University Notes vs Stargazer
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
University Notes
This app allows students to create handwritten and typed study notes with advanced features for memorization and review. It includes tools for highlighting, masking, and layering content to aid in learning and exam preparation.
- Handwritten and typed notes
- Memorization tools (masking, highlighting)
- Layered questions and answers
- PDF annotation
- Note organization with folders
- Drawing and diagram tools
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Handwritten notes for studying, active recall, and exam prep Turn the notes you already take into study material you can actually use. Write by hand or type, organize class and lecture notes, annotate PDFs, build study guides, hide key information, and test yourself before quizzes, midterms, finals, entrance exams, and professional certification exams. Use your own notes for active recall, review, and exam preparation instead of simply storing information. □ 4 ways to study with your own notes 1. Memorize key information with colors Write important words, definitions, formulas, dates, or vocabulary in orange, blue, or other colors using handwriting or keyboard text. Place the Memorization Sheet over your notes to hide the answers. Try to recall the information first, then reveal it to check yourself. Long-press the icon to change the sheet color. 2. Hide highlighted sections for active recall Highlight important sentences, diagrams, anatomy charts, or sections of PDF textbooks and lecture materials. In Memorization Mode, choose which highlighter colors are hidden. For example, use yellow for regular emphasis and red for material you want to memorize. 3. Keep questions and answers on separate layers Write questions, answers, and explanations on different layers. Hide the answer layer, test yourself, rewrite your response, and practice the same digital worksheet again. 4. Cover answers with digital tape Use the Tape tool in Memorization Mode to cover definitions, formulas, vocabulary, answers, or sections of PDFs without changing your original note colors. Tap a tape strip to reveal just that answer, or use the Memorization Sheet to cover several areas at once. □ Review faster with the floating Memorization Sheet Instead of revealing highlighted areas one by one, drag the floating Memorization Sheet over your notes. Only the area beneath the sheet is hidden, making it useful for tables, lecture PDFs, study guides, vocabulary lists, diagrams, and exam materials. □ Practical note-taking tools ・Handwriting and keyboard input ・Multiple pens and highlighters ・Tabs for switching between notebooks ・Ruler, compass, and shapes ・Stickers, sticky notes, and comments ・Detailed eraser settings, including deleting only highlighter marks ・Categories, folders, and subfolders ・Chapters for separating lessons or topics □ Write directly on PDFs Annotate PDFs with handwriting or keyboard text. If a PDF does not leave enough room for notes, extend the right side of the page to create extra space for annotations, solutions, explanations, or review notes. □ Use handwriting and typing together Write by hand or select where you want to type and enter text directly without creating a text box first. □ Keep your notes organized Sort notes with categories, folders, and subfolders, and add chapters inside a notebook to separate lessons, topics, or units. □ Notebook templates Choose from built-in templates including blank paper, ruled paper, grid paper, and handwritten To-Do pages. You can also reuse layouts you create for study sheets, daily reports, professional logs, or exam review pages. □ Recommended for ・High school students taking notes and preparing for tests ・College students organizing class notes, lecture materials, and study guides ・Students working with PDF textbooks and course materials ・Medical, nursing, and pharmacy students ・Students preparing for entrance exams or professional certification exams ・Anyone who wants handwriting, typing, PDF annotation, and memorization tools in one digital notebook Write it down, hide what you want to remember, recall it from memory, and check your answer. Use the notes you already created for active recall, review, and exam preparation.
Stargazer
Explore the night sky by pointing your device upwards. Identify planets, constellations, stars, and satellites. Features an AI assistant for astronomy questions and an augmented reality mode to visualize celestial bodies.
