What are the best Chinese dictionaries for Android and Apple mobile devices?

A quick search in the Android Marketplace or Apple App store reveals pages and pages of Chinese dictionaries, including free, ad supported versions, as well as paid apps between $1 and $20 USD. After sampling a number of them, I have settled in on two favorites that seem to be the easiest to use, have the most features, and offer both free and pro versions:

Best Chinese Dictionary App on Android

So far, my favorite Chinese dictionary for Android is Hanping Ch-En. There is a free version and a paid version for £4.99 (about $7.75 USD).

Here is a list of the features I like best (as available on version 2.2.6 Pro):

• Traditional and simplified Chinese characters.
• Search by Chinese characters, Hanyu Pinyin, English terms (install the free “HanWriting IME” app so you can actually write characters by hand like on an iPod Touch, iPhone or iPad).
• Search for characters in the beginning, middle or end of a term (click the little wrench icon to right of the search field to change this setting.)
• Pinyin is shown right below each character on the detail page.
• Chinese count words are shown when appropriate (e.g. 個, 雙, 台, etc.)
• Drill down on individual characters within multiple character words.
• Audio versions of Chinese terms.
• Shortcut to more details, sample sentences, Google dictionary and Wiktionary via the Android browser.
• Shortcut to “save to clipboard” so you can paste into emails, text messages, other dictionaries, etc.

Best Chinese Dictionary App on iOS4

My favorite app for iPod Touches, iPhones and iPads is KTdict C-E. There is a free version and a pro version for $3.99.

Here are the top features as I see it (as available on version 1.6.1 Pro):

• Beautiful UI (user interface) as one would expect on an Apple device.
• Traditional and simplified Chinese characters.
• Search by Chinese characters (which is a breeze with Apple’s handwriting input), Hanyu Pinyin, and English.
• Drill down on individual characters within multiple character words. Each character can then be copied to the clip board, looked up in the dictionary by itself, or searched within Google, Baidu, Wikipedia (English and Chinese versions), Unihan, Wiktionary, and Dictionary.com (this feature alone is well worth the money!)
• Words you search for are automatically added to the history so you can easily review them later.
• The “Trainer” feature quizes you on words you’ve saved as flashcards. You can create flashcards with the search results, from your favorited terms, and from words in your history.

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