Comparison

Donut 80 vs Visual Pinball

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

Head to head
About

Donut 80

Experience classic games reimagined with an 80s aesthetic. This collection features low-resolution graphics, limited color palettes, and chiptune music, offering new levels and themes for both long-time fans and newcomers.

Highlights
  • 80s retro game demakes
  • Low resolution graphics
  • 16-color palettes
  • Chiptune music
  • New levels and themes
  • Collection of classic games
Features
Read full description

What if Donut Games were made in the 80s? Donut 80 is a collection of games and demakes of classic Donut Games featuring low resolution graphics, 16-color palettes and chip music. No matter if you are an old fan or never played a Donut Game before, this collection will keep you entertained with lots of NEW LEVELS and THEMES to explore. Games Included: Beach Roller Hooland Unicorn Skyride Hard Hat Run Monkey Flight Goat Flight Mummy Flight Ruberth's Kick n' Fly Sunday Lawn Clean Up Charlie Shovel Time Royal Cut This app is free and contains no subscriptions, no in-app purchases. This app contains cross promotion for other Donut Games.

About

Visual Pinball

Experience the full virtual pinball simulator with realistic physics, lighting, and sound. This open-source app offers a redesigned interface, enhanced table management, and the complete desktop experience for mobile devices. Enjoy a vast library of tables without ads or in-app purchases.

Highlights
  • Realistic physics, lighting, and sound
  • Redesigned interface with Liquid Glass
  • Full in-game menu for graphics and controls
  • Support for various backglass and display types
  • Easy table import and management
  • Optimized memory usage
Features
Read full description

The official Visual Pinball app. Built by volunteers since 2000 and open source since 2010, Visual Pinball is the simulator the virtual pinball community has been playing for over two decades. More than 70 people have contributed to it, and this app runs the same engine as the desktop version, so every table plays with the physics, lighting and sound its creator intended. No ads. No in-app purchases. No tracking. Made by volunteers. Two years of work from the Visual Pinball volunteers, in one update. Thank you for your patience, and for playing! A FRESH NEW LOOK • Redesigned for iOS 26 with Liquid Glass • Favorites and recently played tables at the top of your list • Search, sorting and three tile sizes • Light, Dark or System appearance • New loading screen that shows progress THE FULL DESKTOP EXPERIENCE • The complete Visual Pinball in-game menu for graphics, sound, controls and table options • Remap every button on keyboards and game controllers • Save settings for every table, or just the one you're playing MORE TABLES, LOOKING BETTER • Show the backglass and score display (DMD, alphanumeric or reels) on screen, right where you want them • Support for PUP packs, FlexDMD, B2S backglasses, video playback and VNI colorizations • All the latest physics and rendering improvements from the desktop version • Much lower memory use: textures are compressed on first load, then cached EASIER TABLE MANAGEMENT • Import .zip files, along with .vpx and .vpxz • Share any table as a single .vpxz file • The web file manager can now upload whole folders, extract archives, edit scripts and settings, and show the log live AND MORE • Many stability and memory fixes This version requires iOS 26.6 or later.

Screenshots

Donut 804 screens
Visual Pinball3 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is rating: Visual Pinball at 4.3 against Donut 80's 3.8. Visual Pinball also leads on review sentiment (78% vs 50%). Donut 80's advantage is update cadence (weekly vs fortnightly) and iOS requirement (12.0 vs 26.6). On price, ratings volume, 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

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

Visual Pinball holds the better App Store score, 4.3 against 3.8. Both are backed by a comparable volume of ratings — 49 and 75 respectively. Written reviews point the same way: 50% of Donut 80's written reviews are positive against 78% of Visual Pinball's.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

Donut 80 ships an update weekly, Visual Pinball fortnightly. The most recent releases landed on November 3, 2026 and November 5, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard4 real differences · 6 level
Donut 80 versus Visual Pinball: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterDonut 80Visual Pinball
PriceFreeFree
Rating3.8 (49 ratings)4.3 (75 ratings) — better
Positive reviews50.0% of reviews78.0% of reviews — better
Number of ratings4975 — better
Update frequencyWeekly — betterFortnightly
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesNoNo
MonetizationFreeFree
DevicesiPhone, iPad, iPod — betteriPhone, iPad
Requires iOS12.0 — better26.6
Further details — not scored
Size2 MB134 MB
Age rating9+9+
DeveloperDonut GamesJason Millard

Customer experience

Donut 80

All ratings49 ratings
Positive69.4%
Neutral4.1%
Negative26.5%
Written reviews36 reviews
Positive50.0%
Neutral11.1%
Negative38.9%

Visual Pinball

All ratings74 ratings
Positive81.1%
Neutral6.8%
Negative12.2%
Written reviews59 reviews
Positive78.0%
Neutral11.9%
Negative10.2%

User reviews

Donut 80

From 49 App Store ratings

What we love

  • 👍 Fun and engaging gameplay
  • ✨ Nostalgic retro aesthetic
  • 🆓 Free to play, no ads/IAPs
  • 🎵 Fantastic retro music
  • 🕹️ Good controls and playability

Room to improve

  • 💥 Frequent crashes on launch/game selection
  • 📉 Games are boring (for some)
  • ⏳ Been broken for months

Visual Pinball

From 75 App Store ratings

What we love

  • 🚀 Awesome way to play virtual pinball on the go
  • 👍 Super easy to set up with minimal file prep time
  • 👍 Insane that I can play favorite pins on just my phone
  • 👍 Fantastic portable implementation of VPX
  • 👍 Fun and exciting to archive the history of pinball

Room to improve

  • 🔧 More ability to adjust table settings needed
  • 🔧 Struggling to manage camera angle
  • 🔧 No fullscreen on iPad, plunger and outlanes cropped
  • 🔧 Some tables don't work or have issues

Bugs and requests

Donut 80

Reported bugs

4 issues
  • App crashes when opening games
  • App closes immediately on launch
  • Broken on iOS 18
  • Kicks user out when tapping games/levels

Requested features

5 requests
  • Option to mute music/sounds
  • Add more games/levels
  • Make specific games full versions
  • Retro intro sound
  • Update description spelling

Visual Pinball

Reported bugs

2 issues
  • Tables don't load for some users
  • Certain complex/intensive tables error out or run at low FPS

Requested features

6 requests
  • List of most played tables
  • Ability to reposition DMD
  • Option to skip startup checks for some tables
  • Ability to edit table scripts on the app
  • Direct link to table depository
Show 1 more
  • iPad version with more screen space

In-app purchases

None

Donut 80

No in-app purchases

None

Visual Pinball

No in-app purchases

Questions

Is Donut 80 free?
Donut 80 is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Is Visual Pinball free?
Visual Pinball is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Which has better reviews, Donut 80 or Visual Pinball?
Visual Pinball is rated higher. Donut 80 averages 3.8 out of 5 from 49 ratings, while Visual Pinball averages 4.3 from 75 ratings.
Do Donut 80 or Visual Pinball have ads?
Neither Donut 80 nor Visual Pinball shows ads.
Which is updated more often, Donut 80 or Visual Pinball?
Donut 80 ships an update weekly, and Visual Pinball fortnightly. Most recently, Donut 80 was updated on November 3, 2026 and Visual Pinball on November 5, 2026.

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