Arc Studio Pro and Arqo are the two well-designed cloud-native screenwriting tools, at within $20/year of each other. They look more alike than different from the outside. The honest read on what differs underneath.
We’d rather lose the click than lose the trust.
Arc’s Pro tier ships professional-grade revision management UI that’s been refined over multiple cycles. Arqo’s revision-asterisk-gutter and coloured-page rotation match the output, but Arc’s interface for managing the revision pass itself is more mature today.
Arc Studio Pro lets you define custom screenplay formats — half-hour multi-cam, stage, AV, custom hybrids — at a depth that exceeds our current options. We support the major frameworks plus stageplay; Arc supports more niche template variations.
Arc’s paid add-ons (Research Assistant, Character Images) are integrated into the editor. Arqo doesn’t ship character image generation — and we’ve chosen not to. If that’s a workflow you want, Arc is the better tool.
Arc’s iPad/iPhone apps are companion surfaces; the editor itself is built on the desktop assumption. Arqo runs the same Fountain editor on a 390px viewport with three synced views (Flow / Pages / Beats). Phone-first is in the architecture, not bolted on.
Arc Free watermarks PDFs (PDF export is Pro-only without watermark). Arqo Free exports unwatermarked PDF and FDX. If you’re evaluating the tool with a real script, that matters.
Arc has outlining and beat-boarding. Arqo ships 12+ story frameworks (Story Circle, Save the Cat, Pixar, Kishōtenketsu, Hero’s Journey, 3-act, 5-act, AV, stageplay) wired live to scenes — pick a lens per script, swap mid-draft.
Arqo ships character/location/Day-Out-of-Days reports. Arc Studio Pro doesn’t — production-side reports are a Celtx/Final Draft area Arc has chosen not to enter. If your script is going into production, Arqo covers more of the chain.
Arc’s Character Images add-on is a real workflow for some writers. We’ve chosen not to ship it. Casting visualisation lives outside the screenplay tool; we’re trying to keep the editor focused on the words on the page.
Arc’s Research Assistant answers research questions inline. The line between research and content-generation gets blurry fast. Until we can ship a research surface that doesn’t silently turn into a continuation surface, we’re not shipping it.
If a writer can’t use the free tier to send a clean PDF to a friend for notes, the free tier is a demo, not a tier. Arqo Free exports unwatermarked PDF and FDX. We will not change that.
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Free tier opens two scripts. No card. Bring your file, see how it lands.
On the screenwriting-editor surface, mostly yes — same FDX round-trip, same industry PDF, same real-time collab category. On revision-management UI and custom-format depth, Arc is more mature today. On phone editor and production reports, Arqo is more complete.
Yes. Arc exports FDX and Fountain. Drop the file into Arqo’s import; the round-trip back is golden-tested. Custom Arc formats may require a one-time format remap on import.
No, by choice. We’re cautious about "research" surfaces drifting into content-generation. If you rely on the Research Assistant inline, Arc is the better tool today.
Arqo. Arc’s iPad app is a companion view to the desktop editor; Arqo’s iPad app runs the same editor as desktop, offline-capable, on the same script. The phone-first build choice was made on day one.
Yes — per-character voice assignment via ElevenLabs, shareable take links. Bundled in Pro, not a paid add-on (vs. Arc’s Table Read add-on).
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