Pixelsynth vs Waveguide Flute
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
Pixelsynth
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Make a sound in seconds—and shape it while it plays. Pixelsynth turns taps, drags, melodies, and chords into a colorful instrument you can understand by watching it. Everything lives on one screen. No setup and no menu-diving. Touch a note and start exploring. FROM THE DEVELOPER OF PIXELBOOP Pixelsynth is a new visual instrument from the maker of Pixelboop. Both apps share a love of playful grids, immediate feedback, and musical ideas that begin with one touch. PLAY FIRST. LEARN BY WATCHING. Sixteen pads invite you to find a melody, hold a chord, or strum across the screen. Notes light up as you play, and every sound control moves in front of you. You can see what each gesture is doing while you hear the result. SHAPE THE SOUND LIVE • Switch waveforms to change the character of your sound. • Sweep the filter from bright and open to soft and focused. • Shape attack, decay, sustain, and release for crisp plucks, swelling notes, and long tails. • Add motion with LFO, repeating echoes with delay, and depth with reverb. Each control is a colorful tank. Touch higher or lower inside it to set the value directly. Values in the upper half stay where you leave them; notes in the lower half drain away after you lift. It feels immediate because the picture and the sound follow the same gesture. MADE TO BE SEEN Created by a Deaf musician, Pixelsynth treats visual feedback as part of the instrument. The entire musical surface is drawn on a 40 by 24 pixel grid—just 960 pixels—so every control stays visible and every change has a visual response. PLAY IT YOUR WAY Open Pixelsynth as a standalone instrument on iPhone or iPad, or load the included AUv3 instrument in a compatible iOS music host. Your host can send MIDI notes and save the instrument state with your project. A compatible host is available separately. FREE TO EXPLORE No account. No in-app purchases. No third-party ads. The instrument works offline. The standalone app may occasionally show developer news or an introduction to Pixelboop, which you can close immediately. Pixelsynth does not track you or collect the music you play. Open it. Touch a note. See where it takes you.
Waveguide Flute
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Waveguide Flute turns your iPad or iPhone into a physically modeled wind instrument — a Cook/STK-style waveguide flute you play from an on-screen piano roll or a MIDI wind controller (EWI). FEATURES • Authentic waveguide physical modeling — not a sample library • Deep Sound page: shape jet ratio, reflection, loop damping, noise, and more • Expression controls for live performance: blow intensity, breathiness, pitch bend, auto-vibrato • Built-in reverb with 7 factory spaces • On-screen piano roll with velocity and breath control • Full MIDI support — notes, breath (CC#2), pitch bend • Compatible with Akai EWI and other MIDI wind controllers that send breath and pitch bend • Remembers your last settings, with one-tap reset to defaults • Bluetooth MIDI support, plus a configurable Breath Control input (Mod Wheel or custom CC) for keyboard players without a wind controller Play it like a real wind instrument: breathe into the sound, bend pitch, add vibrato — all rendered by a genuine physical model, not recordings.
Screenshots
Verdict
Pixelsynth and Waveguide Flute are too close to call on the numbers: across 5 compared parameters — price, ads, in-app purchases and device support among them — neither pulls far enough ahead to decide it. What separates them is feature set and interface, not measurable difference.
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.
| Parameter | Pixelsynth | Waveguide Flute |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | No | No |
| Devices | iPhone, iPad | iPhone, iPad |
| Requires iOS | 16.0 — better | 17.0 |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 8 MB | 4 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 4+ |
| Developer | de Bastion, Inc | Tomonori Yamasaki |
In-app purchases
Pixelsynth
No in-app purchases
Waveguide Flute
No in-app purchases





