TexSmith vs Reef Chronicles
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
TexSmith
This app offers a complete writing environment for creators. It helps manage projects, capture ideas, and provides a distraction-free space for focused writing from start to finish.
- Project management
- Inspiration recording
- Focused writing mode
- Creative management
- Personal settings
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TexSmith is a comprehensive writing assistant application designed specifically for writers, dedicated to providing users with a focused, efficient writing environment and complete creative management solutions. The application integrates four core functional modules: project management, inspiration recording, focused writing, and personal settings, helping users through the entire writing process from creative inspiration to finished works.
Reef Chronicles
Track aquarium parameters, calculate precise dosing for alkalinity, calcium, and magnesium, and visualize your entire history with detailed charts. This app provides a comprehensive logbook for all your aquarium needs, including tasks, consumables, and livestock management.
- Parameter logging (22 parameters)
- Automated dosing calculations
- Daily consumption analysis
- Full history charting
- Task and reminder management
- Consumables tracking
- CSV import/export
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You test, you write it down, and six months later you still cannot say how much your tank uses in a day. That is the number this works out. It compares what you have dosed against how much the number actually moved, and gives you the daily amount that would hold alkalinity steady. Same for calcium, magnesium and the rest. Everything else is a logbook that stays out of the way. LOGGING 22 parameters. Backdate a test you forgot to enter. "Same as last time" for the ones that never move. A full round takes under a minute, one-handed. DOSING Enter where you are and where you want to be. You get grams or millilitres for your volume and your product, with the arithmetic shown. No conversions on the back of an envelope. It will not give you the whole correction in one go. Alkalinity moving more than 1.4 dKH in a day is how people burn tips off Acropora, so the number is capped whether you like it or not. CHARTS Your whole history, always. No thirty-day window. THE REST Tasks and reminders. Consumables, so you change carbon before it is spent. Livestock, photos, notes. Cycle mode with ammonia and nitrite. CSV in and out, so bring your spreadsheet and take your data with you when you go. THE ANALYSIS The consumption engine wants a few weeks of tests before it says anything, and it will not guess. It discards readings either side of a water change and tells you how much it trusts the answer. It also warns you before a parameter drifts out of range, ramps a dose change across days instead of overnight, puts several parameters on one chart, and answers "what changed?" when something has gone wrong. ALL OF IT IS FREE Unlimited tanks, all your history, every calculator and every piece of the analysis. No tiers, no trial, nothing to buy, nothing that expires. NO ACCOUNT NEEDED It works offline out of the box, and nothing leaves your phone unless you sign in. No ads, no analytics, no tracking, and nothing sold to anyone.
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is review sentiment: Reef Chronicles at 100% against TexSmith's 53%. Reef Chronicles also leads on rating (5.0 vs 4.4) and ads (none vs shown). TexSmith's advantage is ratings volume (419 vs 3). On price, 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
Both are free to download. Neither carries in-app purchases, so what you see is what you pay.
Reef Chronicles holds the better App Store score, 5.0 against 4.4. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: TexSmith has 419 ratings behind it against 3, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews point the same way: 53% of TexSmith's written reviews are positive against 100% of Reef Chronicles's.
| Parameter | TexSmith | Reef Chronicles |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free |
| Rating | 4.4 (419 ratings) | 5.0 (3 ratings) — better |
| Positive reviews | 53.1% of reviews | 100.0% of reviews — better |
| Number of ratings | 419 — better | 3 |
| Update frequency | Every 2 weeks | — |
| Ads | Yes | No — better |
| In-app purchases | No | No |
| Monetization | Ad-supported | Free — better |
| Devices | iPhone, iPad | iPhone, iPad |
| Requires iOS | 16.0 — better | 17.0 |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 52 MB | 10 MB |
| Age rating | 12+ | 4+ |
| Developer | 博博 郎 | TALASTACK LLC |
Customer experience
TexSmith
Reef Chronicles
In-app purchases
TexSmith
No in-app purchases
Reef Chronicles
No in-app purchases








