Comparison

RoughAnimator vs Sketch 3D

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

Head to head
About

RoughAnimator

Create traditional hand-drawn, frame-by-frame animations on your iPad. This app offers professional-grade tools like unlimited layers, onion skinning, and audio import, making it suitable for both beginners and experienced animators. Export your work in various formats or import it into professional animation software.

Highlights
  • Timeline with unlimited layers
  • Onion skinning
  • Audio and video import
  • Custom brushes
  • Apple Pencil support
  • Export to video, GIF, image sequence
  • Import to professional software
Read full description

A fully featured hand drawn animation application for iPad. Made by an animator, for animators. Powerful enough for professionals, simple enough for beginners. Everything you need to create traditional hand drawn frame-by-frame animation, anywhere you go! Features: - Timeline with unlimited layers and easily adjustable exposure length of individual drawings, for pose-to-pose or straight-ahead animating - Onion skinning - Preview playback - Scrub along timeline - Import audio for lip syncing - Import video for rotoscoping animation - Custom brushes - Supports Apple Pencil, Logitech Crayon - Control framerate and resolution - Export animation to Quicktime video, GIF, or image sequence - RoughAnimator projects can be imported to Adobe Flash/Animate, After Effects, and Toon Boom Harmony - Also available on desktop See a short film animated with RoughAnimator: https://youtu.be/vaHuJNNPoMM

About

Sketch 3D

Create and animate 3D models with intuitive touch controls. Import various file formats, apply video textures, and capture animations. Share your creations with a community of designers.

Highlights
  • Design 3D models with touch
  • Apply video as model texture
  • Create 3D model animations
  • Import various 3D file formats
  • Capture movie from 3D scenes
  • Use True Depth Camera for face models
  • Share designs with community
Features
Read full description

Sketch 3D is a tool for designing 3D models from your fingertips. You could download models from others, and could also share your great designs with other users by saving models in Public space. New Feature: Integrated MaterialX library into the app.   Mesh object can be applied with materialx documents. When Saving and Loading with material, the document relative path is stored as a diffuse map entry, similar to the way of handling movie textures. Other features like material adjustment and graph editing are not supported yet. User could download free material documents from public websites and import those zip files with this app, using ShareTo or AirDrop. Feature: Use True Depth Camera to capture face model. Feature: Support using video as model texture. You could use video clips from Photo Album, or from Internet URL (YouTube URL not supported), and then apply it onto a model as texture map. Feature: Capture movie from the 3D scene. Note! If your device could not capture movie, then, could try out a smaller output resolution (by tapping the control pane). However, arbitrary output size may stop capturing prematurely. Feature: Design 3D model animation with skeleton structure. You could design a skeleton structure by placing bones in hierarchical relation. Attach model to the skeleton, and then moving the bones to define different poses. Each pose represented as a keyframe in the timeline view. And animation sequence is produced by playing interpolation between the keyframes. Features: - Import 3D content directly from browser or email, either in .zip, .rar, .7z. - Support formats: Collada DAE, OBJ, 3DS, STL(for 3D printing), and others. - Import/export to iCloud drive, via iTune File Sharing, or to Public area via Apple CloudKit Service. - Supports AirDrop. - Support Quad faces. - Smooth surfaces using Subdivision. - Mirroring editing. - 2-fingers vertex movement, 3 or 4-fingers planar shape creation. - Versatile multi-touches drag-through-space gestures to support editing and changing viewing angle at the same time. - Flexible face strip drawing. - Stitching boundary faces. Stitch triangle soap into connected faces. Stitch over edge or vertex to form a larger face. - Stitching Triangles to Quads. - Loop Cut faces. - Bevel edges. - Extrude faces or edges. - Revolve (Spin). - Vertex Smoothing. - Vertex Slide along edges. - Crease Editing after mesh subdivision. - Split mesh from, or Join mesh to the editing one. - Support hierarchical mesh node structure. - Direct vertex color editing when texture map is not used. - Edit texture map UV coordinates, include atlas generation. - 3D Text generation. - Scene interaction with your created shape. - Design Animation with skeleton structure. - Capture movie from the 3D scene. - Support using video as model texture map.

Screenshots

RoughAnimator1 screens
Sketch 3D4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is price: Sketch 3D at Free against RoughAnimator's $7.99. RoughAnimator's advantage is rating (4.6 vs 2.9) and in-app purchases (none vs 2). 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

Sketch 3D is free to download; RoughAnimator costs $7.99 up front. Sketch 3D sells 2 one-off in-app purchases. RoughAnimator asks for nothing beyond the download.

