Comparison

Argus vs cool

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

Head to head
About

Argus

This app transforms your iPhone into a comprehensive counter-surveillance tool. It helps users detect hidden cameras, listening devices, and trackers in various locations with a structured sweep protocol and multiple detection methods.

Highlights
  • Six independent detection methods
  • Optical lens reflection scan
  • Infrared light source detection
  • WiFi network audit
  • Bluetooth Low Energy scan
  • Magnetic field meter
  • Guided room presets
Features
Read full description

Argus is a counter-surveillance field instrument for iPhone. It turns your phone into a six-tool sweep kit for travelers, hosts, parents and privacy-minded users — built to check any room for hidden cameras, listening devices, BLE trackers and rogue WiFi nodes in roughly three minutes. Most "spy detector" apps do one trick (a magnetometer dial in a fake radar UI) and call it a day. Argus rejects that model. It chains real iPhone sensors into a structured sweep protocol that mirrors how counter-surveillance teams actually inspect a room. — WHAT MAKES ARGUS DIFFERENT — ◉ A real protocol, not a single trick Six independent detection methods, each surfacing a different class of threat. Every reading folds into a structured dossier. ◉ Six instruments, one workflow Optical lens reflection, infrared light source, WiFi network audit, Bluetooth Low Energy scan, magnetic field meter, maximum-brightness flashlight beacon. All driven by real iPhone telemetry. ◉ Guided room presets Six location presets — Hotel, Airbnb / Vrbo, Office, Bathroom, Changing Room, General — each walks you step by step through where to point, what to listen for and what to flag. ◉ Threat Map (unique to Argus) Every sweep is geotagged and pinned on a MapKit view, color-coded by threat level. Browse every hotel, rental and venue you've checked. Useful for frequent travelers and hosts auditing their own units. ◉ Sweep Dossier reports Each sweep produces a shareable PDF report (safety score, flagged devices, timestamps, findings). Records live on-device. ◉ Field Manual built in Real counter-surveillance tradecraft — how spy cameras hide, how to spot them, your legal rights, what to do if you find one. Researched content, not filler. ◉ Privacy by design No account. No cloud sync. No telemetry. The app works fully offline. Useful in hotel WiFi situations where you don't want to broadcast what you're doing. — INSTRUMENT REFERENCE — ◉ Optical Lens Scan — flags reflective glints from camera lenses hidden in mirrors, smoke detectors, vents and décor. ◉ Infrared Detector — surfaces invisible IR light sources from night-vision spy cameras via the front sensor. ◉ WiFi Network Audit — enumerates every device on the local network and flags unknown vendors and rogue cameras. ◉ Bluetooth RF Sweep — discovers BLE transmitters in the 2.4 GHz band, including Bluetooth item trackers and BLE bugs. ◉ EMF Magnetic Meter — baseline + peak detection of magnetic anomalies from electronics hidden behind walls and furniture. ◉ Flashlight Beacon — maximum-brightness mode for manual lens-glint inspection. — QUICK SCAN PRESETS — Hotel Room · Airbnb / Vrbo · Office · Bathroom · Changing Room · General. Each preset chains the relevant instruments into one dossier. — WHO ARGUS IS FOR — • Travelers checking hotel rooms before unpacking • Airbnb / Vrbo guests auditing short-term rentals • Hosts inspecting their own properties • Parents checking rooms, dorms or daycares • Anyone in shared housing, gyms or rentals • Privacy-conscious professionals on the road — IMPORTANT — No consumer app can guarantee 100% detection of every hidden camera or covert device. Argus is a supplementary tool that helps a careful user inspect a room more thoroughly than they could unaided. Use Argus to sharpen awareness, structure the sweep, and create a record — not to replace common sense. — PRO ACCESS — Unlimited sweeps, all six room presets, PDF dossier export, ad-free. Weekly, yearly or lifetime. — LEGAL — Terms of Use: https://pnkl26.web.app/terms-of-service Privacy Policy: https://pnkl26.web.app/privacy-policy — SUPPORT — pnkhanhlinh0206@gmail.com

About

cool

Features
Read full description

cool-radar turns the radios already inside your iPhone into a radar for the devices around you — with no extra hardware, and without inventing a single number. WHAT YOU SEE Nearby Bluetooth LE devices appear as contacts with an estimated distance, a bearing once there is enough geometry to support one, and a ranked guess at what each device actually is. The Wi-Fi card shows the link your phone is really on: type, interface, local address and subnet, the default gateway and the gateway's manufacturer. Where both ends have UWB hardware, distance stops being an estimate and becomes a measurement. HONEST BY DESIGN Every value carries a badge. "Measured" is a hardware reading. "Inferred" is a value the math derived. Distances read "≈ 4.5 m" because radio ranging is an estimate, not a ruler. When there is not enough geometry for a direction, the app draws a ring of possible positions and a question mark instead of a convincing-looking arrow. And when iOS simply does not expose something — neighbouring Wi-Fi networks, raw spectrum, Wi-Fi CSI — the app says so instead of filling the gap with fiction. THE MATH INSIDE • Log-distance path-loss inversion, with a per-device exponent that recalibrates itself from the geometry you walk • Kalman filtering with motion-gated noise, so a device that is standing still stops drifting on screen • Robust multilateration with Huber weights, so a single reflection off a wall cannot drag a position across the room • A naive-Bayes hypothesis engine that ranks device types from the broadcast name, company ID, advertised GATT services, transmit power, address policy and advertising cadence — and shows you the evidence behind every guess • Behaviour analytics over the signal time series: advertising interval, jitter, trend and periodicity • Radio tomography that maps excess path loss into an attenuation picture of the space FEATURES • Top-down radar with range rings, pinch to zoom, double tap to reset • Device list with search and type filters • Device card with signal history, ranked hypotheses and the evidence for each • Unwanted-tracker heuristics based on public advertising patterns • CSV export of a session • Full Russian and English, switchable inside the app PRIVACY All sensing and all math run on your iPhone. No account, no analytics, no tracking, no advertising identifier. One optional setting — off until you turn it on — may send a 24-bit manufacturer prefix to a public vendor database to name your router. Nothing else ever leaves the device. Use cool-radar only on networks and devices you are entitled to inspect. It does not decrypt Find My identities, does not enumerate neighbouring Wi-Fi networks, and provides no covert tracking of people. REQUIREMENTS iOS 18 or later. Bluetooth works on every iPhone. UWB distance needs U1/U2 hardware on both devices. Room geometry needs a LiDAR model. Anything unavailable on your hardware is shown as unavailable rather than simulated.

Screenshots

Argus3 screens
cool4 screens

Verdict

The call

Argus and cool are too close to call on the numbers: across 5 compared parameters — price, ads, in-app purchases and device support among them — neither pulls far enough ahead to decide it. What separates them is feature set and interface, not measurable difference.

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.

ScorecardNo meaningful differences
Argus versus cool: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterArguscool
PriceFreeFree
Rating5.0 (1 ratings) — better—
Positive reviews100.0% of reviews—
Number of ratings1 — better—
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesNoNo
MonetizationFree—
DevicesiPhoneiPhone
Requires iOS17.0 — better18.0
Further details — not scored
Size7 MB4 MB
Age rating4+17+
DeveloperLinh Phan Nhat KhanhZheniy Shacc

In-app purchases

None

Argus

No in-app purchases

None

cool

No in-app purchases

Questions

Is Argus free?
Argus is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Is cool free?
cool is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Do Argus or cool have ads?
Neither Argus nor cool shows ads.

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