Smolcam vs xelka
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
Smolcam
This app offers a customizable retro camera experience with a variety of color palettes and dithering options. It provides a simple, distraction-free interface for capturing and saving photos instantly to your library.
- Customizable retro aesthetic
- Multiple color palettes (3-bit to 24-bit)
- Bayer ordered dithering option
- Zoom support for all device cameras
- Instant save to photo library
- Distraction-free interface
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Smolcam transforms your iPhone into a small, lightweight camera with a customizable retro aesthetic. Features: - Completely free: no ads or in-app purchases - Choose from 8 colors (3-bit) to 16 million (24-bit) color palettes - Enable Bayer ordered dithering, or blue noise dithering for increased detail at low bit depths - Supports zooming through all the cameras your phone has - Instant save to photo library - Simple distraction-free interface that runs smoothly on any device and won't kill your battery
xelka
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Turn any photo into gorgeous, hand-crafted pixel art. xelka is a pixel-art camera built on a real quantization + dithering engine — not a cheap overlay filter. Point it at the world for a live pixel viewfinder, or import any photo and watch it snap into a limited retro palette. • 11 iconic styles — retro handheld greens, vibrant fantasy-console palettes, home-computer 16-color, CRT phosphor, 1-bit ink, Sweetie 16, Modern Clean and more • Real-time pixel-art camera preview (front & back) • Record pixel-art video and export animated GIFs • Fine-tune contrast, saturation, brightness and pixel size • Ordered & Floyd–Steinberg dithering for authentic texture • One-tap share to any app; save to your library • Fully on-device — no account, no ads, no tracking Unlock xelka Pro once to remove the watermark and open every style plus video & GIF export. One-time purchase, no subscription.
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is in-app purchases: Smolcam at none against xelka's 1. Smolcam also leads on iOS requirement (16.0 vs 18.0). xelka's advantage is update cadence (every 2 months vs every 8 months). On price, ads and device support 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. xelka sells 1 one-off in-app purchase. Smolcam asks for nothing beyond the download.
Smolcam ships an update every 8 months, xelka every 2 months. The most recent releases landed on November 9, 2026 and November 5, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | Smolcam | xelka |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free |
| Rating | 5.0 (1 ratings) — better | — |
| Number of ratings | 1 — better | — |
| Update frequency | Every 8 months | Every 2 months — better |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | No — better | Yes |
| Monetization | Free | — |
| Devices | iPhone | iPhone, iPad — better |
| Requires iOS | 16.0 — better | 18.0 |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 1 MB | 3 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 4+ |
| Developer | Jasper Morgal | Jaemin Kim |
In-app purchases
Smolcam
No in-app purchases
xelka
- xelka Pro$0.99









