Starfall Snowman vs First Words Professional
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
Starfall Snowman
This educational app helps young children learn to count to ten and recognize essential vocabulary through interactive snowman-building activities. It features a snowman gallery and matching games for numbers and colors, making learning fun and engaging.
- Interactive snowman building
- Learn to count to ten
- Vocabulary recognition
- Number matching games
- Color matching games
- Snowman gallery
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Children love making snowmen and listening to the charming “Ten Little Snowmen” song. Learn to count to ten and read essential vocabulary while you play. Practice has never been more fun! In this App edition, create a snowman gallery and match number sets to number symbols, and colors to color words.
First Words Professional
This app helps children develop early reading and language skills through interactive word and letter recognition. It offers extensive customization for educators and parents, including word selection, category management, and language options.
- Over 350 words in 12 categories
- Six language options
- Phonics or letter name spelling
- Customizable word categories
- Customizable word lists
- Develops fine motor control and letter recognition
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Thousands of schools use First Words to help their students develop pre-reading, early reading, and language skills. Now there’s a version of First Words specifically for educators and speech language pathologists. Of course, it's great for kids at home, too! First Words Professional has the same child-friendly design and uncluttered interface that made First Words one of the all-time best selling lines of educational apps for iOS. The new additional features make it the ideal choice for individual, institutional and professional use: * More Words --- Over 350 words in 12 categories, including shapes, numbers, food, feelings, clothes, animals, and more. * Six Languages --- Options include American English, British English, Spanish, French, German, and Japanese. * Phonics -- English word lists includes options for spelling with phonics or letter names. * Category Management --- Choose which categories of words are shown to students. Hide word lists that you don't want them to see. * Word Management --- Choose which words to include in each category. Focus on shorter words, longer words, or words with particular letter combinations. Hide words that your child finds particularly distracting. First Words Professional uses the same intuitive interface that is so easy for preschoolers, kindergartners, and kids with special needs to use. They'll giggle with delight at the beautifully drawn pictures and entertaining sounds, all the while learning how letters correspond to sounds and how letters sounds form words. First Words Professional helps kids develop: * Fine Motor Control * Letter Recognition * Phonemic Awareness * Word Recognition First Words Professional includes a large number options: * Phonics or Letter Names * Uppercase, Lowercase, or Capitalized Words * Spell Words Slowly or Quickly * Serif or Sans-Serif font Here's what educators and reviewers have said about earlier versions First Words: “First Words is an app that teaches letters and words in fun and interactive way. Very easy to use these apps will help support your little ones learning with great illustrations and bright colors. Each app supports kids learning and encourages kids to explore and discover by revealing, rewarding and teaching.” -- Fun Educational Apps “Excellent - As a teacher, I love this game! Just what technology was meant to do!” -- iTunes Review “This app has great settings that let you control the level of difficulty for the child – either with lots of hints or almost none at all. The letters slide nicely into each word and when completed the child is rewarded by having the pictured animal enlarge and animate briefly.” --Carisa Kluver at Digital Stortyime “First Words Deluxe is a very straightforward word-building game. Words are either said letter by letter as they are dragged into the appropriate gray boxes or, if chosen in the settings, a smaller set of words can be sounded out with phonics. This makes this game a treat for both pre-readers and early spellers.” --Common Sense Media “Looking to guide your toddler towards recognizing letters and how to spell words up to eight letters long? Then First Words Deluxe might be just what you are looking for. This pre-reader and spelling application encourages vocabulary development in a wide range of categories such as: vehicles, animals, at home, colors, and shapes.” --Andrea Gardner at Applicable2u "First Words is a great app -- as I said at the time, 'Leo loves First Words because it's fun and easy. I love it because he's learning to spell words, and the interface makes that learning error-free.'" ---Shannon Des Roches Rosa at Squidalicious
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is price: Starfall Snowman at $0.99 against First Words Professional's $9.99. First Words Professional's advantage is review sentiment (77% vs 40%) and rating (4.2 vs 3.8). 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
Starfall Snowman costs $0.99 and First Words Professional $9.99 up front. Neither carries in-app purchases, so what you see is what you pay.
First Words Professional holds the better App Store score, 4.2 against 3.8. Both are backed by a comparable volume of ratings — 14 and 39 respectively. Written reviews point the same way: 40% of Starfall Snowman's written reviews are positive against 77% of First Words Professional's.
Starfall Snowman ships an update every 12 months, First Words Professional every 16 months. The most recent releases landed on November 3, 2026 and November 1, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | Starfall Snowman | First Words Professional |
|---|---|---|
| Price | $0.99 — better | $9.99 |
| Rating | 3.8 (14 ratings) | 4.2 (39 ratings) — better |
| Positive reviews | 40.0% of reviews | 77.4% of reviews — better |
| Number of ratings | 14 | 39 — better |
| Update frequency | Every 12 months — better | Every 16 months |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | No | No |
| Monetization | Paid | Paid |
| Devices | iPhone, iPad, iPod | iPhone, iPad, iPod |
| Requires iOS | 12.0 — better | 12.2 |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 24 MB | 103 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 4+ |
| Developer | Starfall Education Foundation | Learning Touch LLC |
Customer experience
Starfall Snowman
First Words Professional
In-app purchases
Starfall Snowman
No in-app purchases
First Words Professional
No in-app purchases
Questions
Is Starfall Snowman free?
Is First Words Professional free?
Which has better reviews, Starfall Snowman or First Words Professional?
Do Starfall Snowman or First Words Professional have ads?
Which is updated more often, Starfall Snowman or First Words Professional?
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