Comparison

LiquidText vs References

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

Head to head
About

LiquidText

This app provides a dynamic workspace for reviewing and organizing information from documents and webpages. It allows users to extract key facts, connect ideas across different sources, and annotate content for research, writing, or study.

Highlights
  • Import documents and webpages
  • Extract and organize excerpts
  • Connect ideas with ink links
  • Compare document sections
  • Annotate PDFs, Word, and PowerPoint
  • Search across all documents
Features
Read full description

*** Named “Most Innovative iPad App of the Year” by Apple App Store *** LiquidText offers a fast, natural way to review, gather, and organize information across all your documents and webpages—then apply the results to writing reports, meeting prep, or simply studying. Pull out key facts and connect them together, squeeze a document to compare sections, draw a line to connect ideas in different documents, comment on multiple pages at once, build upon your thoughts, and much more. ► WHAT PEOPLE ARE SAYING: * "If you want to experience the power of going beyond paper, you can download LiquidText" – Cult of Mac * One of Macworld’s Top 24 Apps for iPad Pro * One of Time Magazine's Ten Best apps for iPad Pro * * "There's a better way to organize your research, and the app is it." – iMore, Serenity Caldwell * “All you need for deep research projects.” – Macworld, Jackie Dove * "The world changed with...LiquidText" – Law360, Paul Kiesel * "LiquidText may just be *the* app for reviewing and annotating PDFs using Apple's tablet and stylus." – CIO Magazine, James Martin * “One of the most powerful, original iPad apps I've tried in years” – Federico Viticci, MacStories.net ► LIQUIDTEXT’S COMPLETE FEATURE SET INCLUDES: (Features with * require a paid upgrade.) Import • Create a workspace and import all the documents and web pages you need • Compatible with PDF, Word, and PowerPoint document types • Import from Dropbox, iCloud Drive, Box, email, and more • Import content from webpage or send to LiquidText directly from Safari • Instant OCR to select text in scanned documents; do a full document-OCR to search as well!* • Import documents & metadata directly from reference managers (supports Zotero and Mendeley)* Interact • Pull excerpts from all the documents in your project into the Workspace area • Add your own notes (typed or written) to the Workspace area • Freely draw on your notes, or on the workspace itself* • Organize excerpts and notes into groups • Connect anything - draw live “ink links” that span pages, documents, notes, and more* • Create mind-maps by drawing “ink links” connecting your excerpts/notes to one another * • Get context - tap notes and excerpts to find original source Compare • Pinch a document to compare different distant pages side by side • Collapse text to see annotated parts side-by-side • Collapse text to view search results(s) side-by-side • Import unlimited number of documents into a project, view up to 3 at once* Annotate • Freely draw* or highlight on your document, notes, or the workspace itself • Add margin notes/comments to text, images, notes, and excerpts • Comment on two or more selections simultaneously • Replace document with a newer version (and annotations are brought to new doc)* Search • Search for keywords across all your LiquidText documents • Find keywords in title or text of your documents* • Bulk highlight, tag, or link to your search results* Realtime Collaboration • Invite colleagues into your shared projects and work together in near realtime* • Leave comments and notifications for your collaborators* • Privacy controls: set whether each workspace & document in your project is shared or private* Easy Export • Export your project as a PDF (includes your Workspace and documents) • Export your project as a Word file (converts your notes/excerpts into a linear document) • Send a full LiquidText file for those with the app. • Send files by email or to Dropbox, iCloud Drive, Zotero, and more* Sync & Backup* • Real-time, cross-platform sync • Continuous cloud backup • Multi-device display: • Use your desktop or tablet as additional display for your other device • Use your tablet for freehand inking while viewing and keyboarding on your desktop See our terms of use at https://www.liquidtext.net/terms-of-use Learn more at LiquidText.net | Better Than Paper

About

References

Browse and interact with your BibTeX libraries on your mobile device. View references, follow links, and access file attachments like PDFs. Supports both classic BibTeX and BibLaTeX formats.

Highlights
  • Browse BibTeX libraries
  • Search references
  • Follow links (DOIs, URLs)
  • View file attachments (PDFs)
  • Supports BibLaTeX
  • Group by keywords
Read full description

