The 25 Best Games On Android

You’re likely already familiar with Among Us at least by name, because for a while in the pandemic, it was a go-to party game and way of keeping in touch with friends. The game is similar to Werewolf or Mafia in the sense that you and your group of friends have to figure out who the imposter is before it’s too late and they’ve killed everyone on board the ship. Today, the game is filled with a bunch of fun mods, like ones that let you transform into any player of your choice or have your vote count for more, which keeps the game fresh. The premiere social deduction game that has made the biggest splash among gamers young and old deserves top billing on any list of the best games on Android devices.

For fans of Animal Crossing: New Horizons, Pocket Camp isn’t quite the full game scaled down to your mobile phone, but is sort of a scaled-down version of the game instead. You can build a camp, interact with locals, gather materials, and more here. For those coming down from New Horizons, it might seem a little barebones, but for those looking to get just a slice of Animal Crossing in a smaller dose, it works well.

The tower defense genre is a popular one on mobile and arguably, Bloons TD 6 is the best game in the entire genre. Developed by Ninja Kiwi, the game is played from a 2.5D perspective but uses 3D graphics. Monkeys fighting against balloons is an insane premise but you only need to hop into a singular game to embrace the madness.

In a time where most seem to consistently feel disappointed with big Call of Duty annual releases, the mobile game is a surprisingly great option that a lot of FPS fans will be able to appreciate. The game has a surprisingly good online connection and fairly snappy gun mechanics that make it a fun, free option to play on your Android device. 

Originally released back in 1997, Castlevania: Symphony of the Night is a game that has found various homes in the 26 and a half years since its release, including Android. The game is considered to be one of the main reasons the "Metroidvania" genre even exists, of course in combination with Nintendo’s Metroid series, so getting to play a classic on your mobile phone a quarter of a century later is a treat. The game features a vast castle to explore and enough gear, items, spells, and more to make exploration a lot of fun. The greatest Castlevania game of all time gets all the love in the world on mobile devices, which qualifies it as another great selection on this list of the best games on Android.

Like Castlevania, Chrono Trigger saw its original release back in the 90s (1995 to be exact) but has stayed relevant by finding a home on platforms like Android, iOS, and more. This game is one of the most beloved and classic RPGs of all time from an era that many consider to be a lull period for the genre. Combat is quite fast-paced and the story is amazing, with over a dozen possible endings.

Sid Meier’s Civilization VI is a turn-based strategy 4X game that’s widely thought of as a top-tier game in the genre. After playing a 60-turn demo, you can choose to purchase the full game. Fans of the game will be pleased to know that they can also get every expansion pack released for it on Android. The game itself sees you start a civilization and over thousands of in-game years, help it thrive to become a powerhouse, whether that’s in cultural influence or technological power. If you're looking for a game that gets the brain gear going and puts your tactical know-how to great use, look no further than this latest selection on our list of the best games on Android.

A lot of the games on this list are games that some Android users might be surprised can function fully on their mobile phones, but Crossy Road is an old-school classic that’s simple but just as fun and addictive as anything else on this list. It’s essentially a repackaged, updated version of Frogger that looks great in its colorful, voxel format.

Released in 2018 and developed and published by Motion Twin, Dead Cells sees players step into the shoes of the Prisoner, an amorphous character that has to fight their way out of an island and kill its king. The game’s permadeath setting means that upon death, you lose all of your loot and currency, but for a certain kind of player, that’s where the fun and challenge are.

Now of course, playing Fortnite on a mobile device isn’t nearly as smooth as playing it on a current-gen console or PC, but if you can get past what’ll either be a big learning curve or a big adjustment with the fairly complicated controls, then it’s an impressive feat how the developers have been able to bring the game over. Even the best players will struggle to replicate their success on an Android device, but it only makes the kills and wins that much sweeter when they do come.

This is an action-adventure RPG with a gacha style that will have a lot of people calling it a Breath of the Wild clone, but the game’s good enough to stand on its own two feet. The game sees you traversing a fully breathing open world to find your sibling. The characters and plot are interesting and although the game’s monetization has been criticised, it’s an action-packed game that’s visually stunning.

