Comparison

Ensemble Composer vs Drums

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

Head to head
About

Ensemble Composer

Create custom drumline music with realistic recorded sounds. Compose street beats, stand jams, or entire musical books. Play along, practice, share, and edit your compositions.

Highlights
  • Compose drumline music
  • Realistic recorded drum sounds
  • Play along and practice
  • Share and edit compositions
  • Support for any time signature
  • Customizable rhythms
Features
Read full description

A whole drumline in the palm of your hand! Compose a street beat, a stand jam, or even your whole book. Play along, practice, share, and edit. With amazing real recorded drum sounds and the ability to create any rhythm over any time signature, this is the real deal. Compose and play along with the actual battery drum line sounds of the Paul Rennick 2012 Santa Clara Vanguard, as recorded by bass tech Brian Lowe - tuned the way they sounded on finals night. Best used with Headphones About Telephonic Amusements: Nicholas Wheeler, software engineer, marched Sky Ryders, Velvet Knights, and UNT - taught at Pioneer and UNT; David Croy, designer, marched Sky Ryders and tech’ed under Paul Rennick at Sky, VK, and has provided visual consulting for UNT and Dynasty Drums. Like us at https://www.facebook.com/DrumlineApps

About

Drums

Learn to play drums with a virtual drum set and engaging rhythm games. Explore various music genres and play along to famous hits, even without prior experience. Enjoy a stress-relieving and exciting musical journey.

Highlights
  • Virtual drum set
  • Rhythm games
  • Multiple music genres
  • Famous song collection
  • Solo play mode
  • Drum circles gameplay
Features
Read full description

Get drums into your pocket! Play world-famous hits in various music genres - Rock, Pop, Hip-Hop, Dance. No experience needed! Drums by Piano Band is a drum set simulator with extraordinary drum games. You can choose different drum sets to play tracks in your favorite music genre. The app offers a collection of famous classical music pieces, originally reworked and rearranged as contemporary compositions. Get very exciting experience of playing popular tunes in a new way on drums. And don’t miss our Rock category! Drums are the very first musical instrument invented by humanity. Hitting out powerful, punchy sounds in a certain rhythm makes us feel excited and uplifted. This is why playing drums is one of the best known stress relievers. Never tried playing any musical instrument? No worries, you can play drums in our app! Rock on and feel the beat power! App features: - Drums circles gameplay; - A collection of famous songs for drums in Rock, Pop, Hip-Hop, and other styles; - Solo playmode. PREMIUM subscription Subscribe to Premium to enjoy exclusive content without ads! Unlimited access to our Premium features include: - All premium songs; - New songs regularly; - No ads. The app contains the following Premium options: - yearly auto-renewable subscription at $24.99; - weekly auto-renewable subscription at $4.99 (includes 7-day free trial). Payment will be charged to iTunes Account at confirmation of purchase. Subscription automatically renews unless auto-renew is turned off at least 24-hours before the end of the current period. Account will be charged for renewal within 24-hours prior to the end of the current period, and identify the cost of the renewal. Subscriptions may be managed by the user and auto-renewal may be turned off by going to the user’s Account Settings after purchase. Privacy Policy: https://simplepiano.co/policy.pdf Terms of Service: https://simplepiano.co/terms.pdf *Prices are equal to the value that ""Apple’s App Store Matrix"" determines is the equivalent of the subscription price in $USD.

Screenshots

Ensemble Composer4 screens
Drums4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is price: Drums at Free against Ensemble Composer's $14.99. Drums also leads on ratings volume (2.2K vs 278) and iOS requirement (13.0 vs 17.6). Ensemble Composer's advantage is in-app purchases (none vs 7) and ads (none vs shown). On rating 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

Drums is free to download; Ensemble Composer costs $14.99 up front. Drums sells 7 in-app purchases, starting at $4.99 per 7 days. Ensemble Composer asks for nothing beyond the download.

ReceptionRating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings

On the App Store both sit at effectively the same score — 4.6 for Ensemble Composer against 4.5 for Drums. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: Drums has 2.2K ratings behind it against 278, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews are what separate them: 77% of Ensemble Composer's written reviews are positive against 52% of Drums's.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

Ensemble Composer ships an update every 2 months, Drums every 8 months. Both last shipped on November 6, 2026.

