# Extreme 500 — The classic card game

> Classic card game of 500 with AI opponents and customizable rules. (iPhone/iPad app by James Swiney.)

- Source: https://appshunter.io/ios/app/extreme-500/id775846912 (this page in markdown: same URL + `.md`)
- Developer: [James Swiney](https://appshunter.io/developer/481532695)
- Category: Games, Entertainment, Board, Card
- Price: $2.99
- Rating: 4.40/5 from 576 App Store ratings · 116 written reviews indexed
- Age rating: 4+
- Requires: iOS 14.0 · 11 MB
- Languages: American English
- Released: 2013-12-18
- Data updated: 2026-09-03
- Monetization: paid
- User reviews in markdown: https://appshunter.io/ios/app/extreme-500/id775846912/reviews.md

## What is Extreme 500?

Extreme 500 is the classic game of 500, with a fresh elegant simplistic design.

Bid, Pass and Trump your way to victory, playing the traditional 4 player partnered 500 or a cutthroat 3 player solo 500. With and against intelligent and challenging Ai.

Play your way! Choose from three different scoring systems and choose how many cards in your deck.

## Key features

- Classic 500 card game
- 4-player partnered mode
- 3-player solo mode
- Intelligent AI opponents
- Three scoring systems
- Adjustable deck size

## Chart rankings

- #198 in Top Paid · Card (US App Store)

## What do users think of Extreme 500?

Overall sentiment: neutral

**Pros**

- 🚀 Great game
- 🕹️ Enjoyable gameplay
- 🕹️ Good practice for playing
- 🕹️ Realistic game play

**Cons**

- 🐛 Scoring issues
- 🐛 Misere bid issues
- 🐛 Partner plays suboptimally
- 🔍 Small card size
- 🔀 Difficulty rearranging cards
- 🕹️ Predictable AI
- 🕹️ Unbalanced dealing

**Commonly reported bugs**

- Cards disappearing from screen
- No-trump bid not working properly
- Misere bid overriding higher bids
- Incorrect scoring for misere

**Most requested features**

- Online/multiplayer mode
- Customizable settings (e.g. speed, sound)
- Ability to sort cards into suits
- Improved partner AI
- Scoring/bidding clarifications
- Support for additional 500 variants (e.g. open misere)

## Recent user reviews (10 of 116)

All indexed reviews: https://appshunter.io/ios/app/extreme-500/id775846912/reviews.md

### 1/5 — Don’t buy

*2026-07-02, version 3.8*

Wish I could get my money back. Gameplay is terrible. When you win bid, kitty stays in middle and you have to switch out one card at a time (instead of the kitty going into your hand and discarding cards). Even worse, when you switch each individual card it isn’t sorted by suit. Also, you can either choose playing a 6 bid or not playing a 6 bid. There is no inkling. Most basic features available in all the other free apps aren’t even available with a paid app. Don’t waste your money.

### 4/5 — Bad bidding

*2026-04-29, version 3.8*

Could never make a bid!

### 5/5 — What do the ratings mean?

*2025-09-09, version 3.8*

Great game. I play it just about every night. One thing I can’t figure out - what do the ratings mean? I just came back from -490 to win, and got an “S”? What does that stand for? Or I’ll take 10 tricks (“slam”), then win a misare for 500 points in 2 hands and get a “B”?… 😅

### 2/5 — Letter Grade Stupid

*2025-04-04, version 3.8*

Game is okay playing partners for an app anyway. Way too may unbidable hands. It’s like the randomization that substitutes for a shuffle is too good. Played thousands of games over the last 60 years and I’ve never had a game  where ten hands delt with no biddable cards. 
This letter grade business incredibly annoying and 100% unnecessary. For a game I had to pay for…it could be a lot better.

### 3/5 — Sus dealing

*2025-01-29, version 3.8*

Admittedly the sample size is small, I’ve only played around 25 hands so far.  

But of those 25 hands I’ve only had about 3 worth even thinking about bidding on, normally I get hand that has a few of each suit but not a lot of any one of them. Meanwhile 80% of the time the AI bids 7 or 8 wins and easily gets them because they have 8 or 9 of a single suit and another ace or two for good measure. 

I hope I can come back and change this and it really just is the small sample size because this is no fun.

Edit: I think I originally wrote this years ago. I still play the game from time to time in order to pass the time, but overall I think my review up top is pretty accurate. The sample size is now a few hundred, so still not massive but more than most people will play the game I reckon. 90% of the time I’m dealt 2 cards in 2 suits and 3 cards in the other 2. It’s incredibly rare to get a hand worth bidding on. Every deal seems to be perfectly average for the player. However, the ai seems to end up with 7+ cards in the same suit AT LEAST every second round. At least this is your partner as often as your 2 opponents. But it leaves me playing very passively. On the other hand, sometimes your partner will make a bid and it matches what’s in your own hand so you might overbid them, especially if the cpu made a larger bid in between. You’re just as likely to find out the opponent players actually held more of the suit than your partner made a bid for, setting you up for massive failure. I got baited into this after being forced to pass about 20 hands in a row. 

