# Cracking the Cryptic — user reviews > 147 indexed App Store user reviews of Cracking the Cryptic by Nick Carney, rated 4.40/5 from 208 ratings. - Source: https://appshunter.io/ios/app/cracking-the-cryptic/id1629992934/reviews - App overview in markdown: https://appshunter.io/ios/app/cracking-the-cryptic/id1629992934.md - Rating breakdown: 5★ 152 · 4★ 23 · 3★ 13 · 2★ 6 · 1★ 14 ## What do users think of Cracking the Cryptic? Overall sentiment: positive **Pros** - 🚀 Best sudoku app - 👍 Great variety of puzzles - 👍 Excellent user interface - 👍 Challenging and fun puzzles - 👍 Constant updates with new puzzles **Cons** - 🐛 Hints are often incorrect or unhelpful - 🐛 Bugs and crashes, especially after updates - 🔋 Battery draining issues - 🔒 Too many in-app purchases required to access content **Commonly reported bugs** - Puzzle progress and purchases disappearing after updates - Incorrect rules or hints in certain puzzles - Crashes and freezes, especially on older devices or Macs - Inconsistent behavior when switching between portrait and landscape modes **Most requested features** - Add more color options for pencil marking and highlighting - Implement a way to clear progress or start puzzles from scratch - Integrate all CTC apps into a single app for better organization - Add keyboard support, especially on Mac - Improve the quality and clarity of hints ## Newest reviews (15 of 147) ### 4/5 — The hint system would be more useful if it weren't riddled with typos *2026-05-09, version 1.2.35* Trying to decipher what the helpful clue is trying to say is a puzzle unto itself when digits are frequently mistyped as other digits. Normally I try to be forgiving of typos, but they're especially egregious here where the meaning changes entirely. The puzzles are mostly fun besides that. ### 3/5 — Hard and not unlocked *2025-11-17* All of these apps follow the same pattern and are generally geared for the very advanced to expert solvers. Also, I paid money for this app, so there is 0.0 reason why I need to complete some number of puzzles to get to other ones. I am not a great solver to any degree, but not a beginner. The 1-stars are generally very difficult for me. My final complaint is the absolute battery hog these apps are. There is a “battery saver” mode, but they drain battery like nobody’s business, so completely close the app when you are not playing. Other than that, I’ve bought them all and get tp about 3-start before giving up. ### 4/5 — Amazing puzzles *2025-10-21* One issue though: every single time I open the app, between 2 and 4 "Purchase completed" popups appear, although my latest purchase was weeks ago ### 4/5 — Pen tool *2025-10-06, version 1.2.32* New update is cool, but the pen tool is absolutely useless in Fog of war puzzles. let me draw on top of the fog! ### 3/5 — Decent App but Obscures Puzzle Difficulty Leading to Wasted Purchases *2025-09-29, version 1.2.32* It’s a pretty nice app for doing sudoku. It hides puzzle difficulty from you before buying a puzzle pack so it’s impossible to know if you’re about to waste money on a set of puzzles well beyond your ability or tolerance for arcane and complex variant rules. Puzzles come with hints which can be useful, but there are many typos in the row/column references. ### 3/5 — New Bug *2025-09-19, version 1.2.29* Love this app and redownloaded it because I saw they added more puzzles, but now when I open the app after downloading the most recent update, my whole screen is just gray and nothing ever appears! Please fix soon! ### 4/5 — Fun. Wish there was more *2025-09-10, version 1.2.28* The puzzles are very fun, ranging from easy to very challenging. As many others note, the hints can be very difficult to follow. I wish there were more frequent updates to add new puzzles. ### 3/5 — Puzzles are good, hints are almost always wrong or vague *2025-08-15* In so many puzzles, there will be a hint such as “r2c8 can only be 9”, and if you go to input 9 into r2c8, it’s just flat out wrong. Probably around 40% of the puzzles, I would say, contain uninterpretable typos, including mislabeling cell positions (saying r5c6 when they mean r6c5, or saying r5c6 when they mean r4c6). Additionally, even many of the clues that aren’t just fully wrong are still vague and unhelpful, assuming leaps of logic, causing me to get to the point where I just have to abandon many of the puzzles because there’s nowhere left for me to make progress. And then I don’t have enough stars to unlock new puzzles, so I often just have to manually put in random numbers until I fill out the grid of one puzzle so I can finish it and unlock new ones. ### 2/5 — Less than “free” app. *2025-06-26, version 1.2.28* It’s made intentionally difficult to play without paying for level packs. There are some free packs at the very bottom of the list. ### 4/5 — Too many