Comparison

ShapeBuilder Preschool Puzzles vs Elmo Loves 123s

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

Head to head
About

ShapeBuilder Preschool Puzzles

This app helps young children develop cognitive thinking and fine motor skills through interactive puzzles. It features easy-to-move shapes that snap into place, revealing images and professional voice recordings of words spoken by a speech therapist. The app offers a wide variety of puzzles, including animals, letters, numbers, and musical instruments, in a fun and engaging format.

Highlights
  • Interactive shape puzzles
  • Speech therapist voiceovers
  • Develops cognitive thinking
  • Enhances fine motor skills
  • Educational content (animals, letters, numbers)
  • Sound effects
Features
Read full description

From the creators of the hit, award winning, iPad app Drawing Pad! ShapeBuilder educates & entertains your little one with easy to move shapes that snap into place on top of silhouette puzzles. Each puzzle has 5 to 10 pieces & after positioning all of the pieces, the real image is revealed along with a professional voice recording of the word spoken by a licensed speech therapist that specializes in early child development. ShapeBuilder encourages cognitive thinking & fine motor skills plus exposes young minds to new music instruments, animals, produce, objects & the alphabet in a fun & engaging format with LOTS of sound effects! Designed for kids! No menu buttons on the puzzles to get in the way of game play! Highlights: Total of 173 puzzles! 30 Music instruments with sound effects 21 Fruits & Vegetables 45 Animals - awesome sound effects! 26 Letters - speech therapist sounds out each letter in a fun way 20 Numbers - one through twenty! 31 other fun items like Firetruck, Police Officer, Garbage Truck, and Volcano Random play resets after all puzzles are completed. Kids have so much fun trying to guess what the puzzle will be! By Darren Murtha & Chris Lott for kids and toddlers in preschool, kindergarden & firstgrade! App for kids 3 to 6 years old - MANY 2 year olds play this too but you may have to play together at first. (Perfect for toddlers / preschool / kindergarten / first grade / and babysitters) In 2009-2010 previously featured as an Apple Staff Favorite! (July) and iTunes App Store Essential for Toddlers (October) FEATURED IN: MACWORLD "App of the Day" tinyurl.com/app-of-day THE WASHINGTON TIMES tinyurl.com/sb-washingtontimes USATODAY.COM tinyurl.com/sb-usatoday SAN FRANCISCO CHRONICLE tinyurl.com/sb-sanfran O'REILLY's Book "Best iPhone Apps" http://tinyurl.com/sb-best-iphone-apps BEAT "Wheels on the Bus" on O'Reilly's APP SMACKDOWN tinyurl.com/app-smackdown "ShapeBuilder earns an edu.Mac.nation daddy score of "A" - Immediately my son was able to locate & move the pieces into position. The audio quality is fantastic, the application is stable, & the variety of puzzle types kept my son engaged & entertained. Together we worked on completing the puzzles & saying out loud what the images were." Michael (an elementary school teacher) from www.edumacnation.com "If you’ve got a preschooler then ShapeBuilder is a great app for your iPhone...This app is great on many levels & a terrific combination of learning & fun." The iPhone Mom (www.theiphonemom.com) "A great little jigsaw app for children aged 3 to 5 years." Daniel Donahoo, Geekdad at wired.com

About

Elmo Loves 123s

This app offers a variety of games, activities, and videos designed to teach young children about numbers and counting. It features interactive tracing, puzzles, and songs with beloved characters, covering numbers 1 through 20.

Highlights
  • Number tracing with surprises
  • Interactive games and puzzles
  • Songs and videos about numbers
  • Coloring pages
  • Learning tracker for parents
  • Addition & Subtraction practice
Currently charting
Read full description

This is an app full of games, activities, and videos, which will help teach your child about numbers and counting. Elmo loves exploring numbers! This app has songs and videos about numbers. It has coloring pages and games about numbers. It has all the numbers from 1 to 20! Elmo’s friend Abby is here, too! Come on! Explore numbers with Elmo and Abby! FEATURES • Trace your favorite numbers to unlock surprises. • Slide, swipe, touch and trace to discover sixty classic Sesame Street clips, sixty coloring pages, hide-and-seek, jigsaw puzzles, counting games and more! • Touch the Abby button to play number games with Abby and her friends. • 123s tracker for grown-ups to see what your child is learning. LEARN ABOUT • Number identification • Number tracing • Counting groups of objects • Addition & Subtraction • Problem Solving • Art and creativity And if you enjoy learning your 123s, you’ll love learning your ABCs! Check out the Parents' Choice Silver Award winner “Elmo Loves ABCs” in the App Store. ABOUT US Sesame Workshop’s mission is to use the educational power of media to help kids everywhere grow smarter, stronger, and kinder. Delivered through a variety of platforms, including television programs, digital experiences, books and community engagement, its research-based programs are tailored to the needs of the communities and countries they serve. Learn more at www.sesameworkshop.org. PRIVACY POLICY The Privacy Policy can be found here: https://sesameworkshop.org/about-us/legal/privacy-policy/ CONTACT US Your input is very important to us. If you have any questions, comments, or need help, please contact us at: sesameworkshopapps@sesame.org.

Screenshots

ShapeBuilder Preschool Puzzles4 screens
Elmo Loves 123s4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is review sentiment: ShapeBuilder Preschool Puzzles at 83% against Elmo Loves 123s's 40%. ShapeBuilder Preschool Puzzles also leads on price ($2.99 vs $4.99) and iOS requirement (8.0 vs 15.0). Elmo Loves 123s's advantage is rating (4.4 vs 4.1) and chart position (#160 vs unranked). On ratings volume, 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

CostPrice · In-app purchases · Ads · Monetization

ShapeBuilder Preschool Puzzles costs $2.99 and Elmo Loves 123s $4.99 up front. Neither carries in-app purchases, so what you see is what you pay.

