Manuscript Study Bible vs Marginalis
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
Manuscript Study Bible
This app provides a Bible translation based exclusively on the earliest manuscript evidence and scholarly consensus, removing texts not attributed to original authors. It allows users to browse original manuscripts behind each verse and experience the text as it was originally written.
- Authentic Bible translation
- Based on earliest manuscript evidence
- Removes unverified texts
- Browse original manuscripts
- Manuscript Mode for original reading experience
- Scholarly consensus curation
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Every Bible on the market includes texts that scholars have proven were not written by who they claim. The Manuscript Study Bible is the first to remove them. Built on the KO3 Codex, this is the only Bible app in existence curated exclusively from earliest manuscript evidence and scholarly consensus. Not church councils. Not tradition. Evidence. WHAT IS INSIDE: All 4 original Gospels: Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. The 7 authenticated Pauline letters that scholars universally agree Paul actually wrote: Romans, 1 Corinthians, 2 Corinthians, Galatians, Philippians, 1 Thessalonians, and Philemon. 1 Clement, a letter originally included alongside scripture in Codex Alexandrinus (~400 AD) and later removed to protect man-made church hierarchies. Nothing else made the cut. If it could not be verified, it is not here. WHAT IS NOT INSIDE (AND WHY): No Old Testament. The Dead Sea Scrolls proved that scribes were adding material to Old Testament books for centuries, inserting phrases like "thus says the LORD" to give human additions divine authority. Jewish scribal tradition itself admits to at least 18 deliberate changes to the Hebrew text. Multiple competing text traditions (Masoretic, Septuagint, Samaritan, Dead Sea Scroll variants) prove there was never one authoritative Old Testament text. Christ fulfilled the law (Matthew 5:17) and Paul called it obsolete (Galatians 3:23-25). The original manuscripts are gone. What survives cannot be verified. No 1 Timothy, 2 Timothy, or Titus. Scholarly consensus identifies these as pseudepigrapha, not written by Paul. No Ephesians, Colossians, or 2 Thessalonians. Disputed authorship with majority scholarly opinion leaning against Pauline origin. No 2 Peter. Nearly universally recognized as one of the latest and least authentic texts in the New Testament. No Revelation. No Hebrews. If it cannot be traced to a verified author or the earliest manuscript tradition, it was excluded. MANUSCRIPT VAULT: Browse the actual manuscripts behind every verse. P46 (~175-225 AD), the earliest collection of Pauline letters. P66 (~200 AD), one of the oldest copies of the Gospel of John. P75 (~175-225 AD), containing Luke and John. Codex Sinaiticus (~330-360 AD) and Codex Vaticanus (~300-325 AD), two of the most complete early manuscripts in existence. Every verse shows which manuscript it comes from and when that manuscript was written. You see the evidence. You decide. MANUSCRIPT MODE: No other Bible app has this. Manuscript Mode strips away the verse numbers, chapter breaks, and formatting that were added centuries after the text was written. The original manuscripts had none of that. The apostles never read numbered verses. Christ never opened a chapter. These were pages of papyrus with continuous lines of Greek text, read straight through the way any letter or document would be read. Manuscript Mode recreates that experience. You read the text the way the people who wrote it and the people who first received it actually read it. No artificial breaks. No imposed structure. Just the words as they were originally set down. It is the most authentic Bible reading experience. Ever WHY THIS EXISTS: For 1,700 years, every major Bible translation has been filtered through the theological conclusions of the Council of Nicaea (325 AD). Translators chose words that supported those conclusions, even when the original Greek allowed for other meanings. The Manuscript Study Bible goes back before that filter. It presents the text as the earliest manuscripts recorded it, with the tools to study the original languages yourself. No agenda. No interpretation forced on you. Just the manuscripts
Marginalis
This app helps you capture and organize highlights from physical books. It allows you to save quotes, ideas, and summaries, and track your reading habits. Enjoy private AI-powered book summaries and share your favorite passages.
- Capture highlights with Live Text
- Organize books into custom lists
- Five types of notes (quote, idea, etc.)
