A great Eagle alternative
that lives on every device.
Eagle is a beloved desktop app — but its library stays on one computer. Kelu keeps the same tagged collection of screenshots, references, and images on your iPhone, your Mac, and the web, in sync without a shared folder in sight.
Same idea, different home.
Both apps exist to make the things you save findable instead of lost in folders. The difference is where that library lives. Eagle keeps it on a single Mac or PC and leaves syncing to you. Kelu keeps it in the cloud and puts it on whatever you're holding — phone, laptop, or a browser tab.
Eagle vs Kelu, honestly
No straw men. Here's where each app is genuinely stronger, so you can pick the one that matches how you actually work.
What you gain by going cloud-native
Your phone is your camera
Most references start as a screenshot or a photo on your phone. Kelu lets you save them in two taps from the share sheet — no exporting to a desktop later.
No shared-folder babysitting
Syncing an Eagle library through Dropbox means watch-folders, conflicts, and a heavy local copy on every machine. Kelu's sync is just built in.
Tag once, find anywhere
Both apps are tag-first. With Kelu those tags travel with you, so the search you'd do on your Mac works identically on your phone and the web.
Start free, move at your pace
Your first 2,500 items are free — enough to bring a real reference collection over and live in it for a while before deciding.
When to stay with Eagle
- You live on one desktop. If everything you save happens on a single Mac or PC, Eagle's local library is fast and fully offline.
- You collect more than images. Eagle organizes video, audio, fonts, GIFs, and PDFs side by side. Kelu is focused on images, screenshots, and visual references.
- You want a one-time price. Eagle is a single purchase with no subscription, which suits people who rarely save from a phone.
We'd rather you pick the right tool than the loudest one. If that's Eagle, it's a genuinely good app.
Eagle vs Kelu — common questions
Is Kelu a good Eagle alternative?
If you mostly work on one desktop and want the widest file-format support, Eagle is excellent. If you save references on your phone as often as your laptop and want them to just appear everywhere, Kelu is the better fit — it's a cloud library with native iPhone, Mac, and web apps that stay in sync automatically.
Does Eagle have an iPhone or web app?
No. Eagle is a desktop application for macOS and Windows. There's no native iOS app and no web version, so the library you build lives on the computer it's installed on. Kelu was built cross-device from the start, so the same tagged collection is on your phone, your Mac, and the web.
Does Eagle sync between my computers automatically?
Not on its own. Eagle stores your library as files on a local drive, and you sync between machines by placing that library inside a cloud drive like Dropbox or Google Drive yourself. Kelu handles syncing for you — there's nothing to set up and no shared-folder conflicts to manage.
Can I move my Eagle library into Kelu?
There's no one-click importer, but Eagle keeps your originals as ordinary image files. Export them from Eagle and add them to Kelu, then tag them — Kelu is tag-first, so you don't need to rebuild a folder tree.
Is Kelu free?
Kelu is free for your first 2,500 items, which is plenty to move your reference collection over and try it across your devices. Beyond that there's a paid plan. Eagle, by contrast, is a one-time purchase with no mobile or web apps.
Does Kelu work offline like Eagle?
Eagle is fully offline because it's a local app. Kelu is cloud-native: anything already synced to a device is there to browse offline, and new saves upload as soon as you're back online. The trade-off is that your library follows you to every device instead of staying on one machine.
Try the library that travels with you.
Bring your references over, tag them once, and reach them from any device. Free for your first 2,500 items.