bugs *2025-06-08* Pls fix Marty’s worm ### 3/5 — Nice puzzles, but… *2025-05-29* First of all: The puzzles are great. The hints are sometimes messed up, but over all, you get a lot for your money. But: I wanted to use the app with my keyboard on an iPad Pro, and the keys are working - sometimes. More often it hangs, and compared to the Online Sudoku App by Sven this really sucks. Hope that we get Svens App here or at least see an improvement in ease of use. ### 5/5 — The only good app on my phone *2025-05-11, version 1.2.24* First and foremost the puzzles are really excellent. But there’s a major problem with this app. Once you get used to it, the UI for every other sudoku website/app will make you cry in comparison. ### 5/5 — Great puzzles and often add more *2025-04-19* Really great puzzles. The hard ones are actually hard! every 2-3 months they add a few more which is really appreciated! ### 3/5 — Regular sudoku *2025-04-12* Can I just play normal sudoku with this app? I can’t figure out how. ### 5/5 — Great App *2025-04-10* Loved the fog of war. Can we have Fog of War II please? 😀 ## Most critical reviews (10 lowest-rated) ### 1/5 — Ohne Geld nicht spielbar *2026-04-10* Game geöffnet. Spielen gedrückt. Gesehen, dass jedes Game Geld kostet. Deinstaliert. Ladet es einfach nicht runter ### 1/5 — Dommage .. *2026-01-20* Superbe app, mais la seule du développeur où le partage familial n’est pas pris en compte ### 1/5 — Shockingly buggy for how simple it is. *2025-10-14, version 1.2.32* Even after the latest update, the app still freezes and crashes, to the point where I have to put my phone to sleep to escape the app. Additionally, the app frequently loses all progress on a puzzle. Twice now in the past week I've been 75% done with a puzzle and I've put my phone away for a moment only to find all my progress on the level erased. Additionally additionally, this is more minor, but every time I am immediately greeted by two popups that say "Your purchase has been successful" that I have to close in order to progress. It's just really annoying. Furthermore, in the new fog of war packs, the line tool draws underneath the fog which is really annoying when trying to do arrow and thermo puzzles. It blows my mind that an app as simple as this can possibly even be this buggy. Puzzles are fun though and I like the channel. ### 1/5 — Startet erst gar nicht. *2025-09-19* Installiert, geöffnet, nichts zu sehen, schwarzes bzw. dunkles Display und keine Reaktion. Das ist das zweitschlechteste was eine App machen kann. Daher noch ein Stern… und wieder gelöscht. ### 1/5 — Hints Are Pathetic *2025-07-08, version 1.2.28* Just a horrible experience from top to bottom. Would not recommend. ### 1/5 — Free to download. Not free to play. *2025-01-15, version 1.2.20* Game sells level packs. Pass ### 1/5 — No support for in-app purchase glitch *2024-09-06, version 1.2.13* I’ve been a Cracking the Cryptic fan since I discovered it during the pandemic. I have purchased all apps and found them all to be well worth the price. I value being able to continually re-solve puzzles to improve my time, so the timing feature, including the record kept of the best time, is a big plus. The hints are great for learning how to improve puzzle solving skills. While the quality of the hints is not consistent, with some over-explaining and some under-explaining, I understand how much time goes into striking the right balance for consistency across puzzles and for users at different levels. I would pay more if the price were increased to make the quality more consistent (perhaps tiered hints for users at different levels). I liked the new approach of the CTC app with separate modules for sale as in-app purchases until I discovered a glitch that no one has helped me solve. I use 2 different Apple IDs to buy apps because I divide my time between Canada and the U.S. and the sale of some apps is restricted by country. My main account is Canadian, but when I need to buy an app restricted to the U.S., I have to log out of the Canadian Apple ID and into the U.S. one. Sometimes I forget to switch back. I inadvertently bought the first 4 CTC modules using the U.S. account. Many months later after solving all puzzles in the first 4 modules except for some puzzles not yet released, I bought the recently released module while logged into the Canadian account. A few days later, I had to log into the U.S. account to download a U.S. banking app. The next time I opened the CTC app after doing that, the free modules and the most recently purchased one showed up with my playing history but the 4 modules I purchased using the U.S. account were set to unpurchased with my playing history gone. I suspected that this was due to switching accounts and discovered that I had purchased different modules while logged into different