Muse — canvas for ideas

Inspired & focused thinking

Free · In‑App Purchases

319 Ratings
Awards

Editors’ Choice

Apps
Ages

4+
Years
Category

Productivity
Developer

Milestone Made, LLC
Language

EN
+ 6 More
Size

100.7
MB

Muse is a canvas for thinking that helps you get clarity on things that matter. Think in private or collaborate with others. BEYOND WHITEBOARDS with nested boards Each Muse board is like a whiteboard that can hold even more whiteboards. Your boards grow organically over time as you develop an idea. Stay in the ideation flow, worry about organizing later. REFERENCE & REMIX with linked cards & excerpts Linked cards let you reference boards from multiple places. And excerpts let you remix parts of PDFs and images without losing the context of the source. Grow your Muse into a space of interconnected whiteboards. ONE CANVAS FOR ANYTHING with ink + text + cards Developing an idea starts with collecting inspiration and stray thoughts. Muse lets you put everything on a single canvas: writing, scribbles, notes, images, videos, PDFs, web links, and any other files. Lay out all the raw materials, then connect the dots with ease. COLLABORATION with shared workspaces Add collaborators to a Muse workspace to plan and strategize together. They'll feel right at home with live cursors, comments, following, and templates. AND PLENTY MORE → Search and quick-jump to boards → Read and annotate PDFs → Create connections between cards → Export boards as PDFs or PNGs → Local-first data with instant sync LEARN MORE Website: https://museapp.com/ Community: https://museapp.com/community Contact us: hello@museapp.com Terms of service: https://museapp.com/terms

Ratings & Reviews

4.6

out of 5

319 Ratings

Editors’ Choice

Brutal minimalism, be damned: Muse’s organized chaos wrangles your files, photos, drawings, and text to provide a perfect brainstorming workspace. If you need to go deeper, Muse’s unique file structure lets you jump in and out of its signature boards with a flurry of slick gestures.
A neat idea, but needs improvement.
01/02/2022

Lordtmy
As far as brainstorming apps goes this is great because of the wide variety it provides: drawing, text writing and importing images as well as URLs to make references easier. The extra abilities do require some time to learn all the different gestures. Some of them are intuitive, some are based on the built in iOS gestures, and some are unique to the app. Sometimes it is a little unclear how to do things or why one action happened instead of the one you intended. For example at one point when trying to follow the tutorial to create a new board I instead created a new window with the same board, essentially duplicating the app which was kinda confusing. But because this is apparently a feature of the iPad and not the app I couldn’t find any help to understand why this happened or how to fix it. It might be helpful to add some documentation besides just the app’s functionality for users who might get confused by similar gesture controls not being recognized properly.Another Major issue with all the gesture controls is a complete lack of undo/redo. It’s very easy to accidentally move, delete, or edit something and have no way to revert that change without just redoing the original thing over again. When accidentally drawing in a text box this isn’t too bad, but when you have something already drawn you can’t take it back or undo the new stroke. It’s not too bad, especially for free, but I think it could use a bit more polish, especially if they are charging to use a bit more cards or with a team.

Developer Response
Thank you for your thoughtful feedback! We are still working to make the app more approachable to new users, and will better document system features in the future as well.Muse does actually have undo and redo. You use the left / right arrow buttons in the action bar, or tap anywhere with two fingers (undo) or three fingers (redo). If this isn’t working for you, please email us at hello@museapp.com so that we can help you further.
A neat idea, but needs improvement.
01/02/2022

Lordtmy

As far as brainstorming apps goes this is great because of the wide variety it provides: drawing, text writing and importing images as well as URLs to make references easier. The extra abilities do require some time to learn all the different gestures. Some of them are intuitive, some are based on the built in iOS gestures, and some are unique to the app. Sometimes it is a little unclear how to do things or why one action happened instead of the one you intended. For example at one point when trying to follow the tutorial to create a new board I instead created a new window with the same board, essentially duplicating the app which was kinda confusing. But because this is apparently a feature of the iPad and not the app I couldn’t find any help to understand why this happened or how to fix it. It might be helpful to add some documentation besides just the app’s functionality for users who might get confused by similar gesture controls not being recognized properly.Another Major issue with all the gesture controls is a complete lack of undo/redo. It’s very easy to accidentally move, delete, or edit something and have no way to revert that change without just redoing the original thing over again. When accidentally drawing in a text box this isn’t too bad, but when you have something already drawn you can’t take it back or undo the new stroke. It’s not too bad, especially for free, but I think it could use a bit more polish, especially if they are charging to use a bit more cards or with a team.
Developer Response 01/05/2022
Thank you for your thoughtful feedback! We are still working to make the app more approachable to new users, and will better document system features in the future as well.Muse does actually have undo and redo. You use the left / right arrow buttons in the action bar, or tap anywhere with two fingers (undo) or three fingers (redo). If this isn’t working for you, please email us at hello@museapp.com so that we can help you further.
Absolutely Brilliant App. Price Hurts.
01/29/2021

Sirartvandelay
This one of those insanely perfect apps that Apple should buy. This should be the iPad’s desktop—not just an endless array of applications. I have no doubt it is worth every penny. But yikes. It will cost you every last penny. $99 a year is really high for an app like this. $99 is the type of price that should allow you to own a product for life when paid up front. I would argue they should move from a yearly to a monthly/yearly subscription model. Something like 4.99 a month (a la Ulysses) or $99 for a lifetime subscription would certainly net them a much broader subscriber base and make it a lot easier for a large variety of people to take the plunge. People who pay $100+ up front for an app want to own it for life and resent subscriptions. Everyone else might be willing to pay $100 a year, but not up front. As is currently constructed, it’s a lose-lose, for customer and company. Chicken/egg dilemma: price is too high to acquire customers and increase revenue, so price stays high because your company increasingly needs enough revenue from those few customers to fund development.On a big picture note: Your team should get a meeting with some upper level Apple execs and pitch them on buying this company to replace the Home Screen on iPad Pro. Imagine this environment being your real iPad desktop—with the opportunity to have rows for apps, and nested app folders. So I give this app five stars because brilliant, beautiful design is worth whatever the cost may be. But with no other way to access it—not even a student rate—I unfortunately have found myself priced out.

