Comparison

PearCircle vs Wave

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

Head to head
About

PearCircle

Read full description

Share live location and presence with the people you trust, your family, your friends, the people on your road trip. No accounts. No tracking. No subscriptions. Your circle's location data lives only on the devices you pair. PearCircle has no central server storing it, no analytics and no telemetry, and PeerLoom holds no key that could read a single thing about you or your circle. KEY FEATURES - Private circles: create a circle, invite people via a link or QR code, share live location directly with them - Multiple circles: one identity, many circles such as family, friends, or partners on a trip; switch between them or see everyone at once - Places and geofences: long-press the map to drop a Place; everyone in that circle gets a notification when someone arrives or leaves - Trips: your motion timeline records each drive or walk; opt in per-circle to let members see each other's trips on the map - Motion at a glance: pins surface walking, driving, flying, or stationary state, with battery and last-seen time - Sharing pause: one tap silences your location for the rest of the day; peers see "Sharing paused" instead of stale dots - Offline map tiles: tiles you've viewed stay cached so the map keeps working without a network connection; download an area in advance for trips into dead zones - No accounts: your identity is a cryptographic key pair generated on your device - No data collection: PeerLoom, Apple, and no third party ever sees your location data HOW IT WORKS PearCircle uses peer-to-peer technology powered by Hypercore Protocol. When devices in the same circle are online at the same time, they find each other using a distributed hash table, the same kind of technology that powers BitTorrent. Once connected, they sync directly, device to device, with no middleman. All sync traffic is encrypted in transit. Each location update, place change, and trip is cryptographically signed by the writing device, so circle members only apply updates they can verify came from a paired member. Place transitions such as "arrived at Home" or "left School" are computed locally on each device. When you cross a geofence, your device writes a signed transition that replicates to peers, and their devices fire the local notification. No service in the middle decides what you are told. PRIVACY - No accounts or sign-up required - No analytics, tracking, or telemetry - No third-party SDKs - All sync traffic is end-to-end encrypted - Location data stays on the devices in your circles, never uploaded to a service that can read it - Optional connection relay: when a network stops two phones connecting directly, PearCircle can fall back to a relay PeerLoom runs. It forwards encrypted data it has no key to read and stores nothing, though it can see that two devices are talking and how much data passes. Direct connections are always tried first, and one switch in Settings turns it off - Map tiles come from a public tile provider as stateless tile-coordinate requests; they don't identify you or your circle - Trip history is local-only by default; per-circle sharing is opt-in PERMISSIONS PearCircle asks for location permission on first launch and explains why each step is needed. "Always" lets the foreground worklet keep sharing while the app is in the background. "While Using the App" works only when PearCircle is foregrounded. If you previously declined, an in-app banner offers a direct link to your iOS Settings. LIMITATIONS - Both devices in a circle must be online at the same time to sync in real time. Changes made offline replicate the next time devices can reach each other. Open source. No vendor lock-in. Built by PeerLoom.

About

Wave

Features
Read full description

Wave is a local-first haptic pattern companion for sending tiny tactile messages. Browse a hand-tuned library of patterns, feel them with Core Haptics, hear matched audio, favorite the ones you use often, and share custom waves through the iOS share sheet. Wave can also spell short messages in International Morse code, morph two patterns together, import and export `.wave` files, and export AHAP files for Core Haptics workflows. Version 1.4 adds Tactile Readout, a practical pre-send analysis panel. It scores a wave's timing, density, intensity, sharpness, and texture so users can tell whether a pattern feels soft, balanced, urgent, tap-only, blended, or sustained before sharing it. Wave does not require an account. Custom waves, favorites, settings, and recents stay on device.

Screenshots

PearCircle4 screens
Wave4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is price: PearCircle at Free against Wave's $2.99. PearCircle also leads on iOS requirement (15.1 vs 17.0). On update cadence, ads, in-app purchases and device support there is nothing between them.

Scored on Price ยท Rating ยท Positive reviews ยท Number of ratings ยท Update frequency ยท Ads ยท In-app purchases ยท Monetization ยท Best chart rank ยท Devices ยท Requires iOS

CostPrice ยท In-app purchases ยท Ads ยท Monetization

PearCircle is free to download; Wave costs $2.99 up front. Neither carries in-app purchases, so what you see is what you pay.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

PearCircle ships an update every 3 days, Wave every 5 days. The most recent releases landed on October 12, 2026 and October 8, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard2 real differences ยท 4 level
PearCircle versus Wave: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterPearCircleWave
PriceFree โ€” better$2.99
Update frequencyEvery 3 days โ€” betterEvery 5 days
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesNoNo
DevicesiPhone, iPodiPhone, iPad
Requires iOS15.1 โ€” better17.0
Further details โ€” not scored
Size77 MB6 MB
Age rating4+4+
DeveloperTimothy HudginsRobert Corbin

In-app purchases

None

PearCircle

No in-app purchases

None

Wave

No in-app purchases

Questions

Is PearCircle free?
PearCircle is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Is Wave free?
Wave costs $2.99, with no in-app purchases.
Do PearCircle or Wave have ads?
Neither PearCircle nor Wave shows ads.
Which is updated more often, PearCircle or Wave?
PearCircle ships an update every 3 days, and Wave every 5 days. Most recently, PearCircle was updated on October 12, 2026 and Wave on October 8, 2026.

Other comparisons