By ibis
Report updated May 19, 2026
ibis Paint X
For digital artists and manga creators ranging from hobbyists to professionals who require high-performance drawing tools on mobile and desktop devices.
ibis Paint X is a well-regarded graphics & design app that is free with in-app purchases. With a 4.5/5 rating from 3.2M reviews, it maintains solid user satisfaction. Users particularly appreciate beginner-friendly drawing tools and intuitive interface design facilitate rapid skill development for new artists, though lack of cloud-based account synchronization prevents progress recovery after app reinstallation or device changes remains a common concern.
What is ibis Paint X?
ibis Paint X is a high-performance digital painting and manga creation app for iOS and Android.
Users hire ibis Paint X to bridge the gap between casual sketching and professional illustration through a low-friction, ad-supported entry point.
Current Momentum
v14.0 · 1mo ago
Active- Added Lasso Selection to Vector tools.
- Added Speech Bubble and Arrow shapes.
- Added Brush Cursor for stylus hover.
Active Nemesis
FlipaClip: Draw 2D Animation
By Visual Blasters
Other Rivals
7-Day Rank Pulse 🇺🇸
Graphics & DesignRating Pulse 🇺🇸
Recent User MoodAI-powered deep analysis surfacing high-signal insights. Still in beta, accuracy improves daily. For informational purposes only.
What makes this app unique?
What Does It Look Like?
How Is The App's Momentum Right Now?
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What Are The Key Features?
Records the entire drawing process as a video for playback and sharing
Access to over 47,000 brushes
Unlocks 20GB cloud storage, premium materials, and advanced filters
How much does it cost?
- Free version with advertisements
- Paid version (Ad Removal Upgrade)
- Premium Membership (Monthly/Yearly plan)
Freemium model uses ad-supported free access to drive volume, with a clear path to monetization via one-time ad removal or recurring premium subscriptions.
Who Built It?
ibis
Empowering digital artists with professional-grade illustration tools and a social ecosystem for sharing the creative process on mobile.
Portfolio
2
Apps
Who is ibis?
ibis inc. has established a dominant position in the mobile illustration market by prioritizing social learning and process recording over traditional static toolsets. Their primary moat is a massive community-driven network effect where users share time-lapse videos of their work, creating a self-sustaining educational environment that desktop-legacy incumbents struggle to replicate. The publisher maintains a disciplined dual-track monetization strategy, successfully balancing a high-volume ad-supported version with a premium paid tier.
Who is ibis for?
- Digital artists
- Manga creators
- Ranging from hobbyists to professionals
- Who value mobile portability
Portfolio momentum
Maintains an active development cycle with 9 updates across its 2 flagship titles in the last 6 months, with the most recent major release occurring 15 days ago.
What other apps does ibis make?
What do users think recently?
High confidence · Latest 71 of 149 total reviews analyzed · Based on 149 reviews. Signal may be noisy.
How did the latest release land?
What is the recent mood?
Recent user voice shows a excited sentiment. Users appreciate beginner-friendly drawing tools and intuitive interface design facilitate rapid skill development for new artists, but report lack of cloud-based account synchronization prevents progress recovery after app reinstallation or device changes.
What Users Love
What Frustrates Users
What Users Want
What is the competitive landscape for ibis Paint X?
How's The Graphics & Design Market?
How does it evolve in the Graphics & Design market?
ibis Paint X holds a consistent #9 Grossing rank across multiple international markets, signaling strong monetization efficiency despite its free-to-start model. The gap between its high Free chart placement and stable Grossing rank suggests the ad-removal and premium-membership tiers are effectively converting the massive user base.
| Country | Category | Chart | Rank | Change |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 🇸🇮 Slovenia | Art & Design | AndroidFree | #5 | ▲2 |
| 🇱🇺 Luxembourg | Art & Design | AndroidGrossing | #6 |
The rivals identified
The Nemesis
Head to Head
The target app should focus on deepening its animation feature set to prevent user churn toward specialized animation-first platforms.
What sets ibis Paint X apart
Offers a significantly broader library of professional-grade brushes and materials for static illustration
Advanced vector toolset provides superior precision for complex line art and technical drawing
What's FlipaClip: Draw 2D Animation's Edge
Streamlined animation-first workflow reduces the learning curve for creators focused on motion
High-frequency update cycle allows for rapid iteration on community-requested animation features
Contenders
Live brushes simulate real-world watercolor and oil paint physics for authentic traditional media results
Deep integration with Adobe Creative Cloud allows for frictionless asset transfer to Photoshop
Procreate
★4.4 (49.2K)Savage Interactive Pty Ltd
⚡The industry standard for professional digital illustration on tablets, representing the primary threat for high-end creative users.
