CardBackup vs Capture
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
CardBackup
Effortlessly transfer photos and videos from your camera's memory card directly to your iPhone or iPad. This app ensures reliable, duplicate-free backups to a chosen folder, keeping your original files organized and ready for professional editing software.
- Incremental backups
- Duplicate file skipping
- Hash file verification
- Conflict handling
- Backup history log
- iCloud Drive support
- Local notifications
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CardBackup copies photos and videos from your camera's memory card to your iPhone - reliably, quickly, and without duplicates. CardBackup copies files to a folder of your choosing. It does not import into your Photos library - it's designed for photographers who want their original files intact and organised, ready for Lightroom, Capture One, PhotoCuller, or whichever app you process in. Connect a card reader or camera, choose a source and destination folder, and tap Back Up. CardBackup handles the rest: skipping files you've already copied, verifying each file as it goes, and keeping a log of your last 30 backup runs. Perfect for photographers who want a safety net while travelling. Back up to a local folder, an external drive, or iCloud Drive — and if you choose iCloud, your shots sync automatically overnight so they're waiting on your Mac when you get home. Works on iPhone, iPad, and natively on Mac. One purchase covers all three. No subscriptions. No ads. No cloud service required. Everything stays on your device. Features: - Incremental backups: skips files already copied, no duplicates - Hash verification: detects corruption on every copied file - Conflict handling: safely renames files when names clash - Backup history with run times and file statistics - iCloud Drive support - Local notifications on completion Visit cardbackup.app for more information.
Capture
Easily import photos and videos from cameras, SD cards, or USB drives while preserving original capture dates, GPS data, and EXIF information. Correct metadata before import and ensure no original files are altered.
- Preserves capture date, time, and GPS
- Imports from cameras, SD cards, USB drives
- Corrects EXIF data before import
- Checks for duplicate photos
- Supports RAW file formats
- Offloads to external SSDs
- Records and applies GPS routes
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Capture imports photos and videos from a camera, SD card or USB drive into your Photos library. It keeps everything the camera recorded: capture date and time, GPS coordinates, make, model, lens, ISO, aperture, shutter speed and focal length. Capture reads those out of the file and writes them onto the photo explicitly, so each shot lands with the date and place it was taken, not the date you imported it. That is why the app exists. A camera or card that mounts as a drive gets no photo importer, only a file browser, and a plain file copy does not set any of it, so whether the date and place survive then depends on whatever program opens the file next. Connect the camera, card or drive, pick the shots you want, and they go into Photos. NEVER THE SAME PHOTO TWICE Every file is checked against your whole library first, rotated copies included, so anything you already imported comes back flagged. You only carry over what's new. FIX IT BEFORE IT LANDS The camera is not always right: a clock that was never set, no GPS receiver, the wrong lens in the EXIF. Correct any of those fields before the photo reaches your library: date and time on one frame or shifted across a whole batch, keeping the intervals between them; location on a map; copyright, artist and file name. NOTHING TOUCHES THE CARD Your originals are never written to. Every edit goes into the copy Photos gets. Rotation is lossless: one EXIF orientation tag rewritten, the pixels untouched. RAW AS SHOT CR3, NEF, ARW, DNG and more, imported exactly as captured. STAYS ON YOUR DEVICE No account, no cloud, no servers. Nothing leaves your iPhone or iPad. FREE TO START Your first import is the whole card, no limits. After that, the free tier allows 5 items a day. WHAT A PURCHASE CHANGES It lifts the 5-a-day limit. Every capability below works on the free tier, with one exception: recording a route runs the GPS for hours at a time, so it comes with the purchase. FOR THE CARD YOU CAN'T AFFORD TO LOSE • Smart Cull scores sharpness while the card is still being read and flags the soft frames. Page through them full size, keep the ones you blurred on purpose, skip the rest so they never reach your library. • Offload to a drive sends a card straight to an external SSD or a Files folder, no laptop. Every file is read back and hash-checked after writing, with a per-file receipt and a plain “safe to erase” verdict before you format anything. • Record your route while you shoot, then geotag the whole card from it, matched by capture time. Recording keeps going with the screen off and the app closed; nothing is logged unless you start a recording, and tracks stay on your iPhone. • Geotag from any GPX track you already have, matched the same way. • Keep both halves of a RAW+JPEG pair, or just one, and save RAW Photos can't render to Files so it survives. • Old digicam videos (AVI, MPG) convert on import so they play on iPhone (iOS 18+), and a Shortcuts import runs with one tap. One plan, as a monthly or yearly subscription, or a one-time Lifetime purchase. --- Capture is an auto-renewing subscription (monthly or yearly); a one-time Lifetime unlock is also available, and prices are shown in the app before you buy. Payment is charged to your Apple Account at confirmation of purchase. Subscriptions renew automatically unless turned off at least 24 hours before the current period ends; you can manage or cancel anytime in your Apple Account settings. Privacy Policy: https://capture.karololszanski.com/privacy Terms of Use: https://www.apple.com/legal/internet-services/itunes/dev/stdeula/
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is rating: CardBackup at 4.5 against Capture's 3.0. CardBackup also leads on in-app purchases (none vs 4) and update cadence (every 3 days vs every 2 months). On price, review sentiment, ratings volume and ads 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
Both are free to download. Capture sells 4 in-app purchases, starting at $1.99 per month. CardBackup asks for nothing beyond the download.
CardBackup holds the better App Store score, 4.5 against 3.0. Both are backed by a comparable volume of ratings — 2 and 2 respectively. Written reviews split almost evenly too, at 100% and 100% positive.
CardBackup ships an update every 3 days, Capture every 2 months. The most recent releases landed on October 31, 2026 and November 4, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | CardBackup | Capture |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free |
| Rating | 4.5 (2 ratings) — better | 3.0 (2 ratings) |
| Positive reviews | 100.0% of reviews | 100.0% of reviews |
| Number of ratings | 2 | 2 |
| Update frequency | Every 3 days — better | Every 2 months |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | No — better | Yes |
| Monetization | Paid | Free with in-app purchases — better |
| Devices | iPhone, iPad | iPhone, iPad |
| Requires iOS | 18.0 | 17.0 — better |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 4 MB | 14 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 4+ |
| Developer | Rory Sinclair | Karol Olszanski |
Customer experience
CardBackup
Capture
In-app purchases
CardBackup
No in-app purchases
Capture
- Monthly$1.991 Month
- Quarterly$3.993 Months
- Yearly$5.991 Year
- Lifetime$19.99