- Point-and-identify celestial objects
- AI-powered astronomy assistant
- Augmented reality solar system exploration
- Constellation artwork and facts
- Night photography planning
- Printable star charts
- Interactive sky quiz
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Point your phone at the sky. Stargazer tells you exactly what you're looking at. Free. Genuinely free — no ads, no in-app purchases, no subscription, no account, no tracking. Not "free to start". Free, forever, everywhere. Knowing what's above your head shouldn't cost money. POINT AND KNOW Hold your phone up and the sky moves with you. Every planet, all 88 constellations, thousands of stars, deep-sky wonders, comets, asteroids and the satellites passing overhead right now. Tap anything to find out what it is. TWO SKIES OVER THE SAME STARS All 88 IAU constellations, each with classic hand-painted artwork warped onto the real stars. Then switch to the Boorong sky — the stars as read by the Boorong people of north-western Victoria — and the Southern Cross becomes a tree with a possum up it, chased by Tchingal the Emu: a constellation made not of stars but of the dark dust lanes of the Milky Way. Every figure names the nation it belongs to and cites its source. THE MOON, AS YOU ACTUALLY SEE IT Tilted the way it truly appears from your latitude — from the southern hemisphere it looks "upside down" compared with northern pictures, and Stargazer is one of the very few apps that gets this right. Drag through minutes, hours, days or a month. See whether tonight's Moon really is bigger than average, against a ring showing its usual size. SPIN THE EARTH Every satellite in orbit right now, wrapped around a globe you can spin and zoom. Search for one, or filter to Starlink and watch hundreds sweep past in formation. NOVA — PRIVATE AI THAT KNOWS ITS ASTRONOMY Ask anything. "Why does the Moon change shape?" "What's that bright star?" Nova runs on Apple Intelligence, entirely on your device. Your questions never leave your phone — there's no server to send them to. Grounded in a verified knowledge base, so answers are right rather than merely confident. A KIDS MODE THAT DOESN'T TALK DOWN Simpler words, same real science. Ask "how big is the Sun?" and get an answer a seven-year-old understands and an adult won't wince at. WALK AROUND THE SOLAR SYSTEM IN AR Put Saturn on your kitchen table. Walk around it, drag it, pinch to resize it. View planets, moons and the ISS in 3D, then step inside an AR orrery and watch the planets orbit around you. BUILT FOR CLASSROOMS No ads to distract. Nothing to buy. No sign-in, no data collection, nothing to consent to — so it clears school IT review easily. Printable A4 star charts for your date and place. A sky quiz with three levels. First Nations seasonal knowledge, sourced and attributed, for the cross-curriculum priority. Teachers: the whole sky, the phases, the seasons, the scale of the solar system — demonstrable in seconds on any iPhone, iPad or Mac in the room. ALSO INSIDE • Tonight — ISS passes, meteor showers, conjunctions, what's up now • 5,000+ fact-checked space facts, a new one every day • Night photography planner: darkness, moonless windows, Milky Way core • Time travel — tonight, next month, ten thousand years • Ask Siri for the moon phase or what's up tonight • Dark-sky finder and live stargazing conditions • Home-screen widgets, night-vision red mode, metric or imperial • VoiceOver labels throughout and full Dynamic Type support YOUR PRIVACY, PLAINLY We collect nothing. No analytics, no advertising identifiers, no profiles, no third-party SDKs. Your location is used on your device to work out your sky and is never transmitted. There's no account, because there's nothing to store. The AI is on-device. We couldn't sell your data if we wanted to — we don't have it. Made for anyone who has ever looked up and wondered. Kids, teachers, campers, insomniacs, grandparents, and everyone who has pointed at a bright dot and asked what it was. Look up. It's free.
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Verdict
The clearest difference is rating: University Notes at 4.6 against Stargazer's 3.0. University Notes also leads on ratings volume (18 vs 2) and update cadence (every 3 days vs weekly). On price, ads, in-app purchases and monetization model 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. Neither carries in-app purchases, so what you see is what you pay.
University Notes holds the better App Store score, 4.6 against 3.0. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: University Notes has 18 ratings behind it against 2, so its average is the more settled of the two.
University Notes ships an update every 3 days, Stargazer weekly. The most recent releases landed on October 12, 2026 and October 1, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | University Notes | Stargazer |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free |
| Rating | 4.6 (18 ratings) — better | 3.0 (2 ratings) |
| Positive reviews | 69.2% of reviews | — |
| Number of ratings | 18 — better | 2 |
| Update frequency | Every 3 days — better | Weekly |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | No | No |
| Monetization | Free | Free |
| Devices | iPhone, iPad, iPod, Mac — better | iPhone, iPad, Mac |
| Requires iOS | 15.6 — better | 26.0 |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 169 MB | 54 MB |
| Age rating | 17+ | 4+ |
| Developer | Foodmenu.world Inc. | Kendal Slack |
Customer experience
University Notes
Stargazer
In-app purchases
University Notes
No in-app purchases
Stargazer
No in-app purchases
Questions
Is University Notes free?
Is Stargazer free?
Which has better reviews, University Notes or Stargazer?
Do University Notes or Stargazer have ads?
Which is updated more often, University Notes or Stargazer?
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