GRID Autosport is a great racing game on PC and consoles, but one of the best racing games on Android. The game boasts a wide array of cars to unlock and various tracks to race them on. It’s a little bit more expensive than most games on this list, but it’s also one of the more premium options with no in-game advertising or microtransactions.

For more casual gamers who want to be able to hop in and out of a game easily, Idle Bank Tycoon lets players build a bank empire, and the cash stays flowing even when you’re not actively online. To build your empire, you’ll need to upgrade locations, increase your reputation, and pull in a lot of wealthy clients. Watching your money go up is addictive.

For fans of multiplayer online battle arena games, League of Legends: Wild Rift is a pioneering entry in the genre. It’s highly competitive and offers 5v5 gameplay which is scaled down slightly for Android, but the game doesn’t suffer for it. The revamped touch controls make for a pleasant mobile gaming experience. 

Developed by Second Dinner and published by Nuverse, Marvel Snap is the collectible card game that took not just Marvel fans, but general gamers by storm about a year ago. Games like this are often quite complicated to learn and daunting to overcome, but this game’s beauty is in its simplicity. Each game is just three minutes which isn’t so much time that you’re finding yourself less productive in your daily routine as a result, but is enough that you can get a dose of the game whenever you want. Despite how easy it is to learn, there is genuine strategy involved too.

Unlike a lot of the bigger games on this list that started out on console or PC but got put on mobile devices later on, due to the nature of the game and the art style, Minecraft offers a pretty faithful, uncompromised experience on Android. In fact, the newer versions of Minecraft have often taken inspiration from the mobile version.

This game combines the simplicity of a platformer with the complexity of an optical illusion for a surprisingly satisfying creation. The game looks gorgeous and presents each of its levels so well. What’s even better is that there’s an entire predecessor to this game to play if you enjoy it enough.

Pokémon GO was one of the biggest things in the world at one point and although the trend itself died down a while ago, the game still has a colossal player base and is just as fun as it was in its heyday. It’s still a solid way of getting out and about and getting exercise while that’s not the focus of your journey. It’s still very addictive to find new "Pokémon" and search for rarer and rarer ones.

Many will recognize this game as one that’s often sponsored in podcasts and YouTube videos, but beneath the relentless advertising is a genuinely solid gacha RPG. If you can ignore some pay-to-win mechanics, Raid: Shadow Legends’ graphics and characters are beautifully designed.

Sky: Children of the Light is a game that lets you explore a kingdom with a cape that gives you flying powers. The game has various kinds of in-game currencies that can be used to buy items and abilities. Where this game really thrives is in its social aspects. When you’re interacting with other players, the game is truly at its best.

You can credit the big wave of roguelike deck-building games in the past four years or so to the success of Slay the Spire. After selecting one of four characters, you’ll rise through various procedurally generated floors and fight enemies with a collectible card game-based system that requires strategy. If you get deep enough into the game, you can spend hours and hours trying different decks on different enemies.

Inspired by Dungeons & Dragons, Slice & Dice is a 20-stage campaign where the battles are determined with a roll of the dice. As you progress in the game, you can upgrade your heroes’ abilities. There are 100 hero classes to unlock and a lot more content behind that too, so playing the game for long hours shouldn’t be an issue.

Stardew Valley is one of the most fun cozy games out there. The game lets you farm, socialize with in-game characters, and just live a fulfilling life that you can escape to on your phone’s screen, including getting married, going fishing or even engaging in combat with monsters. It’s a game that borrows a lot of elements from various genres and executes a lot of them very well.

Streets of Rage 4 successfully captures the feel of old-school arcade beat 'em up games and brings it right to the palm of your hands in 2023. This game comes nearly three decades after the third game in the series and was worth the wait in many respects. There’s controller support if you want it and impressively, the game runs at 60 FPS even on Android.

Here, you control an automatically firing character’s direction, doing your best to get into free space and avoiding enemies. The goal is to survive for as long as you possibly can against wave after wave of monsters that intend to do you as much harm as possible. The roguelike progression makes things that much more fun too.