- Share passages as image cards
- Reading activity insights
- On-device AI book summaries
- Home Screen widget for quotes
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Every great book leaves a mark. Marginalis makes sure you never lose it. A reading journal for physical book readers — capture highlights, organise your library, and revisit the passages that changed how you think. Capture quotes without the friction Point your camera at any page. iOS Live Text does the rest — your highlight is captured in seconds, no typing, no losing your place. Prefer to highlight in other apps? Send any selected text straight to Marginalis from Kindle, Apple Books, Safari, or anywhere with a share sheet. Five kinds of notes, because not every thought is the same Quote. Idea. Question. Reaction. Summary. Each note type gives your thinking room to breathe — and makes it easy to find exactly what you were looking for when you come back. Your library, the way you actually read Organise books across Reading, Up Next, Wishlist, and Finished. Browse by genre or reading status. Add any title by scanning its barcode, searching by name, or entering it manually. Cover images fetch automatically. Share the passages that moved you Turn any note into a beautiful image card — paper or editorial style, portrait or square. Edit inline, then share anywhere. Because some quotes deserve more than a screenshot. Explore your reading with AI Synthesis lets you have a real conversation with your reading. Select books or tags, then ask anything — what themes keep coming back, what tensions you noticed, what remains unresolved. Your reading assistant answers from your own notes, citing exactly where each idea came from. When something is worth keeping, save it as a permanent insight. On supported devices, Marginalis can also generate an intelligent summary of your notes for any book — powered by Apple Intelligence, processed entirely on your iPhone. Understand your reading life A heatmap of your annotation activity. Note type breakdowns. Most highlighted books. Favourite authors. A tag cloud built from your own words. Marginalis reflects your reading back to you in ways that are actually interesting. Your favourite quotes, on your Home Screen The Marginalis widget brings a daily highlight to your iPhone's Home Screen — a small reminder of why you read. Seamless iCloud sync Your library and notes sync automatically across your devices via iCloud. Private, seamless, requiring nothing beyond your Apple ID. Built for privacy, from the ground up No account required. No subscription. No analytics. No advertising SDKs. Your library, your notes, and your reading life belong entirely to you. Free to start. Yours forever. Marginalis is free to download. Up to 5 books, unlimited notes, every feature available to try. A one-time unlock gives you unlimited books, Markdown export, and full reading stats. No subscription. Ever. Reading that leaves a mark.
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Verdict
The clearest difference is monetization model: Manuscript Study Bible at free against Marginalis's free with in-app purchases. Marginalis's advantage is update cadence (every 5 weeks vs every 4 months) and iOS requirement (17.0 vs 26.0). On price, rating, ratings volume and ads 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. Manuscript Study Bible sells 3 one-off in-app purchases and Marginalis sells 1 one-off in-app purchase. Whichever you choose, the download price is not the number that matters.
On the App Store both sit at effectively the same score — 5.0 for Manuscript Study Bible against 5.0 for Marginalis. Both are backed by a comparable volume of ratings — 2 and 3 respectively.
Manuscript Study Bible ships an update every 4 months, Marginalis every 5 weeks. The most recent releases landed on October 1, 2026 and October 8, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | Manuscript Study Bible | Marginalis |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free |
| Rating | 5.0 (2 ratings) | 5.0 (3 ratings) |
| Number of ratings | 2 | 3 — better |
| Update frequency | Every 4 months | Every 5 weeks — better |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | Yes | Yes |
| Monetization | Free — better | Free with in-app purchases |
| Devices | iPhone, iPad — better | iPhone |
| Requires iOS | 26.0 | 17.0 — better |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 15 MB | 8 MB |
| Age rating | 12+ | 4+ |
| Developer | Kenneth Schmidt | TIAGO KHZOUZ SANCHEZ |
Customer experience
Manuscript Study Bible
Marginalis
In-app purchases
Manuscript Study Bible
- 5$$4.99
- 20$$19.99
- 70$$69.99
Marginalis
- Marginalis Unlock$4.99
Questions
Is Manuscript Study Bible free?
Is Marginalis free?
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