ReceptionRating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings

RoughAnimator holds the better App Store score, 4.6 against 2.9. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: RoughAnimator has 3K ratings behind it against 443, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews point the same way: 79% of RoughAnimator's written reviews are positive against 48% of Sketch 3D's.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

RoughAnimator ships an update fortnightly, Sketch 3D every 3 months. The most recent releases landed on November 6, 2026 and November 1, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard8 real differences · 3 level
RoughAnimator versus Sketch 3D: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterRoughAnimatorSketch 3D
Price$7.99Free — better
Rating4.6 (3K ratings) — better2.9 (443 ratings)
Positive reviews78.6% of reviews — better47.9% of reviews
Number of ratings3K — better443
Update frequencyFortnightly — betterEvery 3 months
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesNo — betterYes
MonetizationPaidFree with in-app purchases — better
Best chart rank#8 — better—
DevicesiPhone, iPad, iPodiPhone, iPad, iPod
Requires iOS13 — better14.0
Further details — not scored
Size31 MB187 MB
Age rating4+17+
DeveloperJacob KAFKAVictor Ng

Customer experience

RoughAnimator

All ratings2,936 ratings
Positive92.5%
Neutral3.3%
Negative4.2%
Written reviews852 reviews
Positive78.6%
Neutral9.4%
Negative12.0%

Sketch 3D

All ratings443 ratings
Positive41.1%
Neutral12.2%
Negative46.7%
Written reviews236 reviews
Positive47.9%
Neutral16.1%
Negative36.0%

User reviews

RoughAnimator

From 3K App Store ratings

What we love

  • 👍 Easy to use
  • 🚀 Smooth animation
  • 💡 Useful features like camera and audio
  • 👍 Intuitive interface
  • 👍 Great for beginners

Room to improve

  • 🐛 Crashes when importing video/audio
  • 🐛 Laggy performance with larger projects
  • 🐛 Pixelated/blurry drawings when playing animation
  • 🐛 Onion skin not working
  • 🐛 Brush issues like splotchy lines

Sketch 3D

From 443 App Store ratings

What we love

  • 💡 Powerful 3D modeling and animation capabilities
  • 🚀 Impressive features for a free app
  • 👍 Potential to be a leading 3D modeling tool on iPad

Room to improve

  • 🤯 Extremely confusing and difficult to use interface
  • 🤔 Lack of tutorials and instructions
  • 🐛 Frequent crashes and bugs
  • 👎 Steep learning curve for beginners

Bugs and requests

RoughAnimator

Reported bugs

4 issues
  • Crashes when importing audio
  • Onion skin not working
  • Pixelated drawings when playing animation
  • Laggy performance with larger projects

Requested features

8 requests
  • Add transparency support for exports
  • Implement a text tool
  • Provide more brush options and customization
  • Add a ruler/shape tool
  • Improve audio handling (record, import, sync)
Show 3 more
  • Implement a tween/animation feature
  • Add layer grouping and organization tools
  • Provide a dark mode option

Sketch 3D

Reported bugs

3 issues
  • Crashes when trying to load or save projects
  • Texture and color issues when importing models
  • Unresponsive controls and buttons

Requested features

4 requests
  • In-app tutorials and video guides
  • Improved user interface and controls
  • Support for importing custom 3D models
  • Ability to save and load projects reliably

In-app purchases

None

RoughAnimator

No in-app purchases

2 purchases

Sketch 3D

One-time2
  • Unlimited Keyframe Editing$1.99
  • Unlimited Video Capturing$1.99

Questions

Is RoughAnimator free?
RoughAnimator costs $7.99, with no in-app purchases.
Is Sketch 3D free?
Sketch 3D is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Which has better reviews, RoughAnimator or Sketch 3D?
RoughAnimator is rated higher. RoughAnimator averages 4.6 out of 5 from 3K ratings, while Sketch 3D averages 2.9 from 443 ratings.
Do RoughAnimator or Sketch 3D have ads?
Neither RoughAnimator nor Sketch 3D shows ads.
Which is updated more often, RoughAnimator or Sketch 3D?
RoughAnimator ships an update fortnightly, and Sketch 3D every 3 months. Most recently, RoughAnimator was updated on November 6, 2026 and Sketch 3D on November 1, 2026.

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