Comparison

XstereO vs Solar Journal

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

Head to head
About

XstereO

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XstereO Player - mobile edition. The program is designed to view flat and stereoscopic images. It supports wide gamut color profiles and HDR ! It allows you to view images located on your device or on the web pages. What XstereO Player can do: - Supports major image file formats. It recognizes Left and Right views in one file or from two separate ones. When opening one file, Side-by-Side format or two images in one container are automatically recognised, including Spatial Photos captured by iPhones and Vision Pro. - Display modes for stereo pairs: Left-Right, Right-Left, Animation. - Open a series of photos from the local media library on your device, and while scrolling through them, you can delete unnecessary ones. Two files are deleted at once when deleting a stereo pair. Deletion occurs according to the usual rules, and you can find all deleted photos in Recently Deleted in the Photos application. - Open a series of photos posted on some of the websites. In this case, you can see a detailed description of each photo. The author can describe in advance the type of each photograph on the web page: whether they are flat or a stereo pair (LR or RL).

About

Solar Journal

Features
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Turn your solar telescope photographs into a personal record of the changing Sun. Import a short sequence of photos and explore your annotated solar disc, detected sunspots and the gentle change in brightness from centre to edge. Open a sunspot to see an enlarged crop from your original photograph, or explore nearby spots as a group. Today gives you your latest observation. Discover brings your measurements into context with concise findings and dated NOAA space-weather information. Trends keeps your observing history visible, with the variation between photographs shown alongside each measurement. โ€ข Local photo analysis, with original photographs preserved. โ€ข Sunspot counts, apparent dark coverage and visual size comparisons. โ€ข Date and time corrections, photo removal and optional group tracking. โ€ข CSV, JSON, picture and analysis-prompt reports to share when you choose. โ€ข Explicit journal archive backup and restore. โ€ข A clearly labelled sample journal to explore without a telescope. Five separate photographs are recommended for each session; two or more usable photographs can be saved. Measurements describe what is visible in processed white-light photographs. They are not magnetic measurements or predictions of solar storms. No account, advertising, subscription or AI service is required. Your photographs are not uploaded for analysis. NOAA information requires a connection and is always dated. Solar Journal is independent and is not endorsed by NOAA or telescope manufacturers. Use properly filtered solar observing equipment and follow its manufacturer's safety instructions.

Screenshots

XstereO4 screens
Solar Journal4 screens

Verdict

The call

XstereO and Solar Journal are too close to call on the numbers: across 5 compared parameters โ€” price, ads, in-app purchases and device support among them โ€” neither pulls far enough ahead to decide it. What separates them is feature set and interface, not measurable difference.

Scored on Price ยท Rating ยท Positive reviews ยท Number of ratings ยท Update frequency ยท Ads ยท In-app purchases ยท Monetization ยท Best chart rank ยท Devices ยท Requires iOS

CostPrice ยท In-app purchases ยท Ads ยท Monetization

Both are free to download. Neither carries in-app purchases, so what you see is what you pay.

ScorecardNo meaningful differences
XstereO versus Solar Journal: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterXstereOSolar Journal
PriceFreeFree
Update frequencyMonthlyโ€”
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesNoNo
DevicesiPhone, iPadiPhone, iPad
Requires iOS18.017.0 โ€” better
Further details โ€” not scored
Size1 MB6 MB
Age rating4+4+
DeveloperYury GolubinskySascha Wyss

In-app purchases

None

XstereO

No in-app purchases

None

Solar Journal

No in-app purchases

Questions

Is XstereO free?
XstereO is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Is Solar Journal free?
Solar Journal is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Do XstereO or Solar Journal have ads?
Neither XstereO nor Solar Journal shows ads.

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