Software Alternatives, Accelerators & Startups

PureRef VS Eagle App

Compare PureRef VS Eagle App and see what are their differences

PureRef logo PureRef

The simple way to view and organize your multiple reference images.

Eagle App logo Eagle App

Unify your creative inspiration in one place. Store anything โ€“ inspiring images, design mockups, illustrations, screenshots and more.
  • PureRef Landing page
    Landing page //
    2022-10-23
  • Eagle App Landing page
    Landing page //
    2022-03-03

Eagle is a powerful Windows/macOS digital assets management that uses centralizedย management logic with a cross-reference structure to help creative professional organize digital assets.

If you have issues managing files, design assets and reference materials that:

  • You couldnโ€™t find
  • You donโ€™t know how to classify
  • You didnโ€™t plan to organize
  • You don't remember you had collected or downloaded

Eagle is here to help you! Eagle focuses on 4 major designers' daily workflow, collecting, organizing, searching, and browsing, you can manage your files easily and to link quickly between different parts of your materials to create a inspirational hub/moodboard.

Features and impact you should know about Eagle:

  • No. 1 in the industry that uses cross-reference structure for design materials
  • Instantlyย previewย materials without opening different software (support 90+ file formats such as images, videos, PDF, gif, 3ds, font, audios and more)
  • Streamline daily repetitive management workย into a simple few buttons
  • Trusted by the Worldโ€™s finest design teams like Microsoft, Google, Figma, Sketch
  • Eagle roadmap: https://trello.com/b/LSsVep1d/eagle-development-roadmap

PureRef

Pricing URL
-
$ Details
-
Platforms
-
Release Date
-

Eagle App

Website
eagle.cool
$ Details
freemium $29.95 / One-off (30 days trial, No subscription, Free lifetime updates)
Platforms
Windows Mac OSX Google Chrome Safari Firefox Edge Opera
Release Date
2017 April

PureRef features and specs

  • User-Friendly Interface
    PureRef offers a simple and intuitive interface that makes it easy to organize and manage reference images. The minimalistic design allows users to focus on their work without unnecessary distractions.
  • Lightweight and Portable
    The software is lightweight and does not require installation, making it highly portable. Users can run PureRef from a USB drive or any location on their computer.
  • Flexible Canvas
    PureRef provides a flexible canvas that can be easily resized and adjusted to fit usersโ€™ needs. This allows for seamless scaling of images without quality loss and the ability to organize the workspace freely.
  • Cross-Platform Compatibility
    PureRef is available on Windows, macOS, and Linux, allowing users to maintain a consistent workflow across different operating systems.
  • Customizable Shortcuts
    Users can customize keyboard shortcuts to fit their workflow, which increases efficiency and speeds up navigation within the software.
  • Multiple Image Formats
    PureRef supports a wide range of image formats, ensuring compatibility with most reference images beyond basic formats like JPG and PNG.

Possible disadvantages of PureRef

  • Limited Editing Tools
    While PureRef excels in organizing and displaying reference images, it lacks advanced editing tools, which means users need to rely on other software for image adjustments or annotations.
  • No Cloud Integration
    PureRef does not offer built-in cloud storage or syncing options, which could be inconvenient for users who work across multiple devices and want seamless access to their reference boards.
  • Learning Curve for Advanced Features
    While basic functionalities are easy to grasp, some advanced features and keyboard shortcuts may require time to learn and master, particularly for users new to PureRef.
  • Not Free for All Users
    Although PureRef offers a pay-what-you-want pricing model, users may face ethical dilemmas or budget constraints when deciding what to pay, especially if they plan to use it for professional purposes.
  • Occasional Performance Issues
    Some users report occasional lag or performance issues when handling extremely large collections of high-resolution images, which can disrupt workflow.

