Starmap Pro App Reviews

Ive purchased many of the top listed astronomy apps. I like several of these apps, however this astronomy app is my favorite. Take the time to learn how to use it. You will not be disappointed!!

Poorly executed! Try locating 61 Cygni. What other important objects have been left out?

This latest upgrade has broken landscape view. When turning my iPhone 6+ sideways (which I prefer) theres only half of the display visible, the other half of the screen is black. The same is true on my wifes iPhone 5S. FIX THIS!!! ================ EDIT: Evidently the Devs listened as the latest update has fixed the landscape mode problem. Thanks for fixing my favorite astronomy app!

This is an awesome program that every professional and amateur astronomer should have. And thanks for fixing the landscape issue on the iPhone 6 Plus. You guys are awesome!

I was so relieved to see that I could begin using this app again. Thank you guys for all of your hard work fixing the previous problems with the app. Astronomers at all levels appreciate your efforts.

Cannot touch select sky object to obtain info details. Running iSO 9.0.2. Makes the app unusable until the bug is fixed!

A NEW GLITCH Asteroid data no longer update! Even though it says "Update Required", the update never work! You get a Network Connect error or a Download Incomplete error message and no updating! OLD GLITCH NOW FIXED On the iPhone now, it crashes every time Featured is chosen! Now fixed! ONGOING MAJOR GLITCH Each time this app is upgraded, it forgets that 160 megs of photos have been installed!! So, one has to discover that by accident --and then go through a long download. That should not be necessary and definitely needs fixing. This latest version of the app has done something worse--the app claims all the photoshop bars and photos! are installed, but wont show any in the scrolling list! It responds with a Photos x symbol. And, no, it has nothing to do with my photo settings--I checked that! Oddly, photos still show up in the info windows of individual objects, but not the scrolling list--which is so good for spotting whats up. The only solution is to DELETE all the photos and then re-download. ANOTHER UPGRADE CATASTROPHE The latest upgrade reset all the toolbars. It takes a long time and painstaking work to change the icons in each toolbar to what you want. Having an upgrade destroy all that effort and time is horrendous. Be sure to take snapshots of the screen as a record to get things back in order. Youll be sorry if you dont! The developer is a responsive, decent sort, but this problem reflects poorly on his attention to the program! The upgrade problems lose it a star out of the box. SOME GOOD AND BAD THINGS Pop up photos and info when tapping on an DSO are just wonderful. One tap and you see a mini photo of the object similar to an eyepiece view. But its very tricky tapping on DSOs. Instead, you often end up getting some obscure stars info. Excellent eyepiece views, with user customization to fit your collection. But theres only one magnitude setting--and it handles both DSOs and stars, so its very hard to get a FOV that really represents what youve looking at. (Stars are an odd grey, too; nothing like an eyepiece view.) DISPLAY OMISSIONS Attractive display, including color customization by user and discrete display of DSO names. But the program does NOT show many of the brightest DSOs, including many Messier objects, unless you drill way down to ridiculously small fields of view! Thats really a major deficiency in a star charting program! The symbols for star clusters and globulars are too similar, and there is no color customization of DSOs. SPRAWLING LIST The Tonight feature is wonderful, providing a great way of seeing whats going to be up--and permits great filtering by object type, telescope, magnitude or rating, etc. But youre stuck between a choice of listing only two or scores of objects--and the button for switching requires scrolling through all the objects! There needs to be an in-between setting, too, showing say top 5 or 10 in each category. TOOLBAR LABYRINTH Customizable tool bars, so that you can group the functions you use most into a couple of toolbars. But the customization is needlessly convoluted, you end up having to use multiple toolbars; it switches every time you use a different command; and it doesnt even include the new Find command from its simplified toolbar (which groups all the various finds together). Note: I had taken backup photos to have a record of how I had set things up--and it is still a bear redoing the icon sets. Frederic really should provide an alphabetized list to draw on; as it stands now, one has to hunt and hunt to find the icon/command one wants in the maze of icons. SUMMARY Still, this is one of the best astronomy, planetarium, sky gazing apps available. While SkySafari Plus surpasses it overall, with a better design, better features in many areas, and more frequent upgrades, Starmap Pro is no slouch and makes an excellent app (its photos and one-tap pop up info & photos are the best among all astro apps). At these prices, buy both! Just make sure that you take snapshots of your toolbar customizations because upgrades can reset all that work! Say, that reminds me. I better go take some screen shots of Starmaps menu palettes!

This is a phenomenal app rich with features. I cannot say enough about the incredible number of features and the amount of information available in this app. It does everything you could ask for.

This was the best iDevice planetarium app out there. Sadly it seems to have been relegated to the past for more profit via the squared version. This now crashes on my 6S after doing anything related to the asteroid database and you can no longer click on objects to get more info. So sad...

Simply the best app on my phone