One-time purchase model appeals to professional users avoiding subscription-based or ad-supported creative software
Highly optimized rendering engine provides a tactile, low-latency drawing experience unmatched by cross-platform competitors
Clip Studio Paint for iPhone
★4.5 (39.4K)CELSYS,Inc.
⚡A direct competitor in the manga and comic creation space with a robust, feature-rich professional toolset.
Advanced comic-specific features like panel border creation and speech bubble management tools
Seamless cloud synchronization between mobile and desktop versions for professional production pipelines
MediBang Paint – Drawing & Art
★4.6 (31.7K)MediBang inc.
⚡A strong alternative for comic and manga artists with a focus on cloud-based collaboration.
Built-in team collaboration features allow multiple users to work on the same project file
Extensive library of cloud-based backgrounds and tones specifically tailored for manga production
Peers
Advanced perspective guides and 3D rendering tools provide unique utility for architectural and concept art
Clean, minimalist interface design reduces visual clutter compared to the feature-dense target app
Distraction-free UI design prioritizes the canvas area for a more immersive sketching experience
Predictive stroke technology provides superior line smoothing for users without specialized hardware
Concepts
★4.7 (26.1K)TopHatch, Inc.
⚡Focuses on infinite canvas and vector-based design, catering to designers and architects.
Infinite canvas architecture allows for non-linear brainstorming and large-scale project planning
Fully vector-based engine enables infinite scaling and post-stroke editing of every individual line
New Kids on the Block
Generative AI video synthesis allows users to animate static illustrations with simple text prompts
Rapid feature deployment cycle keeps the app at the forefront of emerging generative AI trends
Leonardo.Ai - Image Generator
★4.7 (83.4K)Leonardo Interactive Pty Ltd
⚡Rapidly gaining traction by focusing on high-quality AI-assisted asset generation for digital artists.
Model training capabilities allow users to create custom styles based on their own artistic portfolio
Integrated AI canvas tools enable in-painting and out-painting to expand existing digital compositions
The outtake for ibis Paint X
Strengths to defend, gaps to attack
Core Strengths
- Social-sharing recording feature drives organic acquisition velocity
- 47,000-brush library creates a high-value asset barrier
- Freemium model sustains high install volume across 500M+ downloads
Critical Frictions
- Lack of account-based cloud sync causes permanent data loss
- System-level gesture interference disrupts brush strokes on Android
- Aggressive premium-gating of custom brush exports limits power users
Growth Levers
- Education partnerships offer untapped B2B distribution channels
- Cross-device sync would significantly reduce power-user churn
Market Threats
- FlipaClip's animation-first workflow drains the motion-creative segment
- Generative AI tools like Kling AI disrupt static illustration workflows
- Procreate's one-time purchase model attracts professional-grade users
What are the next best moves?
Ship cloud-based account synchronization because it is the top-requested feature → reduce permanent churn from data loss
User reviews consistently cite data loss upon reinstallation as the primary pain point.
Trade-off: Pause the AI Disturbance feature expansion — cloud sync has a higher impact on long-term retention.
Audit Android gesture-interference logic because input-sticking reports disrupt the core drawing flow → stabilize Android rating
Android rating (4.46) lags behind iOS (4.71) due to reported pointer input issues.
Trade-off: Same-quarter capacity available — no major lever displaced.
A counter-intuitive read
The app's massive 500 million download count is a liability, not an asset, because it forces a maintenance-heavy support cycle that prevents the rapid iteration needed to compete with agile, animation-first rivals.
Feature Gaps vs Competitors
- Frame-by-frame animation timeline (available in FlipaClip but missing here)
- Seamless cloud synchronization between mobile and desktop (available in Clip Studio Paint but missing here)
Key Takeaways
ibis Paint X dominates the entry-level digital art market through its massive brush library and social-sharing loops, but the lack of cloud-based account sync creates a critical churn risk that threatens long-term retention, so the PM must prioritize account-based data persistence over new feature releases.
Where Is It Heading?
Stable
The digital art market is consolidating around tools that offer seamless cross-device workflows, leaving ibis Paint X exposed to churn if it does not address its local-only storage model. While the current feature-expansion cadence is strong, the PM must shift focus toward infrastructure stability to prevent power users from migrating to cloud-native competitors.
The lack of cloud-based account synchronization causes permanent data loss, which erodes trust among power users and increases churn risk.
The latest release added Lasso Selection and Shape tools, indicating the team is actively expanding the professional-grade toolset for creators.