Comparison

Fins vs DiveDex

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

Head to head
About

Fins

Instantly identify marine life from photos or guided searches. Log your dives, track sightings, and build a personal species collection. Engage with trivia games, earn badges, and plan liveaboard trips while contributing to ocean conservation.

Highlights
  • AI Marine Species ID
  • Guided Search
  • Dive Logbook
  • Marine Trivia Games
  • Badges & Achievements
  • Liveaboard Planning
  • Community Sharing
Features
Read full description

Fins identifies fish, nudibranchs and other invertebrates from a photo or guided step-by-step search, in seconds, wherever you are in the world. Whether you're logging a dive in Raja Ampat, snorkeling the Great Barrier Reef, or just curious about something you spotted at the beach, Fins brings the ocean's species to your fingertips. AI Marine Species ID Upload or snap a photo and let Fins identify the species instantly. Or use guided search to narrow it down step by step, no photo needed. Dive Logbook & Snorkel Tracker Record every dive, log your sightings, and build your personal life list. Your ocean story, beautifully kept. Marine Trivia & ID Games Test your reef knowledge, earn points, and climb the leaderboard. Learning the ocean has never been this fun. Badges & Achievements Unlock badges for new species, dive milestones, and rare finds. Spot a rare nudibranch? There's a badge for that. Liveaboard & Travel Planning Browse and book liveaboards across the world's top dive destinations, all inside the app. Join the Movement Every sighting you log contributes to ocean awareness and conservation. You're not just exploring, you’re helping. Community Share sightings, solve marine mysteries together, and connect with a growing global community of ocean lovers. Who Fins Is For Divers & Snorkelers — Log dives, ID species, relive every underwater adventure. Underwater Photographers — Name your shots and build your own species collection. Liveaboard Travelers — Make the most of every surface interval. Students & Educators — A modern, visual marine field guide for the classroom or the reef. Citizen Scientists — Every sighting you log matters. Curious Explorers — Discover the ocean from anywhere on earth. Fins is your companion for exploration, learning, and conservation. Download Fins and dive smarter.

About

DiveDex

Features
Read full description

**Name what you see underwater — instantly, and completely offline.** DiveDex turns your phone into a live marine-life field guide. Point your camera at a fish, coral, nudibranch or crab and it identifies the species in real time, right on the device. No signal, no account, no uploads — perfect for the boat, the reef, or a remote freshwater lake where there's no bar of reception. Built by a diver, for divers. **IDENTIFY ANYTHING AQUATIC** • Real-time identification from your live camera — just center the creature in the frame. • Powered by the open BioCLIP model running 100% on-device. • Thousands of species across the tree of life: reef and pelagic fish, freshwater fish, corals, nudibranchs, crustaceans, cephalopods, echinoderms and more. • Confidence you can trust — DiveDex captures the clearest, most-confident moment so the ID you save is the one you actually saw. **WORKS 100% OFFLINE** • Everything runs on your phone. Your photos and your location never leave the device. • The species model and reef catalogue download once on first launch; after that you're fully offline. • Add more with free downloadable packs — sharks & rays, nudibranchs, corals, freshwater and more — only what you want. **LOG EVERY DIVE** • Auto-record a dive and see every species you spotted, organised by dive. • An offline gallery of your captures you can browse and revisit any time. **BEAUTIFUL, SHAREABLE ID CARDS** • Every shot becomes a polished 4:5 card — species name, place, and date — ready to post. • Photos are geotagged with your surface location and stamped with a reverse-geocoded place. **CONTRIBUTE TO CITIZEN SCIENCE** • Save a clean, geotagged original ready to submit to iNaturalist. • Cross-check any ID against iNaturalist records near your dive site — a quick sanity check on whether a species is really found where you are. • Your confirmed sightings help build open marine-biodiversity data. **PRIVATE BY DESIGN** • No account. No ads. No tracking. No analytics. • Identification happens entirely on-device; nothing about your dives is uploaded unless you choose to share a photo. DiveDex is a naturalist's tool for curiosity and record-keeping — not a substitute for professional judgement, and never a dive-safety or navigation instrument.

Screenshots

Fins4 screens
DiveDex4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is in-app purchases: DiveDex at none against Fins's 2. Fins's advantage is update cadence (weekly vs every 4 weeks). On price, ads, 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

Both are free to download. Fins sells 2 in-app purchases, starting at $4.99 per month. DiveDex asks for nothing beyond the download.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

Fins ships an update weekly, DiveDex every 4 weeks. The most recent releases landed on October 30, 2026 and November 10, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard2 real differences · 8 level
Fins versus DiveDex: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterFinsDiveDex
PriceFreeFree
Rating4.9 (16 ratings) — better—
Positive reviews100.0% of reviews—
Number of ratings16 — better—
Update frequencyWeekly — betterEvery 4 weeks
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesYesNo — better
MonetizationFreemium—
DevicesiPhoneiPhone
Requires iOS16.016.0
Further details — not scored
Size179 MB89 MB
Age rating17+4+
Developerevan fosterdonarun DAS

In-app purchases

2 purchases

Fins

Subscriptions2
  • Fins Pro Monthly$4.991 Month
  • Fins Pro Yearly7 Days trial$24.991 Year
None

DiveDex

No in-app purchases

Questions

Is Fins free?
Fins is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Is DiveDex free?
DiveDex is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Do Fins or DiveDex have ads?
Neither Fins nor DiveDex shows ads.
Which is updated more often, Fins or DiveDex?
Fins ships an update weekly, and DiveDex every 4 weeks. Most recently, Fins was updated on October 30, 2026 and DiveDex on November 10, 2026.

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