Scorecard8 real differences · 2 level
Ensemble Composer versus Drums: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterEnsemble ComposerDrums
Price$14.99Free — better
Rating4.6 (278 ratings) — better4.5 (2.2K ratings)
Positive reviews77.4% of reviews — better52.1% of reviews
Number of ratings2782.2K — better
Update frequencyEvery 2 months — betterEvery 8 months
AdsNo — betterYes
In-app purchasesNo — betterYes
MonetizationPaidFreemium — better
DevicesiPhone, iPadiPhone, iPad, iPod — better
Requires iOS17.613.0 — better
Further details — not scored
Size15 MB151 MB
Age rating4+4+
DeveloperN. WheelerAIHUNTERS, UAB

Customer experience

Ensemble Composer

All ratings275 ratings
Positive90.5%
Neutral2.2%
Negative7.3%
Written reviews84 reviews
Positive77.4%
Neutral7.1%
Negative15.5%

Drums

All ratings2,199 ratings
Positive87.4%
Neutral4.9%
Negative7.7%
Written reviews234 reviews
Positive52.1%
Neutral6.4%
Negative41.5%

User reviews

Ensemble Composer

From 278 App Store ratings

What we love

  • 🎵 Authentic drum sounds and audio quality (older versions)
  • ✍️ Intuitive composition interface for writing cadences
  • 📱 All-in-one drumline app combining multiple sections
  • 💾 Export functionality to sheet music and audio formats
  • 🎯 Useful for educators and students to practice rhythms

Room to improve

  • 🐛 Severe audio quality degradation after recent update
  • 🐛 Choppy scrolling and laggy performance
  • 🐛 Audio stuttering and cutting off during playback
  • 🐛 Files not saving or disappearing after updates
  • 🐛 Backward compatibility issues with legacy files

Drums

From 2.2K App Store ratings

What we love

  • 👍 Fun and creative game
  • 🥁 Helps improve drumming skills
  • 🎶 Enjoyable music selection
  • 💯 Great for beginners

Room to improve

  • 💰 Subscription-based model
  • 🎬 Too many ads
  • 🔒 Paywall for more content
  • 🐛 Bugs and glitches
  • 🎧 Limited song library

Bugs and requests

Ensemble Composer

Reported bugs

16 issues
  • New update prevents opening older files
  • Audio stutters and cuts off in faster rhythms
  • Triplet rolls don't sound even
  • Bass drum subdivisions not working
  • Tenor section drums moved to incorrect positions
Show 11 more
  • Scroll feature is choppy and laggy
  • Rhythmic accuracy issues
  • Cymbal sounds bleed into each other
  • App crashes with certain subdivisions
  • Polyrhythm and odd time signature issues
  • Saving functionality fails intermittently
  • Split feature freezes and causes progress loss
  • Files duplicate unexpectedly
  • Export format incorrect (.mxl instead of .xml)
  • Tempo synchronization issues
  • App crashes on startup

Requested features

16 requests
  • Revert snare sounds to pre-update quality
  • Multiple sound option choices for drums
  • Hi-hat option for cymbals
  • Single tenor drum section option
  • Separate tempos within drum sections
Show 11 more
  • Undo/redo functionality
  • Auto-save feature
  • iCloud or cloud backup support
  • Different drum tuning options
  • Legato and staccato buzz options
  • Smoother and longer buzz roll sounds
  • Sixtet tenor configuration option
  • Video export/share functionality
  • In-depth tutorial documentation
  • Accent dynamics improvements
  • Rim click sounds for tenors

Drums

Reported bugs

4 issues
  • Frequent crashes and freezes
  • Unresponsive controls
  • Sync issues with the beat
  • Subscription issues

Requested features

5 requests
  • More song variety and genres
  • Ability to play full songs
  • Option to disable ads
  • Offline mode
  • Customizable drum kit

In-app purchases

None

Ensemble Composer

No in-app purchases

7 purchases

Drums

Subscriptions7
  • Drums Weekly Premium7 Days trial$4.997 Days
  • All Access Pass7 Days trial$9.997 Days
  • All Access Pass$9.997 Days
Show 4 more
  • All Access Pass3 Days trial$9.997 Days
  • All Access Pass7 Days trial$17.991 Year
  • All Access Pass$24.991 Year
  • All Access Pass7 Days trial$24.991 Year

Questions

Is Ensemble Composer free?
Ensemble Composer costs $14.99, with no in-app purchases.
Is Drums free?
Drums is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Which has better reviews, Ensemble Composer or Drums?
Ensemble Composer is rated higher. Ensemble Composer averages 4.6 out of 5 from 278 ratings, while Drums averages 4.5 from 2.2K ratings.
Do Ensemble Composer or Drums have ads?
Drums shows ads; Ensemble Composer does not.
Which is updated more often, Ensemble Composer or Drums?
Ensemble Composer ships an update every 2 months, and Drums every 8 months. Most recently, Ensemble Composer was updated on November 6, 2026 and Drums on November 6, 2026.

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