Comparison

Square Panda vs Osmo ABCs

Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.

Head to head
About

Square Panda

This app offers a multi-sensory, game-based learning experience for children aged 2 and up to develop reading skills. It adapts to a child's progress, covering phonics, phonological awareness, spelling, word reading, and reading comprehension through interactive games and stories.

Highlights
  • Phonics games for letter sounds
  • Phonological awareness activities
  • Letter tracing and spelling challenges
  • CVC word reading practice
  • Interactive storybooks with SwipePhonics™
  • Parent and teacher progress portal
Features
Read full description

*FROM THE CREATORS OF THE AWARD-WINNING SQUARE PANDA PHONICS PLAYSET* For early readers ages 2 and up, the award-winning Square Panda app features a multi-sensory, fun learning experience to help children learn to read. Featuring personalized gaming and learning that adapts to where children are in developing reading skills. Feeling ready for an adventure? Explore the island of Square Panda - engaging and fun learning for kids. Phonics Area - Pop bubbles, do a fun dance, and play hide-and-seek in an assortment of mini-games to learn letters and their sounds. Phonological Awareness Area - Go coconuts for learning sounds! Explore rhyming, initial and ending sounds of spoken words, blending, and more. Spelling and Writing Area - Zip! Zap! Learn how to trace uppercase and lowercase letters, complete spelling challenges, and manipulate letters to create new CVC words! Word Reading Area - Ready to hop on the word train? Practice blending and reading words at the CVC level with a fun set of mini-games. Lagoon Area - Let’s go to the Lagoon! Explore letter-sound correspondences and spell any word up to 8 letters long! Supports vocabulary development by revealing pictures for many common words. SquareTales Area - SquareTales stories with our patent-pending SwipePhonics™ technology bridges the gap between sounding out individual letters and blending them into words. Carefully crafted text in each story enables emergent readers to start connecting words and sentences to read fun stories. With 40+ eBooks and new content being released on an ongoing basis, these stories help your child learn how to read so they can say, “I read a book all by myself!” The Square Panda Literacy System is designed to keep children engaged and having fun when developing important reading skills: - Provides simple, highly controlled text to support beginning readers - Builds knowledge of word families and common spelling patterns - Introduces CVC (consonant-vowel-consonant) words and sight words - Supports ELA state standards in foundational reading skills - Supports reading fluency through guided practice and repeated readings of text And much more! Square Panda's learning games have had more than 400,000 words spelled and more than 2 million letters played! PARENT & TEACHER PORTAL - With the Square Panda cloud-based parent and teacher portals, parents can follow their child’s progress as they learn letters and words and teachers can manage student profiles, monitor progress, and identify instructional opportunities. “This is the first time that I've seen him able to actually make that connection and put those sounds together to make words. I am so excited and he is so excited as well to be reading.” “This is making a huge impact on my students and their reading ability. To me, that’s amazing!” "Seeing my daughter advance in her class with letters definitely made me feel good and confident that I'm helping pick products and choices that are making her advance in reading and writing.” Follow us on social! Facebook: @playsquarepanda Instagram: @squarepanda Twitter: @squarepanda Twitter (Education): @squarepandaedu *The Square Panda Phonics Playset is compatible for some learning games to extend the learning and fun! Playset sold separately. Privacy Policy: https://squarepanda.com/pages/application-privacy-policy Terms of Use: https://squarepanda.com/pages/terms-conditions

About

Osmo ABCs

Engage young learners in a hands-on adventure to build pre-reading skills. Through interactive play with a friendly monster, children develop confidence in letter recognition, phonics, and vocabulary. This app requires physical Osmo pieces and a compatible iPhone or iPad.

Highlights
  • Letter recognition
  • Phonics learning
  • Vocabulary building
  • Over 300 words
  • Hands-on play
  • Interactive adventure
Read full description

More than 300 words! Through this playful hands-on adventure with Mo the Monster, kids become confident about letter recognition, phonics, and vocabulary. *Play your favourite Osmo ABCs on both iPhone and iPad! Use your iPhone with the Osmo Base for iPad and Silicone Sticks & Rings pieces - each can be found at playosmo.com. *Requires the Osmo Base for iPad and Silicone Sticks & Rings pieces. Learn more by visiting www.playosmo.com. *Please see our device compatibility list here: https://support.playosmo.com/hc/articles/115010156067 ABOUT OSMO -- 21ST CENTURY PLAY AND LEARNING Osmo uses the screen to create a new healthy, hands-on learning experience that promotes creativity, problem-solving and social interaction. We do this with our reflective artificial intelligence technology.

Screenshots

Square Panda4 screens
Osmo ABCs4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is rating: Osmo ABCs at 3.7 against Square Panda's 2.9. Osmo ABCs also leads on ratings volume (265 vs 30). Square Panda's advantage is monetization model (free vs free with in-app purchases) and iOS requirement (10.0 vs 15.0). On price, review sentiment, update cadence and ads there is nothing between them.

