Comparison

Choral Lab vs Chords Weaver

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

Head to head
About

Choral Lab

Compose and study Bach-style four-part chorales. Harmonize melodies with automatic voice generation, explore a library of 410 Bach chorales, and analyze chords in real-time. Offers both score and piano roll views for detailed study.

Highlights
  • Automatic SATB harmonization in Bach style
  • Library of 410 J.S. Bach chorales
  • Interactive soprano piano roll
  • Real-time chord analysis
  • Score and piano roll views
  • MIDI export
Features
Read full description

Choral Lab brings the art of four-part Bach chorale writing to your iPhone. Whether you're a composer, music student, or theory enthusiast, explore one of the most refined harmonic styles in Western music. Harmonize your melodies. Draw a soprano line on the interactive piano roll and watch Choral Lab instantly generate alto, tenor, and bass voices following authentic Bach voice-leading rules — avoiding parallel fifths and octaves, resolving leading tones, and building natural cadences. Browse 410 Bach chorales. Explore the complete corpus of J.S. Bach's four-part chorales with full score display, real-time chord analysis, and playback with rich choir sounds. Two ways to read the music. Switch between a traditional four-part score view with proper notation and clefs, or a piano roll view to see the voice leading clearly laid out across time. Mute individual voices to focus on any single part or study how voices interact. Generate original chorales. Let the app create complete chorales from scratch in any key — major or minor — with realistic harmonic progressions, passing tones, and Picardy thirds. Study chord analysis. Follow along with real-time Roman numeral chord labels as the music plays. Features: • Interactive soprano piano roll with tie support • Automatic SATB harmonization in Bach style • Library of 410 J.S. Bach chorales • Score view with Bravura music engraving font • Piano roll view with per-voice muting • Real-time chord analysis • Choir, piano, and organ sounds • MIDI export • AUv3 plugin — works in GarageBand, AUM and other hosts • One-tap host tempo sync in plugin mode • MIDI output per voice (soprano, alto, tenor, bass on channels 1–4)

About

Chords Weaver

Features
Read full description

Chords Weaver is a hands-on chord instrument you play by ear. Pick a note on the keyboard and it filters to the chords that fit. Choose one, and two pads open up: one shapes its voicing (spread, inversion, octave) while the other suggests where to go next, the right side resolving, the left adding tension. Build a progression on the timeline, and a live piano roll shows exactly what will play. Press play and the progression comes alive with arpeggios, block grooves and strums, each chord ringing in time. Turn on Drift and the voicings slowly wander on their own, so the loop keeps evolving. MORE - Rich arpeggios: ascent/descent, ternary grooves (waltz, shuffle, jig 6/8), a lilting 7/4, and sparse syncopated patterns (charleston, tresillo, offbeat, push). - MIDI Out to your synths, DAW or hardware, with a 24 PPQN clock. - Four scenes, copy and paste, and a "roll a matching bridge" helper. - Optional cloud save: sign in and your progressions follow you to every device. The app works fully offline. - Five languages: English, Français, Español, Русский, 日本語. Free to download. Weaving, voicings, playback and saving are all free. A one-time Pro unlock adds MIDI/WAV/text export and live MIDI-out. No ads, no subscriptions. Signing in is only for optional cloud sync.

Screenshots

Choral Lab4 screens
Chords Weaver4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is price: Chords Weaver at Free against Choral Lab's $6.99. Chords Weaver also leads on update cadence (every 5 days vs every 6 weeks) and iOS requirement (15.0 vs 17.0). Choral Lab's advantage is in-app purchases (none vs 1). On ads 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

CostPrice · In-app purchases · Ads · Monetization

Chords Weaver is free to download; Choral Lab costs $6.99 up front. Chords Weaver sells 1 one-off in-app purchase. Choral Lab asks for nothing beyond the download.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

Choral Lab ships an update every 6 weeks, Chords Weaver every 5 days. Both last shipped on October 31, 2026.

Scorecard4 real differences · 5 level
Choral Lab versus Chords Weaver: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterChoral LabChords Weaver
Price$6.99Free — better
Rating5.0 (1 ratings) — better—
Number of ratings1 — better—
Update frequencyEvery 6 weeksEvery 5 days — better
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesNo — betterYes
MonetizationPaid—
DevicesiPhone, iPadiPhone, iPad, iPod — better
Requires iOS17.015.0 — better
Further details — not scored
Size186 MB33 MB
Age rating4+4+
DeveloperMartin AdlerLoup Vuarnesson

In-app purchases

None

Choral Lab

No in-app purchases

1 purchases

Chords Weaver

One-time1
  • Chords Weaver Pro$5.99

Questions

Is Choral Lab free?
Choral Lab costs $6.99, with no in-app purchases.
Is Chords Weaver free?
Chords Weaver is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Do Choral Lab or Chords Weaver have ads?
Neither Choral Lab nor Chords Weaver shows ads.
Which is updated more often, Choral Lab or Chords Weaver?
Choral Lab ships an update every 6 weeks, and Chords Weaver every 5 days. Most recently, Choral Lab was updated on October 31, 2026 and Chords Weaver on October 31, 2026.

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