Idle Ants vs Ant Farm Simulator
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both games, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
Idle Ants
Command a growing colony of ants to devour everything in sight, from bugs to airplanes. Earn money to upgrade your colony, supercharge your workers, unlock new ants, and defend your nest. Experience the organized world of ants and lead them to empire status.
- Command ant colony
- Devour various items
- Collect gems and resources
- Upgrade colony and workers
- Unlock fighter ants
- Defend ant nest
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Ants are the true lords of the underground. They’ve been building cities and expanding their communities well before man was able to cobble together his first hut. Now, you can enter the land of ants and see firsthand their organized and structured world taking shape. Command your growing colony of ants and have them devour other bugs, hot dogs and even an airplane! Let your army consume everything in sight and earn money that you can use to: - Collect gems and building resources! - Upgrade and grow your colony into a mighty ant empire! - Supercharge your worker ants: make them faster and stronger! - Open ants' eggs to unlock fighter! - Defend the ants' nest from intruders These ants are waiting on a new commander, will it be you? We make casual moments turn into mad adventures! We’re a gaming studio composed of ‘Casually Mad’ game makers. We produce all of our games internally. We live to tell unique stories and express those in the games we create for players around the world. This passion is echoed by millions that enjoy playing our games like Stickman Hook, Parkour Race and Sausage Flip. Play with us and see what’s next! Let’s hear from you! Join the official Madbox Discord server and share your thoughts. https://bit.ly/35Td03Y Looking for the latest fun and more? Check us out on Instagram - https://bit.ly/3eHq3YF
Ant Farm Simulator
Experience the life cycle and behaviors of an ant colony with realistic AI. Manage your formicarium by feeding, hydrating, and cleaning to ensure your ants thrive. The colony develops even when you're offline, with ongoing updates adding new content.
- Realistic ant AI and life cycle
- Colony management (feeding, hydration, cleaning)
- Offline colony development
- Variety of ant types
- New formicarium designs
- Regular updates
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Ant farm (formicarium) with a colony of ants. Ants have artificial intelligence that mimics the full life cycle, behavior, nature and physics of real insects. You need to take care of your ant colony, feed it, keep it hydrated, and clean up the trash. The colony continues to develop even when the game is not running. The game-simulator is constantly updated, adding different types of ants, new ant care modes, other types of food, new forms of formicaria and much more.
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is rating: Idle Ants at 4.7 against Ant Farm Simulator's 4.2. Idle Ants also leads on ratings volume (172K vs 58). Ant Farm Simulator's advantage is review sentiment (83% vs 56%). On price, update cadence, ads and in-app purchases 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
Both are free to download. Idle Ants sells 11 one-off in-app purchases and Ant Farm Simulator sells 2 one-off in-app purchases. Whichever you choose, the download price is not the number that matters.
Idle Ants holds the better App Store score, 4.7 against 4.2. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: Idle Ants has 172K ratings behind it against 58, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews complicate that: 56% of Idle Ants's written reviews are positive against 83% of Ant Farm Simulator's, so the app with the better star average is not the one people write more warmly about.
Both ship on a similar rhythm, roughly every 4 weeks. The most recent releases landed on November 1, 2026 and October 23, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | Idle Ants | Ant Farm Simulator |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free |
| Rating | 4.7 (172K ratings) — better | 4.2 (58 ratings) |
| Positive reviews | 56.3% of reviews | 83.3% of reviews — better |
| Number of ratings | 172K — better | 58 |
| Update frequency | Every 4 weeks | Every 4 weeks |
| Ads | Yes | Yes |
| In-app purchases | Yes | Yes |
| Monetization | Free with in-app purchases | Free with in-app purchases |
| Devices | iPhone, iPad, iPod — better | iPhone, iPad |
| Requires iOS | 15.0 — better | 16.0 |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 281 MB | 104 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 12+ |
| Developer | MADBOX | Dzmitry Smirnou |
Customer experience
Idle Ants
Ant Farm Simulator
User reviews
Idle Ants
From 172K App Store ratingsWhat we love
- 🚀 Satisfying gameplay
- 👍 Cute and fun ants
- 🚀 Smooth animations
- 👍 Relaxing experience
Room to improve
- 🔍 Lack of content/levels
- 📢 Too many ads
- 🐛 Bugs and glitches
- 💰 Expensive to remove ads
Ant Farm Simulator
From 58 App Store ratingsWhat we love
- 👍 Realistic ant simulation
- 👍 Fun and engaging gameplay
- 👍 Good for ant enthusiasts
- 👍 Simple and nice music
- 👍 Game continues offline
Room to improve
- 🐛 Low ant activity/AI issues
- 🐛 Forced ads
- 🐛 Game can be too simple/boring
- 🐛 Complicated currency system
- 🐛 Game feels outdated
Bugs and requests
Idle Ants
Reported bugs
3 issues- Money going backwards at higher levels
- Inability to progress to new worlds
- Game progress being lost after updates
Requested features
4 requests- More levels and worlds
- Offline earnings
- Ability to customize ants
- Less intrusive ads
Ant Farm Simulator
Reported bugs
4 issues- Forced ads when clicking energy button
- Game stopped working
- Most ants don't do anything
- Game continues to run when app is closed
Requested features
47 requests- More content (designs, bugs, maps)
- Combine colonies into a "super colony"
- Add species names
- Add aphids and ladybugs
- Add honeypot ants
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- Map with underground digging
- Add other insects (spiders, scorpions)
- Add blue ants
- Faster ant growth
- Pause button for offline activity
- Limits for waste piles and litter
- Recycle dead ants as food
- Clean up dead ants to prevent mold
- Add green ants
- Add bullet ants
- More food options (super worms, berries, larger food items)
- Ants move garbage to waste pile
- More food variety and unlocked system
- Option to raise two colonies and make them face each other
- Bigger food items requiring multiple ants
- Sugar food option
- More ants attacking spawned creatures
- Option to start with a smaller colony
- Multiple species of ants with different behaviors
- Queen walks around
- Add males and alates with wings
- More realistic AI for idle workers
- Workers check on brood/queen, clean themselves
- Outworld ants forage more
- More spots for eggs in nests
- Different stages for egg development in chambers
- Different types of waste (food, bathroom)
- Observe trophylaxis between ants and queen
- More diverse farm and food color schemes
- Alates and up to 2-3 queens (rare)
- Ants run on their own
- More live food options that attack back
- Different species and farms
- Workers that sit in the nest get up and work
- Queen walks around more
- Different ant species
- More realistic mechanics (soldier roles, food qualities)
- Clearer mechanics for ant roles and food properties
- Start with 5-10 workers
- Egg laying rate scales with colony population
- Food and water demand scales with colony population
- More chambers for eggs
In-app purchases
Idle Ants
- Fast Ant$0.99
- Mech Ant$0.99
- Small Gems Pack$0.99
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- Mut-Ant$2.99
- Gold-Ant$2.99
- The Queen$4.99
- Ali Ant$4.99
- Medium Gems Pack$4.99
- No Ads pack!$9.99
- Special Offer$9.99
- Large Pack of Gems$19.99
Ant Farm Simulator
- Energy 5000$0.99
- Permanently VIP PREMIUM status$1.99
Questions
Is Idle Ants free?
Is Ant Farm Simulator free?
Which has better reviews, Idle Ants or Ant Farm Simulator?
Do Idle Ants or Ant Farm Simulator have ads?
Which is updated more often, Idle Ants or Ant Farm Simulator?
Other comparisons