Scored on Price · Rating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings · Update frequency · Ads · In-app purchases · Monetization · Best chart rank · Devices · Requires iOS

CostPrice · In-app purchases · Ads · Monetization

Both are free to download. Neither carries in-app purchases, so what you see is what you pay.

ReceptionRating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings

Osmo ABCs holds the better App Store score, 3.7 against 2.9. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: Osmo ABCs has 265 ratings behind it against 30, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews point the same way: 15% of Square Panda's written reviews are positive against 19% of Osmo ABCs's.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

Square Panda ships an update every 6 weeks, Osmo ABCs every 2 months. The most recent releases landed on October 13, 2026 and October 19, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard4 real differences · 6 level
Square Panda versus Osmo ABCs: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterSquare PandaOsmo ABCs
PriceFreeFree
Rating2.9 (30 ratings)3.7 (265 ratings) — better
Positive reviews14.5% of reviews18.9% of reviews — better
Number of ratings30265 — better
Update frequencyEvery 6 weeks — betterEvery 2 months
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesNoNo
MonetizationFree — betterFree with in-app purchases
DevicesiPhone, iPad, iPodiPhone, iPad, iPod
Requires iOS10.0 — better15.0
Further details — not scored
Size420 MB843 MB
Age rating4+4+
DeveloperSquare Panda Inc.Tangible Play

Customer experience

Square Panda

All ratings28 ratings
Positive46.4%
Neutral0.0%
Negative53.6%
Written reviews55 reviews
Positive14.5%
Neutral5.5%
Negative80.0%

Osmo ABCs

All ratings265 ratings
Positive63.0%
Neutral9.4%
Negative27.5%
Written reviews37 reviews
Positive18.9%
Neutral2.7%
Negative78.4%

User reviews

Square Panda

From 30 App Store ratings

What we love

  • 👍 Great for learning letters
  • 👍 Kids enjoy playing
  • 👍 Good graphics
  • 👍 New updates look amazing
  • 👍 Educational value

Room to improve

  • 🐛 App crashes frequently
  • 🐛 App freezes often
  • 🐛 App won't load
  • 🐛 Login issues
  • 🐛 Outdated app

Osmo ABCs

From 265 App Store ratings

What we love

  • 😃 Amazing game
  • 💖 Love it so much
  • ✨ So much fun
  • 👍 Great app for kids
  • 💯 Everything is spot on

Room to improve

  • ❌ Not compatible with iPad Pro
  • ❌ Not receiving verification code
  • ❌ Faulty readings
  • ❌ Unusable like this
  • ❌ Not playable

