Comparison

Hyphen vs Slips

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

Head to head
About

Hyphen

This minimalist app allows for quick capture of daily thoughts, tasks, and moments. It organizes entries by day and provides a visual timeline of your year, highlighting days with more activity. Notes are automatically timestamped and can be entered via typing or voice.

Highlights
  • Quick entry via typing or voice
  • Automatic timestamping
  • Visual year-in-a-glance timeline
  • Smart grouping of related notes
  • Secure cross-device syncing
  • Private and inaccessible by developer
Features
Read full description

Hyphen is a quiet place for the details you would otherwise lose. Write a sentence, list, quotation, decision, observation, or full page. Every note belongs to its day, so you can move naturally through time and return by date, month, year, Chronicle, or search. WRITE WITHOUT FRICTION Capture a quick thought in place. Expand into the full editor when the thought becomes something larger. MARKDOWN MADE FOR IPHONE Use headings, emphasis, lists, checklists, quotations, links, and code without hunting through the iOS keyboard for punctuation. SEE YOUR DAYS TAKE SHAPE Move naturally between Day, Month, and Year, and view time as a quiet record of activity. Hyphen shows continuity without turning your writing into a streak game. FIND WHAT YOU WROTE Search your writing, browse Chronicle, and move directly back to the day where a thought belongs.

About

Slips

This app offers a streamlined note-taking experience with a maximum of five customizable notes. Personalize each note with icons and colors, and sync them seamlessly across all your Apple devices. It provides rich text formatting and quick access options.

Highlights
  • Five customizable notes
  • iCloud synchronization
  • Rich text formatting
  • Home/Lock Screen widgets
  • Share sheet integration
  • Mac app support
Features
Read full description

Slips — Five notes, made yours Five slips. That's all. Slips is a notes app built on a simple idea: five fixed notes are enough for the things you actually return to, and few enough that you always know where everything is. No folders to organize, no archive to dig through, no blank-page guilt. Pick a slip and write. MADE YOURS Name each slip, choose an icon from hundreds of symbols, and give it a color. Groceries, Books, Trips, Meds, Faith, Projects, whatever your five are. Reorder them any time. ALWAYS IN SYNC Your slips live in your own private iCloud and stay current on iPhone, iPad, and Mac. Edit on one device, and it's on the others. Nothing is collected, nothing is tracked, and there are no accounts to create. BACKED UP, JUST IN CASE Every device quietly saves a daily backup of your slips, keeping the last three. Restoring takes one tap, and a safety copy is made first, so even a restore can be undone. You can also export your slips to a file and keep it anywhere. RICH WHERE IT COUNTS Bold, italic, underline, highlight, headers, bulleted and numbered lists, tap-to-check checklists, dividers, and links that turn into preview cards. FAST WAYS IN Add to a slip from any app with the share sheet. Automate with Siri and Shortcuts. Put a slip on your Home Screen or Lock Screen with widgets, or capture instantly from Control Center. AT HOME ON THE MAC A real Mac app: your slips in the sidebar, formatting in the menu bar, Cmd+1 through Cmd+5 to switch slips, an optional menu bar icon, and sharing straight from Safari. SIMPLE PRICING Try a single Slip for free forever. Slips Plus unlocks all five. One purchase covers iPhone, iPad, and Mac, and is shareable with your family. Slips Plus subscriptions renew automatically until canceled in your App Store account settings, at least 24 hours before the current period ends. Lifetime is a one-time purchase. Privacy policy: https://mattlangford.com/slips-privacy Terms of use: Apple's standard EULA Support: https://mattlangford.com/slips-support

Screenshots

Hyphen4 screens
Slips4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is in-app purchases: Hyphen at none against Slips's 3. Hyphen also leads on update cadence (every 2 days vs weekly) and ratings volume (7 vs 1). On price, rating, review sentiment 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

CostPrice · In-app purchases · Ads · Monetization

Both are free to download. Slips sells 3 in-app purchases, starting at $1.99 per month. Hyphen asks for nothing beyond the download.

ReceptionRating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings

On the App Store both sit at effectively the same score — 5.0 for Hyphen against 5.0 for Slips. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: Hyphen has 7 ratings behind it against 1, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews split almost evenly too, at 100% and 100% positive.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

Hyphen ships an update every 2 days, Slips weekly. The most recent releases landed on September 21, 2026 and September 19, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard5 real differences · 5 level
Hyphen versus Slips: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterHyphenSlips
PriceFreeFree
Rating5.0 (7 ratings)5.0 (1 ratings)
Positive reviews100.0% of reviews100.0% of reviews
Number of ratings7 — better1
Update frequencyEvery 2 days — betterWeekly
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesNo — betterYes
MonetizationFree — betterFree with in-app purchases
DevicesiPhone, iPadiPhone, iPad, Mac — better
Requires iOS18.0 — better26.0
Further details — not scored
Size4 MB22 MB
Age rating4+4+
DeveloperCHRISTOPH J WHITELAMMatthew Langford

Customer experience

Hyphen

All ratings7 ratings
Positive100.0%
Neutral0.0%
Negative0.0%
Written reviews1 reviews
Positive100.0%
Neutral0.0%
Negative0.0%

Slips

All ratings1 ratings
Positive100.0%
Neutral0.0%
Negative0.0%
Written reviews2 reviews
Positive100.0%
Neutral0.0%
Negative0.0%

In-app purchases

None

Hyphen

No in-app purchases

3 purchases

Slips

Subscriptions2
  • Slips Monthly$1.991 Month
  • Slips Yearly$14.991 Year
One-time1
  • Slips Lifetime$49.99

Questions

Is Hyphen free?
Hyphen is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Is Slips free?
Slips is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Which has better reviews, Hyphen or Slips?
Hyphen and Slips are both rated 5.0 out of 5 on the App Store, from 7 and 1 ratings respectively.
Do Hyphen or Slips have ads?
Neither Hyphen nor Slips shows ads.
Which is updated more often, Hyphen or Slips?
Hyphen ships an update every 2 days, and Slips weekly. Most recently, Hyphen was updated on September 21, 2026 and Slips on September 19, 2026.

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