Drone Meditations vs Jacquardi4
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
Drone Meditations
This app offers a sophisticated drone synthesizer for creating ambient music, sound healing, and meditative soundscapes. It features four oscillators per patch, extensive modulation options, and multiple tuning systems, providing a deep and authentic instrument for drone music enthusiasts.
- Four oscillators per patch with multiple waveform options
- Per-voice filter, drive, FM, chorus, delay, and reverb effects
- Twenty multi-target LFOs with tempo-locked rates
- Per-voice timing envelopes for dynamic sound shaping
- Six distinct tuning systems
- Over 110 presets and 48 artist tributes
- Live cymatics visualization with pinch-to-zoom
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A deep four-oscillator drone synthesizer for meditation, sound healing, and ambient composition. Inspired by Pauline Oliveros, Éliane Radigue, Stars of the Lid, William Basinski, and the long-form drone tradition. Real synthesis, real tuning systems, real cymatics — designed for listeners who want to go deep. Most "drone apps" give you a few sliders and call it ambient. Drone Meditations gives you a real instrument. SOUNDS YOU CAN SIT WITH FOR HOURS • Four oscillators per patch — sine, triangle, sawtooth, square, white / pink noise, granular pink, or loaded sample • Per-voice filter (LP / HP / BP), drive, cross-osc FM, stereo chorus, three-mode delay with musical timing, stereo Schroeder reverb • Twenty multi-target LFOs per patch (five per voice). LFOs 1–4 hit amp / pan / cutoff / Q / pitch / FM / FX-Mix; LFO 5 has its own row of granular + FX targets (grain, delay, reverb). Each LFO's rate can lock to a musical subdivision of the tempo. • Per-voice timing envelopes — fade in over minutes, fade out later, repeat N times or forever. Rotate harmonically across 20 minutes without touching a slider. • Six tuning systems: 12-TET, just intonation, Pythagorean, Lou Harrison Free JI, Wendy Carlos α/β/γ, Harry Partch 43-tone DESIGNED FOR THE DRONE TRADITION • 110+ presets across Drone Artists, Developer Patches, Solfeggio, Natural Resonance, Cymatics, Mystic & Composers, and Binaural categories — plus an INIT preset pinned at the top • 48 Drone Artists tributes — Oliveros, Riley, Radigue, Stars of the Lid, Sunn O))), Basinski, Niblock, Palestine, Budd, Coltrane, and more — capturing each artist's waveforms, FX, and tuning, not just their pitches • 21 Developer Patches showcasing granular sampling, BPM-locked grain density, FX-Mix LFO swells, and the JG hybrid pad/groove series • Modal chord category — the 7 diatonic modes plus Harmonic and Melodic Minor — with quantize-to-scale so pitch-modulated voices arpeggiate across all 7 mode degrees • Auto-morph between any two presets over 30 s to 60 min • 25 scripted meditation journeys (Deep Listening, Heavy Resonance, Minimalist Arc, and 22 more) • Tune to Room — global LISTEN snaps the chord root to a pitch from the mic; per-strip ear icon snaps just one voice LIVE CYMATICS THAT BREATHE WITH THE AUDIO • Physically-calibrated Chladni patterns fit from real plate- vibration footage. The renderer crossfades between two adjacent eigenmodes bracketing each voice's live frequency — vibrato breathes between physical modes, not styled animation. • Pinch to zoom; tap to enter fullscreen Performance mode with a drifting sand-particle simulation along the nodal lines • Cymatic snapshot gallery + spectrum-analyzer alternative GRANULAR + TEMPO • Granular waveform: pink noise chopped into Hann-windowed grains with size, density, jitter, stereo spread, per-voice overlap • Granular sampling: same scheduler on any loaded sample — freeze a bansuri forever, smear a chord into a tape-decay cloud • BPM-quantized density (½ → 1/32T) locks grain spacing to the global tempo. Per-LFO rate sync extends musical subdivisions to LFO speed. Metronome click toggle for an audible reference. RECORD, SHARE, AND COMPOSE • Mastered session recording: 24-bit WAV + AAC M4A sidecar with loudness normalization, automatic fades, embedded metadata • Per-voice mic record captures into a voice's sample slot — normalized, granular-ready, with the current frequency as the sample's reference pitch • 50+ bundled samples: bansuri, organ, piano, storm, tide, forest, urban, cosmic • Cross-device preset sharing via .dronepreset files — AirDrop a patch between web, iPhone, and iPad, samples embedded inline. iCloud auto-syncs samples-free presets across devices. One-time purchase. No subscription, no accounts, no tracking. Free web version: dronemeditations.com
Jacquardi4
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Concept: “Jacquardi4” is an AUv3 instrument that does not make any sounds but can send out 4 analog-like “Envelope” signals via MIDI control changes (MIDI CC). That is, the app contains 4 MIDI modules of envelope generator. The user can use them for modulating any parameter of 3rd-party’s plugins that can be assigned to MIDI CC , for example, cutoff frequency. System Requirements: AUv3 host that has a flexible capability of MIDI routing (AUM, apeMatrix, LoopyPro, etc). Usage: Just assign MIDI keyboard to Jacquardi4's MIDI IN (it needs to trigger Jacquardi4) and assign Jacquardi4's MIDI OUT to 3rd party's plugins. Explanation of sliders: Channel: determines MIDI channel. Control Rate: determines the resolution of MIDI processing. Higher value, higher resolution. Active: turn on or off the module. Useful when using MIDI learn functionality of 3rd party plugin. MIDI CC: determines MIDI control number. (text-editable) Amp: determines amplitude in dB Offset: determines an initial value. Attack: attack value. Decay Time: decay time value. Decay Curve: decay curve value. Sustain: sustain value. Release: release value. Explanation of Preset File System: At first make a new bank folder, in which you can save a preset file. And push "Save As" button. Also the user can export or import preset files.
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is price: Jacquardi4 at $5.99 against Drone Meditations's $14.99. Jacquardi4 also leads on update cadence (weekly vs every 3 weeks) and iOS requirement (15.0 vs 17.0). On ads, in-app purchases and device support 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
Drone Meditations costs $14.99 and Jacquardi4 $5.99 up front. Neither carries in-app purchases, so what you see is what you pay.
Drone Meditations ships an update every 3 weeks, Jacquardi4 weekly. The most recent releases landed on October 31, 2026 and November 10, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | Drone Meditations | Jacquardi4 |
|---|---|---|
| Price | $14.99 | $5.99 — better |
| Rating | 5.0 (1 ratings) — better | — |
| Number of ratings | 1 — better | — |
| Update frequency | Every 3 weeks | Weekly — better |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | No | No |
| Monetization | Paid | — |
| Devices | iPhone, iPad | iPhone, iPad, iPod — better |
| Requires iOS | 17.0 | 15.0 — better |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 131 MB | 12 MB |
| Age rating | 17+ | 4+ |
| Developer | JOSE ANTONIO GUDE | Satoshi Kajii |
In-app purchases
Drone Meditations
No in-app purchases
Jacquardi4
No in-app purchases
Questions
Is Drone Meditations free?
Is Jacquardi4 free?
Do Drone Meditations or Jacquardi4 have ads?
Which is updated more often, Drone Meditations or Jacquardi4?
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