Comparison

Quartz vs Beat Kitchen Harmonic Synth

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

Head to head
About

Quartz

Transform your iPhone into a professional audio studio for voice and music recording. Offers advanced features like AI-powered EQ and noise reduction, non-destructive editing, and speech transcription in over 50 languages.

Highlights
  • Pro audio recording studio on iPhone
  • AI-powered Magic EQ
  • Neural-based noise reduction
  • Speech transcription (50+ languages)
  • Non-destructive audio editing
  • Customizable presets
Features
Read full description

Quartz is a new and innovative way to record voice & music that turns your iPhone into a pocket-sized pro audio recording studio. It's powerful, easy to use, and sounds great. With built-in presets tailored to the environment and 100% non-destructive editing, it captures exactly what you hear. Major features: Presets, tuned just right Concert, Voice, Rehearsal, Field, and more, exactly tuned for your environment. Plus full customization to create your own. Flexible audio processing All processing and effects are non-destructive and undoable. Experiment freely, change your mind any time, and save keepers as presets. It’s like shooting RAW but for audio. Magic EQ Dials in the perfect EQ with just the press of a button. Quartz uses sophisticated analysis on your recording to automatically balance the highs and lows. Amazing noise reduction Configurable neural-based noise reduction makes speech sound like it was recorded in a studio booth. You have to hear it to believe it. Speech transcription For interviews, lectures, and voice notes, turn recordings into text in more than 50 languages. Never miss a take There's a Live Activity widget for your home screen and Quartz supports remote start/stop recording via AirPods or Bluetooth remote. Other features you'll love: Nested folder storage, file search, batch sharing, zip export, graphic eq, parametric eq, non-destructive editing, usb mic support, auto input gain, fader input gain, level meter, spectral visualizer, lossless recording, L/R stereo swap, iPhone mic selection, input monitoring, insertion recording. And all the little things you'd expect from a full-featured audio recorder: Trimming, looping playback, playback speed, volume control, skip silence. Privacy policy: https://www.madebywindmill.com/quartz/privacy/ Terms of use: https://www.apple.com/legal/internet-services/itunes/dev/stdeula/

About

Beat Kitchen Harmonic Synth

Shape the overtone series directly to create unique sounds. This additive synthesizer allows real-time manipulation of harmonics, LFOs, and envelopes. Explore sound design and synthesis on your device.

Highlights
  • Additive synthesis engine
  • Overtone series shaping
  • Live waveform and spectrum response
  • Modulation matrix with LFOs and envelopes
  • AUv3 support
  • On-device processing
Features
Read full description

BKS Harmonic is an additive synthesizer that builds sound from individual overtones, then gives you tools to shape, scan and filter them by harmony. Load it as an Audio Unit v3 inside AUM, GarageBand, Cubasis, Loopy Pro or any AUv3 host, or run it standalone. A TUNER THAT KNOWS ABOUT STRETCH Tune mode turns the scope into a tuner: it names the note it hears and shows how far sharp or flat it is in cents, with a ring that closes as you land on the pitch. It tunes against the stretch curve rather than equal temperament, so it follows a real instrument. Stretch shapes the overtones inside a note; Key Stretch makes the keyboard follow it, so octaves widen the way a piano's do. FOURTEEN TUNING SYSTEMS, AND A TEMPERAMENT EDITOR Equal and Just, five historical temperaments, and six from outside the European tradition including Maqam Rast, Turkish Rast, Slendro, Pelog and the Harmonic Series. The Temperament slider is a morph, not a switch: fully left is Just, fully right is whichever you chose. Twelve bars show any system as cents away from equal; drag one to make the tuning yours, then copy it out as plain text. Tunings save with the preset. FIVE HUNDRED SCALES Searchable by alternate name: malkauns, nikriz, bhupali and freygish find the right set. THE PARTIALS ARE THE INSTRUMENT The partials display shows every overtone in your sound, and four tools work on it directly. FOLD sweeps upper partials below the fundamental, redistributing energy across harmonic layers — not a filter. The OVERTONE SCAN steps a spotlight through individual partials with triangle, saw or random patterns, and can visit only partials in the active scale. The HARMONIC GATE reinforces partials whose pitch class matches your chord and suppresses the rest: capture a chord, follow MIDI, split the keyboard, or pick the notes on the gate's own keys. SCULPT draws the level and pan of every partial, slides the curve up the grid as a formant, and locks partials in place while the rest moves. THE HARMONIC VOCODER Pass live input or a sample through the synth as an effect. Your sound travels through a bank of tuned peaking bells rather than being replaced by filtered noise: open the Air and the source stays dry, tighten it and the bands resonate into it. Key Track is the mode switch: on it plays as an instrument, off it is a fixed filter you can sweep. Aimed at a sample, the bands track that sample's spectrum as it evolves. One level-matched Blend control crossfades it against the oscillators. PULSE-WIDTH MODULATION Set the core to a saw and Source 2 to a saw: the two ramps subtract, which is what a pulse wave is, and the phase between them sets the duty cycle. Modulate it and you have PWM. A preset in the Utility folder is ready to play. MODULATION A cog on almost every control, so the synth's own engine can drive nearly anything in the interface, including the display. Sources include velocity, envelopes, LFOs, how many notes you hold, how many oscillators sound, the synth's own output level, and Atmo, a shape driven by 84 years of barometric weather data from the Beat Kitchen Weather Sonification Project. Rates run from audio rate down to cycles that span years. THE SCOPE A stereoscope, oscilloscope, spectrum and a live per-partial display. Glow takes the trace from a hard line to a diffuse bloom, Colour sets the hue, Trace Speed and Dot set how it draws — and every one is a modulation target. Route velocity to Colour and the trace shifts as you play. LIVE INPUT A headphone button passes the side-chain straight to the output, so you can hear and see your input with nothing held: green when signal arrives, amber when a bus is connected but silent, red when nothing is. Resynth Speed locks a sample's playback speed to pitch, tape-style, or keeps them independent. Every control has a tooltip, presets work offline, and a harmony wheel follows what you play. One purchase, every update. Made by Beat Kitchen, a music production and teaching community.

