Comparison

swmpc vs mikMPD

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

Head to head
About

swmpc

A fast and elegant music player client for Apple devices. It offers seamless library browsing, intuitive queue management, and full playlist support. Features AI-powered smart fill for playlist generation and is open source.

Highlights
  • Fast library browsing
  • Sane queue management
  • Full playlist support
  • Favorites access
  • AI-powered smart fill
  • Open source
  • Universal purchase
Features
Read full description

Tired of janky MPD clients? Same. `swmpc` is a fast, elegant MPD client built exclusively for iOS, iPadOS & macOS. A clean, native interface that feels right at home on your Apple devices. What you get: • Fast library browsing: Search artists, albums, and tracks instantly • Sane queue management: Add, remove, reorder. Drag and drop. No friction. • Full playlist support: Create, edit, delete, and populate playlists without fighting the UI • Favorites: Quick access to tracks you actually listen to • AI-powered smart fill: Generate playlists or queue tracks by genre or mood • Open source: Inspect it, fork it, contribute. It's your app too. • Universal purchase: One price. Get it for Mac, iPhone, and iPad. Done.

About

mikMPD

Read full description

This requires a running MPD server on your network. More information about MPD and how to configure it can be found here: https://www.musicpd.org. mikMPD should work with other MPD implementations as Mopidy, OwnTone, Chord Poly etc. Album art (fetched from MusicBrainz/CoverArtArchive), synced lyrics (via LRCLIB). Browse by albums, artists, genres, or playlists with search filtering. Album and artist detail views include Wikipedia summaries. Play or enqueue entire albums/artists with one tap. Playlists — Full stored-playlist support: browse, rename, and delete playlists. Radio — Built-in Swedish Radio streams (SR P1–P4 Göteborg) plus custom station management with persistent storage. CD — Play audio CDs directly via cdda:/// URIs with per-track control. File Browser — Navigate the MPD directory tree. Single-tap enters directories, double-tap plays files. Swipe actions for add/play. Search — Concurrent search across songs, artists, and albums with debounced input, batch selection, and album art thumbnails. Queue — View and manage the current playlist. Double-tap to jump to a song, drag to reorder, swipe to delete, clear all, toggle consume mode. Outputs & Partitions — Toggle audio outputs on/off, switch between MPD partitions, create and delete partitions, move outputs between partitions via long-press context menu. Multiple Servers — Save any number of MPD servers and switch between them with one tap. Nearby servers advertising over Bonjour/Zeroconf are discovered automatically and can be added directly. Passwords are stored in the Keychain, and the last-used partition is remembered per server. Listen on Phone — Stream audio from an MPD httpd output directly to the device via AVPlayer. Configure the stream URL per server, then toggle "Listen on phone" in Now Playing. Supports background playback with lock screen metadata (song title, artist, album art) and lock screen transport controls. Snapcast — Control a Snapcast multiroom server from the More tab

Screenshots

swmpc3 screens
mikMPD4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is price: mikMPD at Free against swmpc's $8.99. mikMPD also leads on update cadence (weekly vs every 2 months). On ads, in-app purchases, device support and iOS requirement 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

mikMPD is free to download; swmpc costs $8.99 up front. Neither carries in-app purchases, so what you see is what you pay.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

swmpc ships an update every 2 months, mikMPD weekly. The most recent releases landed on September 26, 2026 and September 24, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard2 real differences · 8 level
swmpc versus mikMPD: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterswmpcmikMPD
Price$8.99Free — better
Rating1.0 (2 ratings) — better—
Positive reviews60.0% of reviews—
Number of ratings2 — better—
Update frequencyEvery 2 monthsWeekly — better
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesNoNo
MonetizationPaid—
DevicesiPhone, iPad, Mac — betteriPhone, iPad
Requires iOS27.026.2 — better
Further details — not scored
Size22 MB5 MB
Age rating4+4+
DeveloperCamille ScholtzMIKAEL PER JOHAN OSTERDAHL

In-app purchases

None

swmpc

No in-app purchases

None

mikMPD

No in-app purchases

Questions

Is swmpc free?
swmpc costs $8.99, with no in-app purchases.
Is mikMPD free?
mikMPD is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Do swmpc or mikMPD have ads?
Neither swmpc nor mikMPD shows ads.
Which is updated more often, swmpc or mikMPD?
swmpc ships an update every 2 months, and mikMPD weekly. Most recently, swmpc was updated on September 26, 2026 and mikMPD on September 24, 2026.

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