The 10 Best Family Games for iPhone and iPad to Play with Your Kids (iOS)

Children are known to be a bit boisterous and full of energy. Many of them really connect with the music! If you have a musical child, My Singing Monsters allows them to create songs from the monsters they find. These monsters chime in, so you don’t have to worry about grinding your teeth through broken keys, and instead can enjoy the rhythms they make with their monsters, giving them clues on how to unlock them along the way.

From the title alone, you’d be forgiven for thinking this was a kids’ game about sneezing. But it’s actually a daring cooperative adventure where the whole family collects clues to try to deduce which of the castle’s residents stole the magic ring that protects the kingdom before an evil wizard comes to steal it.

So much for the plot of the novel. But while it’s clearly aimed at younger players, it’s a surprisingly fun fantasy foray for young and old alike, thanks to its variable difficulty settings and impressive array of achievements. Their cooperative nature avoids bickering over who will win. And with basic strategy and memory elements, it’s educational too.

It is based on a board game. But while the original game had an archaic electronic gadget in the middle of the board that buzzed and farted in a weak attempt to make the game more engaging, this adaptation makes good use of the move to digital with great animations, sound effects, and a touchscreen based mini-game.

I really wanted to focus on the hidden gems in this list. But when Matt asked his kids and wife, in an effort to do real, in-depth journalistic research, what their favorite iPad game was, they chanted “Cut the Rope!” Then he begged me to include it.

It’s not hard to see why. It’s an endearing, harmless game that’s very easy to learn but has a difficulty range that can challenge even the most experienced puzzle fan. And for the little ones, well, Om Nom is cute enough to make watching the little scenes an entertaining pleasure in itself.

So, while we won’t take on any of the other glaring candidates for this list, for his family at least, Cut the Rope is the king of casual family games for iPhone and iPad. I doubt they are the only ones.

Roblox is a gaming platform filled with hundreds of games that you can play with your kids. You’ll need a few different devices, as each device is one person – but you can join in from your PC, your Xbox, and any other forms of technology you have, really. There are plenty of other kids on the platform and I’m sure that once you hand them the toy, they’ll find a bunch of favorites to bring you along.

From delivering pizzas to starting all-out wars to collecting bees or even farming, there is something for everyone, and your child can have the freedom to choose any game they want. Roblox makes sure that all the games on its platform are vetted and appropriate, so if you want to leave the game with them, you don’t have to worry about what they might end up clicking on. It probably deserves an article of its own, but we think Roblox really belongs on our list of the best family games for iPhone and iPad, as well as other platforms.

Solving a little to the left may seem better for older kids, but it’s a lot of fun to solve with younger kids too! In our family, we tend to work together trying to solve simple-looking puzzles, taking turns putting items back in place. It’s a game about putting items back in place, giving you a relaxing and satisfying feeling when you solve the level, and many of them have multiple ways to solve them!

Ticket to Ride is a digital adaptation of the board game of the same name. The goal is to be the fastest player to connect all your cities and reach your assigned destinations. Best of all, it’s an easy-to-understand game that all ages can enjoy.

There are a range of different tactics you can use to try to block other players or take over important routes before they can. This gives Ticket to Ride a lot of replay value as you can try a different approach each time. Best of all, the game supports local multiplayer, which means you can easily play with your kids without much setup required.

It is the elite of children’s app developers. And as with all the best things designed for kids, their titles always have a little something in them for adults, too.

Toca Hair Salon Me is the latest in a long line of hair styling titles where you wash, dye, style and accessorize hair to your heart’s content. Fun activity? Yes. game? Not real. So why include it?

The answer is that it uses an ingenious piece of technology that wraps images around the model’s head and moves the mouth and nose.

This is odd enough when using photos of friends and family. But there’s nothing stopping adults from using images of plants, construction work or stills from monster movies. The results were funny and horrific in equal measure.

attention! It is a family game for iPhone which is often played in our house. The concept is very simple – your family chooses a category, then one person holds the phone to their head, revealing a word to everyone. They need to give hints about what the word is, quickly, over time. Once a person gets the word, they can dip their head and offer another word.

There are lots of different kid-friendly categories in the app, from animals to green – allowing you to find something your kids might be best at. When it comes to shouting out what the word makes you think, shy kids can really get into the game, and become more confident in what they’re saying, especially since you’re all under a timer!

I’m sure you remember Mad Libs from when you were a kid, but instead of having to use a physical book to write in, you can actually download Mad Libs and use the app to create funny stories. It’s a very simple game – you’re given a category for a word, such as an adjective or a noun, and you have to think of a word to put in that blank. Once you fill in all the words, you can read a silly story.

It’s a great way for children to expand and use their vocabulary, while also providing entertainment for a group of people. There are stories being added constantly, and even interactive hints. It’s a lot of fun in short bursts.

I’ve always felt that any truly great mobile game should offer something for players of all stripes, from casual gamers to pros. This is especially true for family games, with Carcassonne perhaps the perfect example.

For glassy-eyed strategy fans, it’s a brutal two-player game of scheming, scheming and one-upmanship. For happy adult players, it’s a fun multiplayer game that includes tile drawing and cooperative art. For kids, there’s the option to turn off the mysteriously confusing “Farmers” rule, resulting in simple, kid-friendly tactical combat.

It helps that this is a brilliantly streamlined app, so skillfully designed that even the most tech-scared of people will fall under its influence and be browsing through the menus after just minutes of use.

We hope that you will find something interesting in our list of the best family games for iPhone and iPad, and that you will spend many enjoyable hours with your children!