# Tortoise Blocks — Snap blocks, draw pictures > Snap blocks, draw pictures (iPhone/iPad app by Tomoki Kobayashi.) - Source: https://appshunter.io/ios/app/tortoise-blocks/id6798677334 (this page in markdown: same URL + `.md`) - Developer: [Tomoki Kobayashi](https://appshunter.io/developer/323485927) - Category: Education, Graphics & Design - Price: Free - Age rating: 4+ - Requires: iOS 26.0 · 8 MB - Languages: American English, Japanese - Released: 2026-08-18 - Data updated: 2026-09-23 - User reviews in markdown: https://appshunter.io/ios/app/tortoise-blocks/id6798677334/reviews.md ## What is Tortoise Blocks? Tortoise Blocks is a visual programming app for children. Snap a few blocks together, press play, and a tortoise draws the picture on the canvas — one line at a time, with the block it is drawing lit up in the program. BLOCKS THAT SNAP TOGETHER Move and turn. Put the pen down, pick a color, fill a shape. Drag a block into place or tap to add it, change a number where it sits, and undo anything you like. One tap on the trash can clears the whole program when you want to start over. REPEAT, IF, AND BOXES Run a group of blocks again and again. Ask a question and take one path or the other. Keep a number in a box and add to it as the program runs. These are the ideas real programs are made of, in words a child already knows. BLOCKS YOU MAKE YOURSELF Give a block a name, put whatever you like inside it, and call it by that name from anywhere in the program. A block can call itself, too — and one that calls itself twice, a little smaller each time, draws a tree. There is a ready-made tree to look at before you build your own. ROLL THE DICE Any number — and any color — can be a dice roll instead. The same program then draws a different picture every time it runs, which turns "do it again" into a game of its own. WATCH IT DRAW Play, pause, step forward one command at a time, scrub back and forth, change the speed while it runs. The block being drawn stays highlighted, so it is never a mystery which block made which line. BLOCKS BECOME SWIFT A second pane shows the very same program as real Swift code, colored like an editor and ready to copy. It is waiting there for the day blocks stop being enough. KEEP IT AND SHARE IT Drawings are ordinary documents in Files and Finder, and each one shows its own picture as its icon — so a folder of them reads as a gallery rather than a row of identical squares. Export a drawing as SVG or PNG, or send it through the share sheet. FOR PARENTS AND TEACHERS There is no sign-in and no account. There is nothing to type but numbers. There is no advertising, no analytics, no third-party SDK, and no network connection of any kind — the app contains no networking code at all. Drawings stay on the device and in whatever location you choose to save them. Tortoise Blocks runs on iPad, Mac and Apple Vision Pro — blocks are built on iPad and Mac, and on Vision Pro a finished drawing goes on the table in front of you. It speaks English and Japanese, and is free and open source under the MIT license. ## Version history (last 4 releases) ### 1.3.0 — 2026-09-22 NOW ON IPHONE Tortoise Blocks runs on iPhone, and on iPad the way back to your drawings is where you look for it. • On iPhone, the program fills the screen, and the blocks and the drawing open from the buttons along the bottom. • On iPhone, tapping a drawing in the Files app opens it straight away. • On iPad, a Drawings button now sits at the top left while a drawing is open, so there is always a way back to the list. • Other small fixes and internal improvements. ### 1.2.0 — 2026-09-14 BLOCKS THAT MOVE LIKE BLOCKS Building a program now feels more like handling real blocks. • Drag a block and it lifts off looking just like itself — and a block with others inside carries them along. • The rows part to show exactly where your block will land, and a block that holds others lights up in its own colour when you drop into it. • The block that is running lifts gently instead of wearing a dark outline. • Blocks slide into place when you add, move, delete or undo, and the program scrolls to the block you just added. • The trash can bounces when you throw a block in, and the whole circle can be tapped. • All of it follows Reduce Motion in Settings. ### 1.1.0 — 2026-08-26 BLOCKS YOU MAKE YOURSELF Give a block a name, put whatever you like inside it, and call it from anywhere in your program. A block can call itself, too — which is all it takes to draw a tree. • A new sample draws a fractal tree, so you can see a block calling itself before you build one. • Every block now carries one ⋯ menu: delete it, move it up or down, or give an "if" its "otherwise". • Tap the trash can to clear the whole program at once. You can undo it. • Block labels stay on one line in narrower windows. ON APPLE VISION PRO Tortoise Blocks now runs on Apple Vision Pro, as a viewer for the drawings you make here. Open one and it goes on the table in front of you, at whatever size you like, with the tortoise walking across the paper as the picture appears. Your drawings are the same documents on every device. ### 1.0.0 — 2026-08-25 No release notes. ## More apps by Tomoki Kobayashi - [Real Halftone 2](https://appshunter.io/ios/app/real-halftone-2/id1632423711) - [FFFrame](https://appshunter.io/ios/app/ffframe/id6753587312) All apps by Tomoki Kobayashi: https://appshunter.io/developer/323485927 --- *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 2026-09-23.*