accounts. However, when I logged out of the Canadian account and into the U.S. account, the modules I had purchased using the U.S. account were still showing up as not purchased and the “restore purchases” function did not work. I have tried every way I can find to report the problem to developers and Apple but have received no solution. I tried requesting a refund of the apps I can no longer access, thinking I would re-purchase them using the Canadian account (though my play history would still be lost), but Apple told me they are not eligible for a refund. If a solution to this problem is found, I will change my review. ### 1/5 — Joke *2024-07-28* Looks like it was programmed by a 12 year old and everything is purchase to play ### 1/5 — No games without purchase *2024-07-09, version 1.2.12* I downloaded this game having checked the types of in app purchases available. What I found when I opened the app was no games at all unless a purchase was made. I am all for reasonable in app purchases but to not have anything to try out made me delete it right away. I’d have no trouble paying an “entry” fee as long as it included some games- perhaps I would buy more if I liked them. But there being no games is misleading and is why it’s no longer on my phone. ### 1/5 — Scammers *2024-06-26, version 1.2.12* It’s free to download, it costs is use after downloading it. ## Most praised reviews (10 highest-rated) ### 5/5 — Please let us reset *2026-06-22* I love this app and the puzzles - I have spent hours playing. However, I’ve gotten to the point where I would love to replay but the empty stars just doesn’t give the same feeling of progression because the number on the pack select menu doesn’t change. I’ve tried deleting multiple ways, but something about the way it’s saved in iCloud makes it impossible. Please please please give the option to completely reset progress. ### 5/5 — Awesome! Love all of the puzzles especially the new worm by blobz! *2026-05-25, version 1.2.35* But can we please have a setting to keep the calculator available? Some of the non killer puzzles require math but don’t have a calculator available. Also I really want to see more yin yang puzzles! (: ### 5/5 — high quality puzzle *2025-11-27* so good worth paying! Just a tiny problem with the app. After the recent update, purchase notices pop up everytime the app is opened. I bought 4 packs after the update, and somehow I have to close 8 pop-ups in a row. Not so serious one but if you could fix that then it would be much less bothering ### 5/5 — Best sudoku app for experts and challenge-seeking enthusiasts *2025-11-10* This is the best Sudoku app, hands down. I’ve tried countless Sudoku apps in search of a real challenge, but none satisfied me—until I discovered this one! Finally, a Sudoku app designed for true Sudoku lovers seeking the highest challenge. I highly recommend this app to anyone who loves a real challenge. ### 5/5 — Purchase pop up *2025-10-29, version 1.2.32* Very good app and I’ve recently made two purchases for new levels which causes the “Purchase Complete: Your content has been unlocked. Enjoy!” message to pop up twice for each purchase every time I open the app. So every time I open the app I’m getting four pop ups. Can be quite annoying. ### 5/5 — I recommend the puzzle packs *2025-10-11, version 1.2.32* Some fantastic puzzles here, really well rounded difficulties. I personally really enjoyed the very cheap worm puzzles, and the slightly more expensive fog pack. But there’s a great deal of free content here, and no ads or intrusive marketing. ### 5/5 — Love the game *2025-06-20* Best sudoku app ### 5/5 — love variant sudoku *2025-06-17, version 1.2.28* excellent app, I love the creativity of the puzzles! I wish there were more knight sudoku in this one. ### 5/5 — I want more!! *2025-06-05, version 1.2.25* I loved every second of it! I finished all the packs and can’t get enough of it! Add more packs please🪃🛝 ### 5/5 — The best Sudoku App out there *2025-05-13* I bought this to support my favorite YouTubers, but I ended up spending hours and hours enjoying wonderfully constructed app. Pretty much every day it’s one of the highlights to choose one of the sheer endless amounts of puzzles to challenge myself and improve my nonlinear thinking. Not only does this app offer great variety in puzzle types, I can decide every day if I want a quick achievement by choosing a lower difficulty or challenge myself to a 2-3 hour monster. I mean every word when I write that Cracking the Cryptic deserve all the success they have and more. Please, more puzzles packs, take my money! --- *Data collected daily from the US App Store and indexed by [AppsHunter](https://appshunter.io/). User reviews are verbatim App Store reviews. Ratings, prices and chart positions refresh continuously; this snapshot is from 2026-08-26.*