Eagle App features and specs

  • File manager
  • Digital Asset Management
  • Font Manager
  • Design Tools
  • Audio Management
  • Video Management
  • GIF viewer
  • Drag and drop
  • Batch Processing
  • Browser Extensions
  • video bookmark
  • Tags
  • Smart Folder
  • Color Filter
  • Keyword Suggest
  • Inspiration

Analysis of Eagle App

Overall verdict

  • Eagle App is considered a powerful tool for creative professionals and anyone looking to manage digital assets effectively. Its numerous features and user-friendly design make it a strong choice for those who value organization and efficiency in handling multimedia content.

Why this product is good

  • Eagle App is widely appreciated for its robust features tailored for organizing and managing digital assets. It provides users with an intuitive and visually-oriented interface, making it easy to store, tag, organize, and retrieve various types of media files such as images, videos, and other document formats. Users enjoy its ability to handle large libraries efficiently, its customization options, and seamless integration with other design tools.

Recommended for

    Eagle App is highly recommended for designers, photographers, artists, and content creators who regularly deal with large volumes of media files and need a robust system for organization. It's also suitable for educators and marketing professionals who need to manage and present collections of digital content. Those who appreciate a visually engaging and customizable organization tool will find Eagle App particularly beneficial.

PureRef videos

The Best Free Tool for Artists - PureRef

More videos:

  • Tutorial - PureRef tutorial: a free, cross-platform virtual board for artists!
  • Review - PureRef Review

Eagle App videos

What is Eagle App?

More videos:

  • Demo - Introducing Eagle App
  • Review - Organize Your Design Assets Like a Pro With Eagle App
  • Review - Forget About Explorer & Finder โ€“ Mindblowing Tagging Software for Windows & Mac โ€“ Eagle App Review
  • Review - The best image organizer and file manager Eagle.cool
  • Review - Graphic Design Organization | Eagle App
  • Review - How I keep my DESIGN assets Organized - Eagle App
  • Tutorial - Overview of Library and Interface | Getting Started with Eagle

Category Popularity

0-100% (relative to PureRef and Eagle App)
Productivity
21 21%
79% 79
Digital Asset Management
22 22%
78% 78
Digital Drawing And Painting
File Manager
0 0%
100% 100

User comments

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Reviews

These are some of the external sources and on-site user reviews we've used to compare PureRef and Eagle App

PureRef Reviews

We have no reviews of PureRef yet.
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Eagle App Reviews

  1. Eagle App Review: good for being productive, can find files very easily

    Its very good for managing your reference materials to swipe files. It's not only for designers but for marketers as well!

    ๐Ÿ Competitors: Adobe Bridge, Inboard, Pixave, Pixa, Raindrop.io, PureRef
    ๐Ÿ‘ Pros:    Organisation|Instant preview|Bulk tagging|Batch processing|Diverse meta search engines.
    ๐Ÿ‘Ž Cons:    No app for ios
  2. jennifer2454
    One of the best Digital Asset Management platform

    Eagle is one of the best Digital Asset Management platforms I have come across. Being a designer we have to manage ton of images and files day to day, using subfolders may lead to a stressful situation. With Eagle, everything is a lot easier, its interface is intuitive I get to use tags, annotations and categorizing functions to organize all my digital assets all in one place. The added browser extension works flawlessly and makes it easier to manage and save new assets. Also, the pricing is affordable with great value.
    Highly recommend it to anyone who wants to have your digital assets well organized!

    ๐Ÿ Competitors: Eagle, digiKam, Adobe Bridge
    ๐Ÿ‘ Pros:    Digital asset management|Great user experience|Easy to use|Beautiful search experience|Support lots of format|Desktop browser extension|Regular updates|Great value for the money|Cheap price
    ๐Ÿ‘Ž Cons:    No mobile version|None so far

Best Bookmark Managers for Teams, Designers & Power Users
Eagle is more than a bookmark managerโ€”itโ€™s a visual library for organizing images, design assets, and creative resources. It allows users to collect and categorize visuals in a way thatโ€™s intuitive and fast. With powerful filtering and previewing capabilities, Eagle helps designers streamline their creative workflow while keeping all their references in one tidy place.