ReceptionRating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings

Elmo Loves 123s holds the better App Store score, 4.4 against 4.1. Both are backed by a comparable volume of ratings — 86 and 97 respectively. Written reviews complicate that: 83% of ShapeBuilder Preschool Puzzles's written reviews are positive against 40% of Elmo Loves 123s's, so the app with the better star average is not the one people write more warmly about.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

ShapeBuilder Preschool Puzzles ships an update every 8 months, Elmo Loves 123s every 5 months. The most recent releases landed on November 10, 2026 and November 12, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard5 real differences · 6 level
ShapeBuilder Preschool Puzzles versus Elmo Loves 123s: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterShapeBuilder Preschool PuzzlesElmo Loves 123s
Price$2.99 — better$4.99
Rating4.1 (86 ratings)4.4 (97 ratings) — better
Positive reviews83.2% of reviews — better40.0% of reviews
Number of ratings8697 — better
Update frequencyEvery 8 monthsEvery 5 months — better
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesNoNo
MonetizationPaidPaid
Best chart rank—#160 — better
DevicesiPhone, iPad, iPodiPhone, iPad, iPod
Requires iOS8.0 — better15.0
Further details — not scored
Size98 MB459 MB
Age rating4+4+
DeveloperMurtha Design LLCSesame Workshop (Apps)

Customer experience

ShapeBuilder Preschool Puzzles

All ratings86 ratings
Positive72.1%
Neutral10.5%
Negative17.4%
Written reviews161 reviews
Positive83.2%
Neutral7.5%
Negative9.3%

Elmo Loves 123s

All ratings91 ratings
Positive83.5%
Neutral3.3%
Negative13.2%
Written reviews55 reviews
Positive40.0%
Neutral10.9%
Negative49.1%

User reviews

ShapeBuilder Preschool Puzzles

From 86 App Store ratings

What we love

  • 👍 Easy to use
  • 🎓 Educational for young kids
  • ⭐ Engaging and entertaining
  • 🎨 Vibrant graphics and visuals

Room to improve

  • 🐛 Crashes and compatibility issues
  • 🔇 Missing sound or audio features
  • 🔁 Repetitive puzzles
  • 🕰️ Puzzles advance too quickly

Elmo Loves 123s

From 97 App Store ratings

What we love

  • 👍 Great for learning numbers
  • 👍 Engaging and fun activities
  • 👍 Loved by toddlers
  • 👍 Interactive play
  • 👍 Educational content

Room to improve

  • 😞 Elmo not prominent
  • 😞 Videos with crying
  • 😞 Tracing not accurate
  • 😞 Inconsistent learning
  • 😞 Paid app issues

Bugs and requests

ShapeBuilder Preschool Puzzles

Reported bugs

3 issues
  • App crashes on launch
  • No sound or audio issues
  • Puzzles not displaying correctly

Requested features

4 requests
  • More variety and new puzzles
  • Ability to pause, replay, or navigate puzzles
  • Customization options (e.g. difficulty, categories)
  • Support for multiple languages

Elmo Loves 123s

Reported bugs

29 issues
  • Videos with crying in them
  • Count video for number 14 missing
  • Purchased features gone
  • Elmo nowhere to be seen after intro
  • Advert added to paid app
Show 24 more
  • App broken after iOS update
  • App only shows half the screen
  • App cuts off content in landscape mode
  • Alignment messed up after iOS upgrade
  • App won't rotate to horizontal position
  • App displays offset, missing screen part
  • Orientation stuck in portrait mode
  • Sporadically won't recognize touch
  • Screen cut off, app unusable
  • Won't go full mode on iPad screen
  • App no longer works with iPhone software
  • Stuck in portrait, won't landscape
  • Tracing not accurate
  • Pop up ads in paid version
  • Videos no longer available (resolved)
  • App doesn't work properly
  • App keeps crashing
  • Crashes too much
  • Doesn't enforce correct form when tracing
  • Poor touch controls for tracing
  • Keep on crashing within seconds
  • App keeps crashing on iOS7
  • Crashes and force closes on iOS7
  • App won't load

Requested features

9 requests
  • Remove videos with crying
  • Restore Count video for number 14
  • Add numbers above 20
  • Add music videos
  • Add number 0
Show 4 more
  • Add support for Portuguese language
  • Add parental lock for settings
  • Improve tracing accuracy
  • Add more diversity

In-app purchases

None

ShapeBuilder Preschool Puzzles

No in-app purchases

None

Elmo Loves 123s

No in-app purchases

Questions

Is ShapeBuilder Preschool Puzzles free?
ShapeBuilder Preschool Puzzles costs $2.99, with no in-app purchases.
Is Elmo Loves 123s free?
Elmo Loves 123s costs $4.99, with no in-app purchases.
Which has better reviews, ShapeBuilder Preschool Puzzles or Elmo Loves 123s?
Elmo Loves 123s is rated higher. ShapeBuilder Preschool Puzzles averages 4.1 out of 5 from 86 ratings, while Elmo Loves 123s averages 4.4 from 97 ratings.
Do ShapeBuilder Preschool Puzzles or Elmo Loves 123s have ads?
Neither ShapeBuilder Preschool Puzzles nor Elmo Loves 123s shows ads.
Which is updated more often, ShapeBuilder Preschool Puzzles or Elmo Loves 123s?
ShapeBuilder Preschool Puzzles ships an update every 8 months, and Elmo Loves 123s every 5 months. Most recently, ShapeBuilder Preschool Puzzles was updated on November 10, 2026 and Elmo Loves 123s on November 12, 2026.

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