Comparison

Beat vs PracticePlay

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

Head to head
About

Beat

Develop pitch sensitivity and harmonic awareness through interactive exercises focused on just intonation. Explore intervals and chords, tune by ear, and enhance your musical listening skills in a focused environment. Ideal for musicians seeking to refine their understanding of pure tuning relationships.

Highlights
  • Interactive interval training
  • Chord tuning and harmonic awareness
  • Progressive ear-training exercises
  • Customizable interval and chord building
  • Focus on just intonation
  • Designed for real musical environments
Features
Read full description

Core Features Interactive Interval Training Develop sensitivity to pitch relationships by exploring intervals tuned using just intonation. • Hear intervals begin perfectly aligned • Adjust pitch in real time to hear beats appear and disappear • Tune intervals by ear using guided listening exercises • Practice intervals across multiple keys and registers Chord Tuning and Harmonic Awareness Understand how scale degrees shape harmony by exploring chords built from pure tuning relationships. • Major, minor, diminished, and augmented triads • Seventh chords including dominant, major, minor, half-diminished, and fully diminished • Isolate chord tones to hear how each pitch affects resonance • Adjust individual notes to hear chords stabilize or destabilize Challenge Mode Strengthen listening accuracy through progressive ear-training exercises. • Tune intervals by ear with adjustable difficulty levels • Customize time limits and precision targets • Unlock intervals through guided progression • Track improvement and share results with teachers or directors Lab Mode Experiment freely with pitch relationships and harmonic structure. • Build custom intervals, chords, or harmonic textures • Assign independent tuning values to each pitch • Explore consonance, dissonance, and overtone interaction Designed for Real Musical Environments In rehearsals and performances, musicians rarely hear themselves in isolation. Beat-Less Tuning removes ensemble noise and allows you to focus on deliberate listening, helping you build reliable tuning instincts that translate directly into real musical situations. This app is ideal for: • Band and orchestra students • Choir and vocal ensemble singers (especially Straight-Tone singing) • Drum corps and marching musicians • Barbershop and a cappella performers • Music educators and ensemble directors Why Just Intonation? Most modern instruments use equal temperament, which balances pitch across all keys but slightly compromises many intervals. Beat-Less Tuning introduces just intonation, where intervals follow natural harmonic ratios that create clarity, depth, and resonance. The listening skills developed in this app strengthen tuning awareness in any musical tuning system. Built by Musicians and Educators Beat-Less Tuning was created by Grammy Finalist and Recording Academy Music Educator of the Year Jeremy Bradstreet, in collaboration with software developer Noirit Ghosh Choudhuri. Together they combined decades of teaching experience and advanced software design to create a powerful and intuitive listening tool for musicians at every level. Train your ears. Build your sound. Hear music more clearly.

About

PracticePlay

This app automatically records and replays your musical practice sessions hands-free. It intelligently listens for instruments, capturing only your playing to help you focus on improving your sound and technique. Analyze your performance with playback speed and pitch adjustments.

Highlights
  • Hands-free recording
  • Automatic playback
  • Instrument sound recognition
  • Session library
  • Playback speed and pitch control
  • Share recordings
Features
Read full description

