Compass Retro vs Luopan Compass

A full-screen, photo-realistic retro compass fills your display, recreating the look and feel of a classic analog instrument. When you hold your device flat, the needle smoothly aligns to true north, turning your phone into a dedicated, intuitive navigation tool. The app supports both light and dark themes, each with its own carefully crafted photograph: in light mode, the compass rests in bright, daytime lighting; in dark mode, it's bathed in the warm glow of an evening sunset. This app is purpose-built for one thing only-being a beautiful, reliable compass-with no extra screens, menus, or distracting features.

Luopan brings the ancient Chinese geomantic compass to your iPhone. Whether you practise feng shui, study the I Ching, or simply want a beautifully rendered directional tool, Luopan gives you a faithful multi-ring compass that responds in real time to the way you hold your device. The rotating dial mirrors a traditional luopan with four concentric rings rendered in SwiftUI Canvas. The innermost lacquer circle holds a classic red-and-silver magnetic needle. Surrounding it are the eight trigrams (Ba Gua) of the I Ching in the Later Heaven arrangement, then the 24 Mountains (Er Shi Si Shan) with both Chinese characters and pinyin transliterations, and finally a precision degree-tick ring calibrated to one-degree intervals. Key features: - Live compass heading with smooth spring animation - 24 Mountains ring — active sector highlighted in gold as you rotate - 8 Trigrams ring with element-coloured Unicode symbols and Chinese names - Degree-tick ring with major (10°) and minor (5°/1°) tick marks - True North / Magnetic North toggle for location-aware correction - Level indicator showing pitch and roll for horizontal placement - Save directions as named bookmarks with sitting (坐) and facing (向) notation - Share any reading as plain text - Calibration guide for accurate magnetometer readings - Fully customisable rings — hide any layer for a cleaner view - Dark mode support with adaptive gold and lacquer theme - Haptic feedback on mountain sector crossings