Screenshots

Quartz4 screens
Beat Kitchen Harmonic Synth4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is monetization model: Quartz at free against Beat Kitchen Harmonic Synth's free with in-app purchases. Beat Kitchen Harmonic Synth's advantage is iOS requirement (16.0 vs 18.4). On price, rating, review sentiment and ratings volume 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. Quartz sells 8 in-app purchases, starting at $1.99 per month and Beat Kitchen Harmonic Synth sells 1 one-off in-app purchase. Whichever you choose, the download price is not the number that matters.

ReceptionRating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings

Quartz holds the better App Store score, 5.0 against 4.8. Both are backed by a comparable volume of ratings — 20 and 12 respectively. Written reviews split almost evenly too, at 100% and 100% positive.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

Quartz ships an update every 5 days, Beat Kitchen Harmonic Synth every 3 days. The most recent releases landed on November 7, 2026 and October 31, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard2 real differences · 8 level
Quartz versus Beat Kitchen Harmonic Synth: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterQuartzBeat Kitchen Harmonic Synth
PriceFreeFree
Rating5.0 (20 ratings) — better4.8 (12 ratings)
Positive reviews100.0% of reviews100.0% of reviews
Number of ratings20 — better12
Update frequencyEvery 5 daysEvery 3 days — better
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesYesYes
MonetizationFree — betterFree with in-app purchases
DevicesiPhoneiPhone, iPad — better
Requires iOS18.416.0 — better
Further details — not scored
Size30 MB60 MB
Age rating4+4+
DeveloperMade by Windmill, LLCBeat Kitchen LLC

Customer experience

Quartz

All ratings20 ratings
Positive100.0%
Neutral0.0%
Negative0.0%
Written reviews10 reviews
Positive100.0%
Neutral0.0%
Negative0.0%

Beat Kitchen Harmonic Synth

All ratings12 ratings
Positive100.0%
Neutral0.0%
Negative0.0%
Written reviews4 reviews
Positive100.0%
Neutral0.0%
Negative0.0%

In-app purchases

8 purchases

Quartz

Subscriptions4
  • Monthly Subscription7 Days trial$1.991 Month
  • Monthly Subscription7 Days trial$3.991 Month
  • Yearly Subscription7 Days trial$9.991 Year
Show 1 more
  • Yearly Subscription7 Days trial$19.991 Year
One-time4
  • One time purchase$14.99
  • One time purchase$19.99
  • One time purchase$34.99
Show 1 more
  • One time purchase$39.99
1 purchases

Beat Kitchen Harmonic Synth

One-time1
  • Full Unlock$14.99

Questions

Is Quartz free?
Quartz is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Is Beat Kitchen Harmonic Synth free?
Beat Kitchen Harmonic Synth is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Which has better reviews, Quartz or Beat Kitchen Harmonic Synth?
Quartz is rated higher. Quartz averages 5.0 out of 5 from 20 ratings, while Beat Kitchen Harmonic Synth averages 4.8 from 12 ratings.
Do Quartz or Beat Kitchen Harmonic Synth have ads?
Neither Quartz nor Beat Kitchen Harmonic Synth shows ads.
Which is updated more often, Quartz or Beat Kitchen Harmonic Synth?
Quartz ships an update every 5 days, and Beat Kitchen Harmonic Synth every 3 days. Most recently, Quartz was updated on November 7, 2026 and Beat Kitchen Harmonic Synth on October 31, 2026.

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