carries in-app purchases, so what you see is what you pay.
IWL holds the better App Store score, 5.0 against 4.0. Both are backed by a comparable volume of ratings — 4 and 2 respectively. Written reviews split almost evenly too, at 100% and 100% positive.
Emphasized ships an update every 4 months, IWL fortnightly. The most recent releases landed on September 8, 2026 and September 21, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | Emphasized | IWL |
|---|---|---|
| Price | $2.99 — better | $29.99 |
| Rating | 4.0 (4 ratings) | 5.0 (2 ratings) — better |
| Positive reviews | 100.0% of reviews | 100.0% of reviews |
| Number of ratings | 4 — better | 2 |
| Update frequency | Every 4 months | Fortnightly — better |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | No | No |
| Monetization | Paid | Paid |
| Devices | iPhone, iPad, Mac | iPhone, iPad, Mac |
| Requires iOS | 17.6 — better | 18.0 |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 8 MB | 27 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 4+ |
| Developer | Algirdas Gridziuska | Koding Robots doo |
Customer experience
Emphasized
IWL
In-app purchases
Emphasized
No in-app purchases
IWL
No in-app purchases








