Comparison

Cohestry vs Shortboard

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

Head to head
About

Cohestry

This app helps you organize notes and discover connections between them. It visualizes your thoughts in a 3D brain and resurfaces older ideas to prevent them from being forgotten. Create rich notes with various formatting options and import existing notes from Apple Notes.

Highlights
  • Visualize note connections in a 3D brain
  • Rediscover older notes with 'Worth Revisiting'
  • Daily insights based on existing notes
  • Rich note creation with formatting, images, and tables
  • Import Apple Notes on Mac
  • Native iPhone and Mac app
Features
Read full description

Cohestry is a second brain for people who want their notes to become more useful over time. Capture ideas, thoughts, references, and unfinished threads in one place, then let Cohestry help you see how they connect. Instead of leaving notes buried in folders, Cohestry turns your knowledge into something you can explore, revisit, and build on. EXPLORE YOUR THINKING Cohestry visualizes connections between your notes as an interactive 3D brain, making it easier to spot related ideas and understand how your thinking is developing. REDISCOVER WHAT MATTERS Worth Revisiting brings older notes back into view so useful ideas do not disappear into an archive. Today’s Insight surfaces a connection from your existing notes, giving you a reason to return to ideas you may have forgotten. WRITE WITHOUT FRICTION Create and edit rich notes with support for formatting, lists, tables, images, and more. Cohestry is designed to work as a complete notes app, not just a layer on top of one. BRING YOUR APPLE NOTES WITH YOU On Mac, import your existing Apple Notes and start building from the knowledge you already have. BUILT FOR APPLE Cohestry is a native iPhone and Mac app designed around a simple idea: your notes should become more valuable the longer you keep them. Core note-taking features are free, including unlimited notes and Apple Notes imports. Advanced connection features are available with Cohestry Pro. End user license agreement: https://www.apple.com/legal/internet-services/itunes/dev/stdeula/

About

Shortboard

Create custom shortcut buttons on your Home and Lock Screens. Launch apps, shortcuts, or App Shortcuts directly from a widget with a single tap. Personalize the look with various styles, icons, and colors.

Highlights
  • Customizable shortcut widgets
  • Home and Lock Screen support
  • App and Shortcut launching
  • Icon and color customization
  • Multiple widget sizes
  • Transparent widget option
  • Shortcuts app integration
Features
Read full description

Tap a tile, and it just runs. Shortboard turns your Home Screen and Lock Screen widgets into boards of shortcut buttons. Every tile runs a shortcut, an app or an App Shortcut right in place, and the Shortcuts app never comes forward. Pick a style, choose your shortcuts in Edit Widget, and give each one an icon that makes sense. The things you do every day, one tap each. BOARDS FOR EVERY SIZE • Each board is made for one widget size: Small (up to 20 slots), Medium (40), Large (50) or Extra Large (64). • Add slots and the tiles get smaller. The rows arrange themselves. • Shortcuts, apps and App Shortcuts sit side by side on the same board. • Touch and hold the widget, tap Edit Widget, pick a board and choose your shortcuts. They fill the slots in order. MAKE IT YOURS • Six styles: Cloud, Pastel, Neon, Mono, Candy and Ink. Start from a look in Discover, or from a blank board. • Light, dark, or matching your system. • Go transparent and your wallpaper shows through, or pick a colored background. • Shortboard · Liquid Glass puts any board on a frosted glass widget. • Give any slot its own icon, glyph color and tile color. Fine-tune the font, tile shape, icon size and spacing. • Preview transparent boards on your own wallpaper before they go on your Home Screen. ICONS THAT MAKE SENSE • Shortcuts reach a widget without icons. Give each one a symbol, an emoji, a photo or an app's icon, matched by its name. • Name a shortcut after an app in your library, and it wears that app's icon automatically. • Keep a library of your apps with their real icons, plus dark icons for dark boards. • Bring your apps in fast: import the apps on your iPhone from iOS's app usage log, share an app's App Store page to Shortboard, search the App Store, pick from popular apps, or bring over your apps from WidgetLoft. LOCK SCREEN • A wide board fits up to eight shortcuts, in one or two rows. • A round button holds one shortcut or four. • Lock Screen boards are free and unlimited. SHORTCUTS AUTOMATION • Shortboard adds its own actions to the Shortcuts app: Create Board, Update Board, Find Boards, Delete Board, Set Shortcut Icon and Remove Shortcut Icon. • Run them from an automation, and your boards and widgets update on their own. EASY FROM THE FIRST TAP • An animated welcome and short tours on the real screens show you around. • Step-by-step guides for everything Shortboard can do, in Settings → How it works. • Available in nearly 40 languages. PRIVATE BY DESIGN • No account, no tracking, no ads. • Your boards, icons and settings stay on your device. • Only app names and App Store IDs go to Apple, to fetch icons. • Purchases and Pro screen visits go to our purchase service under a random ID. • The app usage log is read on your iPhone and never uploaded. FREE AND PRO • Free: 2 Home Screen boards with up to 8 slots each. Lock Screen boards and the app library are free and unlimited. • Shortboard Pro unlocks unlimited Home Screen boards and every slot each size allows, up to 64 shortcuts on one board. • Pro is a one-time purchase, not a subscription. Pay once, keep it forever. Questions or ideas? Write to infokoksoft@gmail.com Website: https://mucahitk.com/shortboard Terms of Use: https://mucahitk.com/shortboard/terms-of-use Privacy Policy: https://mucahitk.com/shortboard/privacy-policy