So yea, not a bad way to waste 30 mins whilst on a train or something, especially if you don’t play too often. But the dealing is incredibly suspicious and stacked against the player and you quickly start realising the games shortcomings the more you play.

### 2/5 — Repetitive game play

*2025-01-04, version 3.8*

Clunky app. Personalised rule changes don’t even get applied to the game. After several games, the algorithm became extremely predictable and completely frustrating. Lame. Would love a refund.

### 3/5 — Not a real good 500 player

*2024-08-05, version 3.8*

You never lead the joker first when you make it no trumps, you save it so you can get back in the game. You never play top card when your partner leads, when you have smaller trumps, it makes your partner think you have no more trumps. You also don’t call 7 of the same trump when the opponent before you calls 6, it’s quite obvious the person who developed this app a very poor 500player. Please tweak this game to make it better. Also once opponents are out of trumps, play your suit instead of playing trumps and robbing your partner of all his trumps, but appears you haven’t tried to correct anything so don’t see anything happening to make it better. When your partner has the trick, and you are the last player never take it when you have a smaller trump in your hand absolutely has no idea how to play 500. Fix it. Whoever done this App doesn’t know a thing about 500 why would you play the right bower on the Joker when you have a smaller trump in your hand. Your partner doesn’t take your trick with the joker after player one card in no trumps is played as you usually have a run down in one suit and cannot get back in. Please fix these mistakes I could scream poor poor player. Stop draining your partner for trumps when opposition has no trumps left use your suit, even if not good your partner may not have that suit and take it with a trump, sorry mate you haven’t played much 500. You don’t make 8 when you are only holding 5 trumps, you know nothing about this game your hopeless, and the people on here saying what a great game never played tournament 500. I give you1 out of 10.

### 3/5 — Predictable

*2024-01-03, version 3.8*

I can always tell what suit others are going to bid in when I have only one card in an entire suit. 
Happens more time than not.

### 4/5 — Cross ruff

*2023-12-13, version 3.8*

Pretty good game but could use some improvements in partner bidding and play in the 4 player game.  Get him to stop pulling trump as soon as the opponents are out, then play winners in other suits down to a loser in a suit other than trump.  The opponents play against misere bids needs improvements.  I win about 90% of games, should be more challenging.

### 1/5 — Deleted

*2023-09-29, version 3.8*

Whilst I really enjoyed the game I found on my iPhone I couldn’t shut it off which was really frustrating. Also on the iPhone some of the cards are hidden by the black cut out in the iPhone 13. I literally had to turn my phone off to get out of this app.

## Frequently asked questions about Extreme 500

### What is Extreme 500?

Extreme 500 is a digital adaptation of the classic card game of 500. It features an elegant and simplistic design, allowing players to bid, pass, and play trump to achieve victory.

### What game modes are available?

The app offers two primary game modes: the traditional 4-player partnered 500, and a more competitive 3-player solo 500. Both modes are played against intelligent and challenging AI opponents.

### Can I customize the gameplay?

Yes, you can personalize your experience by choosing from three different scoring systems. Additionally, you can adjust the number of cards in your deck to suit your preferences.

### Is this app free to play?

Based on the provided information, this application is a paid app. There are no mentions of in-app purchases or advertisements, suggesting a one-time purchase for the full experience.

### What are the benefits of playing against AI?

Playing against the intelligent and challenging AI in Extreme 500 provides a consistent and engaging experience, allowing you to practice your strategy and improve your skills at any time without needing human opponents.

## Version history (last 5 releases)

### 3.9 — 2026-08-05

Performance improvements and bug fixes

### 3.8 — 2023-09-13

Interface updates.

### 3.7 — 2021-09-26

Extreme 500 now runs at 120fps on iPhone 13 Pro and iPhone 13 Pro Max

### 3.6 — 2021-04-29

Extreme 500 will now run at a super smooth 120fps on devices that support 120hz.

### 3.5 — 2020-10-19

This update adds support for the iPhone 12 screen sizes.

## Apps similar to Extreme 500

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| --- | --- | --- | --- |
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## More apps by James Swiney

- [Extreme Hand and Foot](https://appshunter.io/ios/app/extreme-hand-and-foot/id688166777)
- [Hectic Space](https://appshunter.io/ios/app/hectic-space/id841199768)
- [Tower of Words 2](https://appshunter.io/ios/app/tower-of-words-2/id1052565194)
- [Hectic Space 2](https://appshunter.io/ios/app/hectic-space-2/id1072350018)
- [Find the Words](https://appshunter.io/ios/app/find-the-words/id1318717143)

All apps by James Swiney: https://appshunter.io/developer/481532695

## Related topics

[500 bid](https://appshunter.io/ios/topics/500-bid)

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*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 2026-09-03.*