Carry your BibTeX libraries with you on your iPad and iPhone! A BibTeX library is a collection of bibliographic references (papers, books, reports, etc.), designed to work with the LaTeX typesetting system. Each library is stored in a specially-formatted text file (typically ending in .bib), which you can create with your favourite text editor. The References app gives you an easy way to browse through and interact with your BibTeX libraries. You can scroll, search, follow links, and view file attachments. In particular: - The app creates links from DOIs, MathSciNet references, ACM IDs, and of course URLs. - The app understands elementary LaTeX, so if your titles and/or abstracts contain markup or mathematics (and if your LaTeX is simple enough) then the app can display them nicely. - If you used BibDesk or JabRef to create your library, the app can view your file attachments (e.g., PDFs that you have attached to your references). - You can view references grouped by keywords, if you use the Keywords field in your BibTeX libraries. You can also view all of your smart/static groups from BibDesk, and your dynamic/static groups from JabRef. - The app supports BibLaTeX libraries as well as classic BibTeX. The References app can open BibTeX libraries from anywhere on your device. In particular, you can use iCloud Drive to keep them synchronised between your devices. This app is read-only, not an editor. It takes great care in helping you view and explore BibTeX libraries and their links and file attachments; however, it does not provide a way to modify your libraries. FILE ATTACHMENTS: To view file attachments (e.g., PDFs), the path to each file should be included in the corresponding entry in your BibTeX library. You can do this using the specially encoded Bdsk-File-* fields (as used by BibDesk), or the plain text File field (as used by JabRef). If you are writing your BibTeX files by hand, just add a File field giving the location of the attachment, such as File = {../PDFs/foo.pdf}. You can tell References where to find these attachments by linking folders in your app settings. The app will look for your attachments within these folders – for example, if you link your Documents folder then the app will be able to match the BibTeX field {../PDFs/foo.pdf} to a real location such as Documents/PDFs/foo.pdf or Documents/foo.pdf. The app is able to read attachments stored on your device, or on iCloud Drive, or on third-party providers including Box, Dropbox, Google Drive, Nextcloud or OneDrive. If you are having trouble viewing attachments from a third-party provider, please mail the References developer with the details. FURTHER INFORMATION: To learn more about BibTeX, see http://www.bibtex.org/ .

Screenshots

LiquidText4 screens
References4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is price: LiquidText at Free against References's $4.99. LiquidText also leads on ratings volume (6.4K vs 25) and update cadence (every 2 weeks vs monthly). References's advantage is review sentiment (88% vs 50%) and in-app purchases (none vs 13). On ads, device support and iOS requirement 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

LiquidText is free to download; References costs $4.99 up front. LiquidText sells 13 in-app purchases, starting at $5.49 per month. References asks for nothing beyond the download.

ReceptionRating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings

References holds the better App Store score, 4.9 against 4.6. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: LiquidText has 6.4K ratings behind it against 25, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews point the same way: 50% of LiquidText's written reviews are positive against 88% of References's.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

LiquidText ships an update every 2 weeks, References monthly. The most recent releases landed on September 28, 2026 and September 23, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard7 real differences · 3 level
LiquidText versus References: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterLiquidTextReferences
PriceFree — better$4.99
Rating4.6 (6.4K ratings)4.9 (25 ratings) — better
Positive reviews49.6% of reviews87.5% of reviews — better
Number of ratings6.4K — better25
Update frequencyEvery 2 weeks — betterMonthly
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesYesNo — better
MonetizationFree with in-app purchases — betterPaid
DevicesiPhone, iPad, MaciPhone, iPad, Mac, Vision Pro — better
Requires iOS17.6 — better18.0
Further details — not scored
Size317 MB55 MB
Age rating17+4+
DeveloperLiquidText, Inc.Benjamin Burton

Customer experience

LiquidText

All ratings6,376 ratings
Positive91.3%
Neutral3.0%
Negative5.8%
Written reviews1,465 reviews
Positive49.6%
Neutral13.7%
Negative36.7%

References

All ratings25 ratings
Positive100.0%
Neutral0.0%
Negative0.0%
Written reviews40 reviews
Positive87.5%
Neutral2.5%
Negative10.0%

Bugs and requests

LiquidText

Reported bugs

5 issues
  • Frequent crashes and data loss issues
  • Inconsistent behavior with Apple Pencil
  • Text selection and highlighting problems
  • Sync issues between iPad and Mac versions
  • Unexpected changes to existing annotations

Requested features

5 requests
  • Dark mode option
  • Improved palm rejection and writing experience
  • Better export and sharing options
  • Thumbnail/outline view for easier navigation
  • Ability to rotate and resize text/image annotations

References

Not enough reviews yet to summarise bugs or requests.

In-app purchases

13 purchases

LiquidText

Subscriptions10
  • LiquidText Live, Monthly, Stu7 Days trial$5.491 Month
  • LiquidText Live, Monthly, StPr7 Days trial$5.491 Month
  • LiquidText Unlimited, Mo, Stu7 Days trial$10.901 Month
Show 7 more
  • LiquidText Live, Monthly7 Days trial$10.901 Month
  • LiquidText Live, Monthly, Upg7 Days trial$10.901 Month
  • LiquidText Unlimited, Yr, Stu7 Days trial$19.001 Month
  • LiquidText Live, Yearly, Stu7 Days trial$54.901 Year
  • LiquidText Live, Yearly7 Days trial$99.991 Year
  • LiquidText Live, Yearly, Upg7 Days trial$99.991 Year
  • LiquidText Unlimited, Yr7 Days trial$189.991 Year
One-time3
  • LT Pro - For Students$19.99
  • LiquidText Pro$29.99
  • LiquidText Pro II$89.99
None

References

No in-app purchases

Questions

Is LiquidText free?
LiquidText is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Is References free?
References costs $4.99, with no in-app purchases.
Which has better reviews, LiquidText or References?
References is rated higher. LiquidText averages 4.6 out of 5 from 6.4K ratings, while References averages 4.9 from 25 ratings.
Do LiquidText or References have ads?
Neither LiquidText nor References shows ads.
Which is updated more often, LiquidText or References?
LiquidText ships an update every 2 weeks, and References monthly. Most recently, LiquidText was updated on September 28, 2026 and References on September 23, 2026.

Other comparisons