Comparison

Orca IDE vs NomadCode

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

Head to head
About

Orca IDE

This app mirrors your desktop terminal sessions, including AI agent interactions, directly to your iPhone. It provides full keyboard input and multi-terminal support for seamless remote coding management. All processing remains on your desktop, ensuring your data stays secure.

Highlights
  • Live desktop terminal mirror
  • AI agent session management
  • Full keyboard input
  • Multi-worktree, multi-terminal support
  • Phone-fit zoom and smart keyboard
  • Background command execution
  • End-to-end encrypted pairing
Features
Read full description

Orca Mobile is the companion app for Orca, the open-source agentic coding workspace for macOS, Linux, and Windows. Pair your iPhone to your desktop in seconds and pick up a terminal session from the couch, the kitchen, or across the office. WHAT IT DOES • Live mirror of your desktop terminal, including running AI agent sessions (Claude Code, Codex, custom CLIs). • Full keyboard input — type, tab-complete, Ctrl-C, scroll back, all from the phone. • Multi-worktree, multi-terminal: jump between projects with a tap. • Phone-fit zoom and a smart on-screen keyboard with quick Ctrl/Alt accessory keys and shortcuts. • Background long-running commands and get a notification when a TUI goes idle (e.g. when Claude finishes thinking). HOW IT WORKS Orca Mobile is a thin client. Nothing runs on your phone except the viewer. Your code, your shells, your AI agents — all of that stays on your desktop. The phone shows you what's happening and forwards your keystrokes back over an encrypted local-network connection. Pairing is end-to-end encrypted. Your desktop generates a one-time keypair and shows a QR code; you scan it from the app. After that, all traffic between phone and desktop is sealed with that pair's keys. PRIVACY • No analytics SDK, no crash reporter, no third-party SDKs of any kind in the iOS app. • Pairing tokens and your preference list live in the app's own sandbox. The app's traffic to your desktop is end-to-end encrypted on your local network only. • The Orca desktop app collects anonymized usage metrics per the policy at https://www.onorca.dev/privacy. The mobile app itself does not. • Open source: every line is auditable at https://github.com/stablyai/orca. REQUIREMENTS • An iPhone (iOS 16+) on the same Wi-Fi as your desktop. • The Orca desktop app, free, from https://www.onorca.dev/ or https://github.com/stablyai/orca/releases.

About

NomadCode

Access and manage your remote machines, including servers and NAS, directly from your phone. Utilize AI coding agents for development tasks, share access with trusted individuals, and perform real-time system monitoring and file transfers.

Highlights
  • AI coding agent integration (Claude Code, Codex, Gemini, etc.)
  • Persistent SSH sessions
  • File transfer via SFTP and SMB
  • Remote desktop access (VNC)
  • Customizable SSH terminal with hardware keyboard support
  • Secure key management (iOS Keychain)
  • Agent sharing with access control
Features
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Your work lives on your own machines. Nomad lets you reach it from your phone — and keeps it running while you are away. Start something on your Mac, your Linux box, your NAS or a cloud server. Lock the screen, get on a train, change networks: the session stays alive on the machine, not on the phone. Open the app again and you are exactly where you left off. WORK WITH AI CODING AGENTS Claude Code, Codex, Gemini, Cursor, OpenCode, Hermes and others run on your computer, signed in with your own accounts and keys. Nomad turns them into a chat you can follow from anywhere. • Send a photo, a screenshot or a video with your prompt • Tap a file path in a reply to open the file • Queue the next instruction, approve a permission request, pause or cancel a turn • Put several agents in one conversation and @mention whoever takes the next task SHARE YOUR AGENT WITH FAMILY AND FRIENDS Let the people you trust chat with your agent too. They scan a one-time QR code or open an invitation link, and they only join after you approve them. You choose whether they can chat and how much history they see, and you can pause or revoke access at any time. Creating a share requires signing in; recipients do not need an account. REACH THE WHOLE MACHINE, NOT JUST THE CHAT When an agent finishes a change you still have to restart the service, read the log, check the port, look at the screen and pull the file down. That is all here too. • A real SSH terminal, with a customisable key bar and hardware-keyboard support • Files over SFTP and SMB: browse, transfer, preview, edit • A remote desktop over VNC, with trackpad or direct pointer and Retina scaling • Port forwarding, ping, traceroute, LAN scan, and live CPU, memory and disk YOUR MACHINES, YOUR KEYS Passwords and private keys stay in the iOS Keychain and never leave the device. Nomad connects straight to your hosts over SSH — nothing in between, no server of ours in the path. Terminal output, chat content, commands and file contents are never collected. Signing in with Apple, Google, or GitHub is optional — it syncs only non-secret settings between your own devices, and is required only to share an agent. Nomad needs a computer to connect to: a Mac, a Linux server, a NAS or a cloud VM you can reach over SSH.

Screenshots

Orca IDE4 screens
NomadCode4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is rating: NomadCode at 5.0 against Orca IDE's 4.6. Orca IDE's advantage is ratings volume (32 vs 1) and update cadence (every 3 days vs every 9 days). On price, ads, in-app purchases 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

Both are free to download. Neither carries in-app purchases, so what you see is what you pay.

ReceptionRating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings

NomadCode holds the better App Store score, 5.0 against 4.6. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: Orca IDE has 32 ratings behind it against 1, so its average is the more settled of the two.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

Orca IDE ships an update every 3 days, NomadCode every 9 days. The most recent releases landed on October 11, 2026 and October 7, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard6 real differences · 5 level
Orca IDE versus NomadCode: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterOrca IDENomadCode
PriceFreeFree
Rating4.6 (32 ratings)5.0 (1 ratings) — better
Positive reviews87.9% of reviews—
Number of ratings32 — better1
Update frequencyEvery 3 days — betterEvery 9 days
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesNoNo
MonetizationFreeFree
Best chart rank#18 — better—
DevicesiPhone, iPad, iPod — betteriPhone
Requires iOS15.1 — better17.0
Further details — not scored
Size41 MB25 MB
Age rating4+4+
DeveloperLovecast LLCYong Guo

Customer experience

Orca IDE

All ratings32 ratings
Positive87.5%
Neutral9.4%
Negative3.1%
Written reviews33 reviews
Positive87.9%
Neutral9.1%
Negative3.0%

NomadCode

All ratings1 ratings
Positive100.0%
Neutral0.0%
Negative0.0%

In-app purchases

None

Orca IDE

No in-app purchases

None

NomadCode

No in-app purchases

Questions

Is Orca IDE free?
Orca IDE is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Is NomadCode free?
NomadCode is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Which has better reviews, Orca IDE or NomadCode?
NomadCode is rated higher. Orca IDE averages 4.6 out of 5 from 32 ratings, while NomadCode averages 5.0 from 1 ratings.
Do Orca IDE or NomadCode have ads?
Neither Orca IDE nor NomadCode shows ads.
Which is updated more often, Orca IDE or NomadCode?
Orca IDE ships an update every 3 days, and NomadCode every 9 days. Most recently, Orca IDE was updated on October 11, 2026 and NomadCode on October 7, 2026.

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