Comparison

iA Writer vs Things 3 for iPad

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

Head to head
About

iA Writer

This writing application provides a clean, distraction-free environment to focus on your words. It offers features like Focus Mode to dim distractions, plain text writing with HTML preview, and customizable keyboard layouts. Organize and export your documents in various formats.

Highlights
  • Distraction-free writing environment
  • Focus Mode for sentence/paragraph highlighting
  • Plain text writing with HTML preview
  • Document search, sort, and cloud syncing
  • Customizable keyboard layouts
  • Export to WordPress, Medium, Word, PDF
  • Inverted light-on-dark mode
Features
Currently charting
Read full description

“Leaving life’s mess for an ideal realm of words.” —The New Yorker “My favorite iOS app for writing in Markdown, without question, is iA Writer. iA Writer is just beautiful. To me, it’s the gold standard for Markdown syntax styling... an elegant champagne flute. That’s iA Writer for me.” —John Gruber “iA Writer creates a clean, simple and distraction-free writing environment for when you really need to focus on your words.” —The New York Times “iA Writer is an example of how powerful simplicity and accessibility can be.” —The Guardian “iA Writer is all about textual production—writing this phrase, this sentence, this word at this moment.” —WIRED 4 x Best of App Store Winner # The Simple Writing App iA Writer removes distractions. Giving you a calm, focused, writing space, so you can express yourself clearly. # Focus Focus Mode dims everything but the current sentence or paragraph, helping you stay in the flow. # Start Don’t worry about the format. First, write in plain text. Then preview in HTML. # Organize Search, sort, and quickly swap between documents from different clouds. # Customize When you tap and hold a key in the command keyboard, you’re given the chance to choose your own layout. Rearrange your keys, or pick new ones from the extensive list. # Search You can open documents and launch frequent actions in no time with the new Quick Search. It lives in the keyboard so it’s always close at hand. # Work iA Writer includes an inverted light-on-dark-mode, perfect for working day and night. # Clean Spot superfluous adjectives, weak verbs, repetitive nouns, false conjunctions and clean your text of the usual rumble. # Shape Customize your templates and export to WordPress or Medium, HTML, Microsoft Word (.docx), or PDF. # 100% Text Embed links, pictures, tables and text files in plain text and see them in preview. # Get in Touch - Visit ia.net/writer for more information - Visit ia.net/writer/support for support and feedback

About

Things 3 for iPad

Organize your life and make progress on your goals with this award-winning productivity app. It helps you plan your day, manage projects, and break down tasks into manageable steps. Enjoy a clean interface designed for efficient task management and goal achievement.

Highlights
  • To-Do management
  • Project organization
  • Area categorization
  • Daily planning
  • Calendar integration
  • Reminders and repeaters
  • Widgets
Features
Read full description

Get things done! The award-winning Things app helps you plan your day, manage your projects, and make real progress toward your goals. Best of all, it’s easy to use. Within the hour, you’ll have everything off your mind and neatly organized—from routine tasks to your biggest life goals—and you can start focusing on what matters today. “Things offers the best combination of design and functionality of any app we tested, with nearly all the features of other power user applications and a delightful interface that never gets in the way of your work.” —Wirecutter, The New York Times KEY FEATURES • Your To-Dos Your basic building block is the almighty To-Do—each a small step toward a great accomplishment. You can add notes, tag it, schedule it, and break it down into smaller steps. • Your Projects Create a Project for any big goal, then add the to-dos to reach it. Use headings to structure your list as you outline your plan. There’s also a place to jot down your notes, and a deadline to keep you on schedule. • Your Areas Create an Area for each sphere of your life, such as Work, Family, Finance, and so on. This keeps everything neatly organized, and helps you see the big picture as you set your plans in motion. • Your Plan Everything on your schedule is neatly laid out in the Today and Upcoming lists, which show your to-dos and calendar events. Each morning, see what you planned for Today and decide what you want to do. The rest is down to you :) MORE THINGS TO LOVE As you dive deeper, you’ll find Things packed with helpful features. Here are just a few: • Reminders — set a time and Things will remind you. • Repeaters — automatically repeat to-dos on a schedule you set. • This Evening — a special place for your evening plans. • Calendar integration — see your events and to-dos together. • Tags — categorize your to-dos and quickly filter lists. • Quick Find — instantly locate to-dos, headings, or tags. • Type Travel — jump from list to list with your keyboard; just start typing! • Magic Plus — drag the + button to insert to-dos anywhere in a list. • Share extension — create to-dos with content from other apps. • Widgets — see lists on your home/lock screens. • Mail to Things — forward an email to Things; now it’s a to-do. • Markdown — structure & style your notes. • And much more! MADE FOR IPAD Things is tailored to the iPad, with excellent pro features as well. Chief among them is the outstanding support for your keyboard & trackpad. You can edit your to-dos without touching the screen, utilize plenty of shortcuts, and navigate your lists at blistering speed—just start typing! “Things has the best implementation of external keyboard support I’ve ever seen in an iPad app.” —Federico Viticci, MacStories You can also enjoy a beautiful dark mode at sunset, connect your calendars, open multiple windows, add a variety of widgets, scribble with Apple Pencil, create to-dos via Siri, import from Reminders—Things can do it all! There’s even Shortcuts integration if you want to automate your workflows. AWARD-WINNING DESIGN Made in Stuttgart, with two Apple Design Awards to its name, Things is a fine example of German engineering: designed not only to look fantastic, but to be perfectly functional as well. Every detail is thoughtfully considered, then polished to perfection. “It’s like the unicorn of productivity tools: deep enough for serious work, surprisingly easy to use, and gorgeous enough to enjoy staring at.” —Apple GET THINGS TODAY Whatever it is you want to accomplish in life, Things can help you get there. Install the app today and see what you can do! • Things is also available for Mac, iPhone, Apple Watch, and Apple Vision Pro (sold separately). • Sync is provided for free via our Things Cloud service. • A free trial is available for Mac: www.things.app If you have any questions, please get in touch. We provide professional support and will be glad to help you!