Stop fumbling for the record, stop, and play buttons. PracticePlay automatically listens, records, and plays back your musical practice sessions hands-free so you can focus on actively hearing yourself and improving your sound, technique, and musicality. “I can’t think of a more helpful app for both teaching and performing. The ability to truly hear exactly what you sound like is the greatest benefit of all.” —Ryan Gardner, Professor of Trumpet, University of Colorado Boulder “PracticePlay is a dream come true: an intuitive tool with hands-free recording and automatic playback for reflective, efficient, and meaningful deep practice.” —Wiff Rudd, Professor of Trumpet, Baylor University Practice without thinking about technology. PracticePlay listens for your instrument, records every take you play, and stays out of the way the rest of the time. Whatever the environment, it just works. Conversations, instruction from a teacher, lesson notes spoken aloud, ambient noise from your home—none of it triggers a recording. PracticePlay’s on-device sound model recognizes musical instruments specifically, so the only takes in your library are the ones you actually played. WHY MUSICIANS LOVE IT • Never miss a take. The breakthroughs you didn’t expect to record? They’re already saved. • Practice with full attention. No tapping a record button between phrases, no audio editing afterward. • Compare progress over time. Every session is in your Library, organized by date and searchable by name. • Keep the takes that matter. Name and star your best recordings, and let PracticePlay clear out the old ones you never marked. • Listen back with intent. Adjust playback speed and pitch for analysis. FOR SOLO PRACTICE IN THE WOODSHED The phone sits ten feet away on the music stand. You play. It records. You stop. You hear yourself. You play again. With rest while listening you’ll improve faster without burning yourself out. FOR CHAMBER MUSIC AND ENSEMBLE REHEARSALS The app sits in the back of the room and earns its place by knowing when not to act. The whole group hears how they sound together and starts making improvements immediately. FOR LESSONS AND MASTERCLASSES PracticePlay sits in like a quiet assistant. It captures every excerpt the moment the student plays, then steps aside while the teacher and student talk it through. The next recording begins on the next note. FOR AUDITION TAKES Take back-to-back recordings without walking over to your device. Play, listen back, adjust, play another take. Hear exactly what the panel will hear before they hear it. FEATURES • Listens for music—ignores everything else • Records the moment you start playing • Replays automatically when you stop • Saves every session to your Library • Name, star, search, and filter your recordings • Select several at once to share, rename, star, or delete • Optional auto-cleanup of old recordings (starred and named ones are always kept) • Waveform scrubbing with speed and pitch controls • Works with any mic or speaker • Share recordings or whole sessions straight from the app • Native apps for iPhone, iPad, and Mac No record button. Just play. PracticePlay does the rest! TRY IT FOR FREE When you’re ready, the full app is yours forever with a one-time $9.99 purchase. No subscriptions. No accounts. No ads. Pay ONCE and use it on EVERY iPhone, iPad, and Mac you own. Family Sharing supported. (Prices shown in this description are in USD. Exact price may vary by region based on current exchange rates. Payment will be charged to your Apple ID Account at confirmation of purchase. Devices using the same Apple ID can share the purchase.) Questions? Need help? Send us a message at hey@practiceplay.app.

Screenshots

Beat4 screens
PracticePlay4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is price: PracticePlay at Free against Beat's $4.99. PracticePlay also leads on ratings volume (22 vs 3). Beat's advantage is in-app purchases (none vs 1) and iOS requirement (15.1 vs 17.0). On rating, review sentiment, ads and monetization model 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

PracticePlay is free to download; Beat costs $4.99 up front. PracticePlay sells 1 one-off in-app purchase. Beat 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 Beat against 5.0 for PracticePlay. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: PracticePlay has 22 ratings behind it against 3, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews split almost evenly too, at 100% and 100% positive.

Scorecard4 real differences · 6 level
Beat versus PracticePlay: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterBeatPracticePlay
Price$4.99Free — better
Rating5.0 (3 ratings)5.0 (22 ratings)
Positive reviews100.0% of reviews100.0% of reviews
Number of ratings322 — better
Update frequency—Fortnightly
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesNo — betterYes
MonetizationPaidPaid
DevicesiPhone, iPad, iPodiPhone, iPad, Mac
Requires iOS15.1 — better17.0
Further details — not scored
Size223 MB9 MB
Age rating4+4+
DeveloperJeremy BradstreetOne Good Idea, LLC

Customer experience

Beat

All ratings3 ratings
Positive100.0%
Neutral0.0%
Negative0.0%
Written reviews2 reviews
Positive100.0%
Neutral0.0%
Negative0.0%

PracticePlay

All ratings22 ratings
Positive100.0%
Neutral0.0%
Negative0.0%
Written reviews14 reviews
Positive100.0%
Neutral0.0%
Negative0.0%

In-app purchases

None

Beat

No in-app purchases

1 purchases

PracticePlay

One-time1
  • Unlock Unlimited Recording$9.99

Questions

Is Beat free?
Beat costs $4.99, with no in-app purchases.
Is PracticePlay free?
PracticePlay is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Which has better reviews, Beat or PracticePlay?
Beat and PracticePlay are both rated 5.0 out of 5 on the App Store, from 3 and 22 ratings respectively.
Do Beat or PracticePlay have ads?
Neither Beat nor PracticePlay shows ads.

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