Social recommendations and mentions

Based on our record, Eagle App seems to be a lot more popular than PureRef. While we know about 47 links to Eagle App, we've tracked only 4 mentions of PureRef. We are tracking product recommendations and mentions on various public social media platforms and blogs. They can help you identify which product is more popular and what people think of it.

PureRef mentions (4)

  • how do u guys organize your visual inspiration/refs digitally?
    I mainly use offline means: organising all my files in a hierarchy of folders and using pureref (which I highly recommend) to make moodboards, and ofc an external hard drive to save backups. The only online means I use is google drive for online backups. Source: about 4 years ago
  • HELP! So I want to trace this Image(704x702) into a Pixel art (32 x 32 or 40 x 40) but when I resize it, it gets like this (2nd picture) and if I don't, then the pixels are too small, What do i do?
    If you just want the image to be a transparent overlay while you draw 'through the image'(with it being unchanged) you can use something like Pureref(pureref.com) to set the image as always on top + turn opacity down a bit. Source: about 4 years ago
  • Hide user name in menu bar.
    If you canโ€™t get it to work inside of max, I thought of a free easy workaround you could try. I use the software pureref to manage and quickly access reference images. You could just resize an empty pureref window to cover your username. Change the color and opacity to whatever you want, lock the window and switch turn on the transparent to mouse option and you should be good to go! Source: over 4 years ago
  • Hello Reddit! this is my 1st time posting and i'm excited to share some of my sketches with you guys. I like drawing dynamic poses, it's a really fun exercise!. These 4 girls are from reference pics out of Pinterest. Suggestions are welcome :D. Have a great day!
    The high kicking girl on the right is in a PureRef board I keep to practice gesture. Source: almost 5 years ago

Eagle App mentions (47)

  • Pinterest Is Drowning in a Sea of AI Slop and Auto-Moderation
    I had a Pinterest account back when there were genuinely great resource for niche things like Japanese graphic design. Since then, I've moved to simply having a local image/video database UI app like Eagle[0] and checking Are.na[1] for interesting collections. [0] https://eagle.cool/. - Source: Hacker News / 6 months ago
  • Linkwarden: FOSS self-hostable bookmarking with AI-tagging and page archival
    An alt suggestion, I use Eagle (https://eagle.cool/) for this. I started using it primarily for images inspiration collecting but it has grown into my "everything" collecting, including bookmarks. Libraries can be shared via file sharing (e.g. Google drive, dropbox), one time purchase price, amazing software design, extensions, and more. - Source: Hacker News / over 1 year ago
  • Ask HN: Favorite app you discovered in 2024
    Https://eagle.cool/ - image curation app Raycast Notability. - Source: Hacker News / over 1 year ago
  • Ask HN: What macOS apps/programs do you use daily and recommend?
    Sketch (https://www.sketch.com/) they have brought back stand alone license without subscription hell. Handbrake - Video conversion Eagle (https://eagle.cool/) collecte and organize all design//visual inspiration at one place(this is also my default screengrab app) Monodraw - Flowchart, ASCII, Visual thinking app. - Source: Hacker News / about 2 years ago
  • Ask HN: How are you tracking tools / products to try out later?
    For several years now, while reading HN and Xitter every day, I've been collecting lots of tools, projects and technical blog posts to "try out later". Most of them are never used, or stop being developed. But quite a few end up resurfacing, or being useful for new projects I start. What do you use to keep track of tools / products you want to try out later? Or for keeping a library of "state of the art" to try at... - Source: Hacker News / over 2 years ago
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What are some alternatives?

When comparing PureRef and Eagle App, you can also consider the following products

BeeRef - A Simple Reference Image Viewer

Raindrop.io - All your articles, photos, video & content from web & apps in one place.

Milanote - Milanote is a note taking app for creative work.

Inboard - Inboard is a Mac desktop application that helps organize your images. Perfected workflow

Pinterest - Pinterest is a visual discovery tool that you can use to find ideas for all your projects and interests.

FrameRef - FrameRef is a modern reference board for creative professionals, combining images, videos, and PDFs in one infinite canvas.