Screenshots

iA Writer4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is rating: Things 3 for iPad at 4.9 against iA Writer's 4.6. Things 3 for iPad also leads on ratings volume (12K vs 1.5K). iA Writer's advantage is chart position (#24 vs unranked) and device support (3 vs 1). On price, review sentiment, update cadence and ads 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

iA Writer costs $19.99 and Things 3 for iPad $19.99 up front. Neither carries in-app purchases, so what you see is what you pay.

ReceptionRating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings

Things 3 for iPad holds the better App Store score, 4.9 against 4.6. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: Things 3 for iPad has 12K ratings behind it against 1.5K, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews point the same way: 73% of iA Writer's written reviews are positive against 79% of Things 3 for iPad's.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

iA Writer ships an update every 2 weeks, Things 3 for iPad every 10 days. The most recent releases landed on November 6, 2026 and November 9, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard4 real differences · 7 level
iA Writer versus Things 3 for iPad: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameteriA WriterThings 3 for iPad
Price$19.99$19.99
Rating4.6 (1.5K ratings)4.9 (12K ratings) — better
Positive reviews72.8% of reviews79.4% of reviews — better
Number of ratings1.5K12K — better
Update frequencyEvery 2 weeksEvery 10 days — better
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesNoNo
MonetizationPaidPaid
Best chart rank#24 — better—
DevicesiPhone, iPad, iPod — betteriPad
Requires iOS15.0 — better16.4
Further details — not scored
Size70 MB66 MB
Age rating4+4+
DeveloperInformation Architects AGCultured Code GmbH & Co. KG

Customer experience

iA Writer

All ratings1,543 ratings
Positive88.4%
Neutral3.4%
Negative8.2%
Written reviews1,022 reviews
Positive72.8%
Neutral9.2%
Negative18.0%

Things 3 for iPad

All ratings11,830 ratings
Positive97.7%
Neutral1.2%
Negative1.1%
Written reviews816 reviews
Positive79.4%
Neutral8.1%
Negative12.5%

User reviews

iA Writer

From 1.5K App Store ratings

What we love

  • 🚀 Distraction-free writing experience
  • 👍 Elegant and minimalist design
  • 💡 Helpful syntax highlighting and formatting tools
  • 🚀 Seamless sync across devices
  • 👍 Reliable and stable performance

Room to improve

  • 🐛 Occasional crashes and sync issues
  • 🔒 Limited cloud storage integration options
  • 👎 Lack of advanced organization and navigation features
  • 👎 Subpar text selection and cursor control
  • 👎 Dated app icon and visual design

Things 3 for iPad

From 12K App Store ratings

What we love

  • 🚀 Efficient and intuitive
  • 👍 Clean and simple interface
  • 🔋 Helps stay organized and productive
  • 💡 Excellent for GTD workflow
  • 🚀 Seamless syncing across devices

Room to improve

  • 💰 Expensive for full ecosystem
  • 🔒 No end-to-end encryption for sync
  • 🔍 Limited filtering and sorting options
  • 🔍 Repeating tasks could be improved

Bugs and requests

iA Writer

Reported bugs

3 issues
  • Crashes when opening certain files
  • Sync issues leading to data loss
  • Formatting problems when exporting to other formats

Requested features

6 requests
  • Improved cloud storage integration (Dropbox, Google Drive, etc.)
  • Enhanced file management and organization tools
  • Better text selection and cursor control
  • More customization options for appearance and layout
  • Integrated outline/table of contents view
Show 1 more
  • Collaborative editing features

Things 3 for iPad

Reported bugs

2 issues
  • Sync issues and data loss reported
  • Siri integration not working well in some languages

Requested features

4 requests
  • Add location-based reminders
  • Improve task prioritization and urgency indicators
  • Implement mass editing and batch actions
  • Introduce web app and Windows support

In-app purchases

None

iA Writer

No in-app purchases

None

Things 3 for iPad

No in-app purchases

Questions

Is iA Writer free?
iA Writer costs $19.99, with no in-app purchases.
Is Things 3 for iPad free?
Things 3 for iPad costs $19.99, with no in-app purchases.
Which has better reviews, iA Writer or Things 3 for iPad?
Things 3 for iPad is rated higher. iA Writer averages 4.6 out of 5 from 1.5K ratings, while Things 3 for iPad averages 4.9 from 12K ratings.
Do iA Writer or Things 3 for iPad have ads?
Neither iA Writer nor Things 3 for iPad shows ads.
Which is updated more often, iA Writer or Things 3 for iPad?
iA Writer ships an update every 2 weeks, and Things 3 for iPad every 10 days. Most recently, iA Writer was updated on November 6, 2026 and Things 3 for iPad on November 9, 2026.

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