Screenshots

Cohestry4 screens
Shortboard4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is update cadence: Shortboard at daily against Cohestry's weekly. Shortboard also leads on ratings volume (8 vs 1). On price, rating, ads and in-app purchases 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. Cohestry sells 3 in-app purchases, starting at $5.99 per month and Shortboard sells 2 one-off in-app purchases. Whichever you choose, the download price is not the number that matters.

ReceptionRating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings

On the App Store both sit at effectively the same score — 5.0 for Cohestry against 5.0 for Shortboard. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: Shortboard has 8 ratings behind it against 1, so its average is the more settled of the two.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

Cohestry ships an update weekly, Shortboard daily. The most recent releases landed on October 31, 2026 and November 2, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard2 real differences · 8 level
Cohestry versus Shortboard: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterCohestryShortboard
PriceFreeFree
Rating5.0 (1 ratings)5.0 (8 ratings)
Positive reviews—100.0% of reviews
Number of ratings18 — better
Update frequencyWeeklyDaily — better
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesYesYes
MonetizationFreemiumFreemium
DevicesiPhone, iPad, Mac — betteriPhone, iPad
Requires iOS26.0 — better27.0
Further details — not scored
Size16 MB22 MB
Age rating4+4+
DeveloperUgochukwu NwuneMucahit KOKDEMIR

Customer experience

Cohestry

All ratings1 ratings
Positive100.0%
Neutral0.0%
Negative0.0%

Shortboard

All ratings8 ratings
Positive100.0%
Neutral0.0%
Negative0.0%
Written reviews7 reviews
Positive100.0%
Neutral0.0%
Negative0.0%

In-app purchases

3 purchases

Cohestry

Subscriptions2
  • Cohestry Pro Monthly7 Days trial$5.991 Month
  • Cohestry Pro Annual7 Days trial$39.991 Year
One-time1
  • Cohestry Pro Lifetime$99.99
2 purchases

Shortboard

One-time2
  • Shortboard Pro (Lifetime)$4.99
  • Shortboard Pro (Lifetime)$9.99

Questions

Is Cohestry free?
Cohestry is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Is Shortboard free?
Shortboard is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Which has better reviews, Cohestry or Shortboard?
Cohestry and Shortboard are both rated 5.0 out of 5 on the App Store, from 1 and 8 ratings respectively.
Do Cohestry or Shortboard have ads?
Neither Cohestry nor Shortboard shows ads.
Which is updated more often, Cohestry or Shortboard?
Cohestry ships an update weekly, and Shortboard daily. Most recently, Cohestry was updated on October 31, 2026 and Shortboard on November 2, 2026.

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