Developer Response
Thank you for all the lovely praise ❤️On price, we've just rolled out some new options including a starter membership at $3.99 per month. Let us know what you think.
Absolutely Brilliant App. Price Hurts.
01/29/2021

Sirartvandelay

This one of those insanely perfect apps that Apple should buy. This should be the iPad’s desktop—not just an endless array of applications. I have no doubt it is worth every penny. But yikes. It will cost you every last penny. $99 a year is really high for an app like this. $99 is the type of price that should allow you to own a product for life when paid up front. I would argue they should move from a yearly to a monthly/yearly subscription model. Something like 4.99 a month (a la Ulysses) or $99 for a lifetime subscription would certainly net them a much broader subscriber base and make it a lot easier for a large variety of people to take the plunge. People who pay $100+ up front for an app want to own it for life and resent subscriptions. Everyone else might be willing to pay $100 a year, but not up front. As is currently constructed, it’s a lose-lose, for customer and company. Chicken/egg dilemma: price is too high to acquire customers and increase revenue, so price stays high because your company increasingly needs enough revenue from those few customers to fund development.On a big picture note: Your team should get a meeting with some upper level Apple execs and pitch them on buying this company to replace the Home Screen on iPad Pro. Imagine this environment being your real iPad desktop—with the opportunity to have rows for apps, and nested app folders. So I give this app five stars because brilliant, beautiful design is worth whatever the cost may be. But with no other way to access it—not even a student rate—I unfortunately have found myself priced out.
Developer Response 05/27/2021
Thank you for all the lovely praise ❤️On price, we've just rolled out some new options including a starter membership at $3.99 per month. Let us know what you think.
iPad at its most creative
10/28/2020

Andrew Anonymous
I was about 75 cards into Muse before the light bulb went on: This is a game-changer! Finally, an app that views the iPad not as an iPhone or laptop, but as a unique tool for creative work. A board is a Tabula Rosa where you can place and move cards, drawings, other boards, etc. The interactions are visual and tactile using fingers, the pencil and the keyboard. It took me awhile to appreciate all of the design choices as I was coming from the usual Drafts/Bear/Roam/Notion/Notes world (yeah, finding the right notes app is a quest). Muse is truly different. Now, I use Muse for the creative stuff and Notes for more quotidian needs. I'm guessing that this is still early days for Muse and that it will add features like links in future releases. The subscription prices is much less than Roam's $180/year. Given the power of Muse, you could almost say it's a bargain.
iPad at its most creative
10/28/2020

Andrew Anonymous

I was about 75 cards into Muse before the light bulb went on: This is a game-changer! Finally, an app that views the iPad not as an iPhone or laptop, but as a unique tool for creative work. A board is a Tabula Rosa where you can place and move cards, drawings, other boards, etc. The interactions are visual and tactile using fingers, the pencil and the keyboard. It took me awhile to appreciate all of the design choices as I was coming from the usual Drafts/Bear/Roam/Notion/Notes world (yeah, finding the right notes app is a quest). Muse is truly different. Now, I use Muse for the creative stuff and Notes for more quotidian needs. I'm guessing that this is still early days for Muse and that it will add features like links in future releases. The subscription prices is much less than Roam's $180/year. Given the power of Muse, you could almost say it's a bargain.

New Features: • New Tape Tool creates textured tape strips with a paper-like pattern, including tap-to-reveal for hiding and uncovering content underneath (Backstage Pass feature) • New Stroke Eraser mode deletes entire strokes on contact instead of clipping them (Backstage Pass feature) • Paste YouTube URLs to automatically import video thumbnails as image cards alongside the link • Videos can now be scrubbed while playing or paused by dragging the playback position Improvements: • Reduced CPU usage from unnecessary background processing Bug Fixes: • Fixed crash when switching back and forth between Muse and other apps on iPad • Fixed Unicode and case-insensitive search issues when finding text in boards • Fixed profile settings not correctly tracking image changes • Fixed accidental undo/redo triggering during Apple Pencil drawing • Fixed tapping in the middle or top of a text block incorrectly placing the cursor at the bottom Thanks for using Muse!

Version 3.5.2 Feb 28

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Information

Seller: Milestone Made, LLC
Size: 100.7 MB
Category: Productivity
Compatibility: Requires iOS 15.0 or later.

iPhone
Requires iOS 15.0 or later.

iPad
Requires iPadOS 15.0 or later.

iPod touch
Requires iOS 15.0 or later.

Mac
Requires macOS 12.0 or later.

Apple Vision
Requires visionOS 1.0 or later.
Languages: English and 6 more

English, French, German, Simplified Chinese, Spanish, Traditional Chinese, Ukrainian
Age Rating: 4+

4+

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In-App Purchases: Yes

Unlimited membership, monthly $9.99

Pro membership, monthly $9.99

Unlimited membership, yearly $99.99

Pro membership, yearly $99.99

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