Bugs and requests

Square Panda

Reported bugs

130 issues
  • App freezes
  • App crashes
  • App won't load
  • Login issues
  • Outdated app
Show 125 more
  • Poor customer support
  • Apps not available in US stores
  • Paid apps used to be free
  • Slow loading times
  • Interface is messy
  • Errors are frequent
  • App closes unexpectedly
  • Missing stars and codes in books
  • QR codes missing in books
  • Inconsistent app performance across devices
  • App drains battery quickly
  • Phone gets extremely hot
  • Apps not showing on one tablet
  • Lagging and disconnecting from playset
  • Glitchy and not smooth
  • App boots to gray screen and shuts down
  • App won't stay open
  • App loads but only plays one game
  • Play set doesn't work
  • No web link for help
  • Sign up for help doesn't work
  • App not loading or advancing
  • Logs out when going to a story
  • Crashes before one page is read
  • Stuck on loading screen
  • Letters stuck or upside down
  • App not responding to touch
  • Letters not working
  • App not working on screen
  • App crashes on first game
  • App not loading at all
  • App crashes on loading profiles
  • App breaking on load
  • Login errors
  • Cannot proceed from map screen
  • Stuck on panda flying screen
  • Download stops midway
  • App crashes after contacting tech support
  • Sound doesn't work in some apps
  • App won't let me create an account
  • App disabled overnight
  • App won't download
  • App won't load properly
  • Background is colored but everything in front is black
  • App keeps closing and turning off the board
  • A few clicks into any games and it takes him back to the start menu
  • All of the applications crash
  • None of the apps will open far enough to even play the game
  • Only one panda game that reads books
  • Super slow
  • App crashes with every game
  • Gets an error every time
  • Website says wrong credentials
  • Cannot update password
  • App freezes and games never load
  • Will send the game board back soon if the problem isn’t fixed
  • Can’t get his name to come up in the lagoon
  • Returning the game board and deleting the apps
  • Need an Apple iPad to play this game
  • Will be returning the game
  • Really frustrated
  • Can’t get the app to stop crashing
  • App crashes with every game
  • My son is so upset
  • Loaded app and he got to use it for 5 min then kicks me out
  • Request that I re login and gives me an error every time
  • Tried all the apps same deal
  • Tried using their website says i have wrong credentials
  • Will not allow me update password
  • Sent in to customer support and still waiting
  • Seemed like a good idea but so far the app doesn’t follow through
  • First letter was stuck on M
  • Showed an upside down K
  • Kept saying remove the M
  • Couldn’t get any letters to work
  • Couldn’t get the app to work on the screen
  • Said touch a letter and nothing happened
  • My 5 year old told me she doesn’t like it and it doesn’t work
  • Very disappointed
  • Assume their new update fixed it all
  • Was able to play multiple games with no issues
  • Learning device also works with your phone, not just a tablet
  • Phone got extremely hot
  • Battery was drained very quickly
  • Not sure if a tablet would have the same issue
  • Crashed on the first try
  • This is terrible
  • Couldn’t get to load at all
  • I’m returning
  • Love the hands on tile + fun games
  • Concise and straightforward enough for my 5 yo to do independently and enjoy and be successful
  • Every single time we try to use this app it does not work
  • My daughter gave up on this!
  • How can you come out with a product and it does not work?
  • Spent 20min just trying to get something to load and it never does
  • We are returning this
  • Constantly crashing
  • Every time we try to go anywhere in square land or read any books in square tales, the app completely crashes
  • Happens every time now
  • My child is completely frustrated
  • 개같이 로그인오류떠서 못쓰게만든건 누구대가리에서 나온 아이디어냐 (Whose idea was it to make it unusable with dog-like login errors?)
  • iPad app is crashing and won’t load at all
  • Attempted downloading the app on my iPhone, and it won’t download!
  • Cannot use
  • Cannot proceed from the map screen
  • Stuck on the screen where the panda is flying
  • Stops midway
  • What should I do?
  • Crashes on the very first game
  • Cost way too much money for the app to crash
  • Woeful app keeps crashing
  • Books will not download
  • Terrible app
  • Bugs that are continually being reported are being ignored
  • Crashes after contacting tech support and following instructions
  • Way too expensive of a device for this to happen
  • Crashes during the first game
  • Seems like it would be really cool other wise
  • Stopped working
  • Used to work fine
  • Crashes on loading profiles
  • Even after the update
  • Please fix!
  • Breaks on load
  • Reinstalled and still doesn’t work

Requested features

37 requests
  • Add more games to a single app
  • Allow customization of name in lagoon
  • Fix bugs and glitches
  • Make app compatible with more devices
  • Provide better tech support
Show 32 more
  • Make all apps free again
  • Improve app loading speed
  • Update the interface
  • Fix login errors
  • Provide a web link for help
  • Allow password updates
  • Fix missing stars and codes in books
  • Include QR codes in books
  • Improve app stability
  • Fix battery drain and overheating issues
  • Allow users to download all apps on any device
  • Make sound work in all apps
  • Ensure all apps are visible on all devices
  • Improve connectivity with playset
  • Fix glitchy and unsmooth app performance
  • Allow users to create accounts
  • Make the app available in all regions
  • Fix the issue where the app only plays one game
  • Make the play set work with the app
  • Allow users to sign up for help and more games
  • Fix app not loading or advancing issues
  • Fix app logging out issues
  • Fix app crashing before pages are read
  • Fix stuck loading screens
  • Fix issues with letters being stuck or upside down
  • Fix app not responding to touch
  • Fix issues with letters not working
  • Fix app not working on screen
  • Fix app crashing on first game
  • Fix app not loading at all
  • Fix app crashing on loading profiles
  • Fix app breaking on load

Osmo ABCs

Reported bugs

11 issues
  • Not compatible with iPad Pro
  • Not receiving verification code
  • Faulty readings (wrong tile detection)
  • Camera orientation issues on newer iPads
  • App won't open for some users
Show 6 more
  • Reflector not recognizing letters/pieces
  • No sound
  • Audio keeps dropping
  • App crashes on opening
  • ABC app not opening
  • Connectivity issues with ABC game redirection

Requested features

3 requests
  • Update app for newer iPads
  • Fix ABC game redirection to App Store
  • Fix audio issues

In-app purchases

None

Square Panda

No in-app purchases

None

Osmo ABCs

No in-app purchases

Questions

Is Square Panda free?
Square Panda is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Is Osmo ABCs free?
Osmo ABCs is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Which has better reviews, Square Panda or Osmo ABCs?
Osmo ABCs is rated higher. Square Panda averages 2.9 out of 5 from 30 ratings, while Osmo ABCs averages 3.7 from 265 ratings.
Do Square Panda or Osmo ABCs have ads?
Neither Square Panda nor Osmo ABCs shows ads.
Which is updated more often, Square Panda or Osmo ABCs?
Square Panda ships an update every 6 weeks, and Osmo ABCs every 2 months. Most recently, Square Panda was updated on October 13, 2026 and Osmo ABCs on October 19, 2026.

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