Comparison

PLAY vs Colorblocks World

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

Head to head
About

PLAY

This app uses virtual Play-Doh to teach children the alphabet. Kids can trace letters, learn new vocabulary, and create custom Play-Doh scenes. It also includes letter matching games and progress tracking for parents.

Highlights
  • Virtual Play-Doh letter tracing
  • Vocabulary association with letters
  • Customizable Play-Doh creations
  • Play-Doh scene building
  • Letter matching games
  • Progress tracking for parents
Features
Read full description

“Top 20 Best Apps of the Week” - The Guardian UK “The perfect blend of nostalgia and learning opportunities” - About.com “Fun, mess free way for learning”-Yahoo Voices “Well-thought out, educationally beneficial, colorful”- The Learning Treehouse “Completely transforms the way kids interact with technology” - Appshappens.com Learn your ABCs using ‘virtual’ PLAY-DOH modeling compound with this delightfully interactive educational app! PLAY-DOH Create ABCs application is designed to help children develop the essential skills required for reading and writing. Using this app, children will learn to: recognize letters, write letters using proper stroke order and associate letters with sounds. WRITE AND CRAFT! Learn how to write letters of the alphabet by using ‘virtual’ PLAY-DOH modeling compound. Discover new vocabulary words that start with the same letter. What starts with the letter A? An alligator! But be careful, it’s ready to chomp! When you successfully complete each letter, you are rewarded with a ‘virtual’ PLAY-DOH treat that you can create and customize. Want to change the color? Go ahead! Want to squish it? You can do that, too! CREATE AND SHARE! Build your own PLAY-DOH scenes with your PLAY-DOH creations. The PLAY-DOH gallery is just a click away on the ‘create and share’ button. There you can enjoy all the animated, colorful objects you make as you work your way through the letters of the alphabet. Select your favorite background and then bring PLAY-DOH scenes to life with custom PLAY-DOH pictures. Save your creations on your phone or tablet and share them with others! LETTER MATCHING Click on the ‘match’ button and you can enjoy a new activity: matching letters with the PLAY-DOH creations. The ‘match’ feature reinforces initial letter sounds by matching letters with objects that start with the same sound. A letter select screen allows you to play the activity on any letter you choose. Can you match the letters of the alphabet to the different PLAY-DOH creations? Give it a try! PLAY-DOH Create ABCs includes: -Tracing of uppercase and lowercase letters of the alphabet -Exciting ‘virtual’ PLAY-DOH treats -Poem and animations to re-enforce learning letter sounds -‘Squishable’ PLAY-DOH animations! -A matching activity to match letters with pictures -A letter select screen that allows children to choose any letter to play -A creativity zone, the PLAY-DOH gallery, where kids design custom PLAY-DOH scenes -A save-to-camera feature where parents can save and share their child’s colorful creations -Curriculum developed and reviewed by preschool education expert
s -Multiplayer profiles that allow more than one child to play and save their progress -Parental reporting to show progress PLAY-DOH Create ABCs will help children develop: -Language and pre-reading skills, including letter recognition and phonemic (sound) awareness and knowledge. - Fine motor skills and coordination -Their creativity via ‘learning by doing’ NOTE: Before you download this experience, please consider that this app contains in-app purchases that cost money. Additional content cannot be unlocked without spending money. ABOUT PLAYDATE DIGITAL PlayDate Digital Inc. is an emergent publisher of high-quality, interactive, mobile educational software for children. PlayDate Digital's products nurture children's emerging literacy and creativity skills by turning digital screens into engaging experiences. PlayDate Digital content is built in partnership with some of the world's most trusted global brands for kids. Visit us: playdatedigital.com Like us: facebook.com/playdatedigital Follow us: @playdatedigital Watch all our app trailers: youtube.com/PlayDateDigital1 HAVE QUESTIONS? We'd love to hear from you! Your questions suggestions and comments are always welcome. Contact us 24/7 at info@playdatedigital.com

About

Colorblocks World

Embark on a vibrant adventure with beloved characters from a popular children's show. Engage in creative painting, explore the color wheel, and unlock rewards while learning about colors in a fun, interactive way. This app fosters early color recognition and self-expression.

Highlights
  • Creative Painting Game
  • Explore the Colour Wheel
  • Dress up characters
  • Unlock rewards
  • Learn color recognition
  • Watch show clips and songs
Features
Read full description

Are you ready for the colour adventure of a lifetime? Enter the magical world of the hit CBeebies show, COLOURBLOCKS, and play with your favourite characters like never before!* Unlock rewards in the Colourblocks' houses and have fun dressing up the Colourblocks, create your own masterpieces in the Creative Painting Game, explore the colour wheel and watch much-loved clips and songs from the show. The colour learning doesn't stop there! Colourblocks World is packed with original makes and fun surprises along the way! COLOURBLOCKS helps children to see and understand colours in a brand new and exciting way. It's the story of a group of friends, who use Colour Magic to bring Colourland to life in the most vibrant way imaginable! COLOURBLOCKS uses the proven magic of Blocks to help young children dive into the wondrous world of colour. Developed in consultation with a global team of colour experts and packed with loveable characters, show-stopping songs, humour and adventure, the show delivers colour recognition, colour names, meaning and signifiers, mixing, mark making, similar and contrasting colours, light and dark and all kinds of patterns – and that’s just for starters. It's all designed to inspire young children to be Colour Explorers, discovering how the colours all around them work, whilst getting hands-on with colour themselves. Importantly, it's designed to instil a passion for colour in young children which they can take with them throughout life. COLOURBLOCKS WORLD has been carefully designed to support your child on their early colour learning adventure and provides an immersive digital milestone for children to engage with the Colourblocks. The paid subscription app is scaffolded to introduce children to colours in a particular order and helps children connect the concept of individual colours with how they might feature in the real world. Fundamentally, it gives children a foundation in colour, art and self-expression and enables them to get hands-on with colour through playing games, such as sorting colours, exploring light and dark, ordering colours and painting! "Colourblocks World is a fantastic new app, which takes children on an exciting learning journey exploring how colour really works. In addition, children can apply colour to different pictures and objects in the world, which encourages self-expression and so helps build confidence at this early stage of child development." Prof. Stephen Westland, Colour Literacy Project What's included? 1. Meet the Colourblocks and bring Colourland to life through the power of Colour Magic! 2. Enjoy surprises along the way! 3. Unlock rewards in the Colourblocks' houses and have fun dressing them up. 4. Explore creative expression alongside the Colourblocks in the Creative Painting Game. 5. Let the Colourblocks help your child learn about the Colour Wheel through fun and accessible gameplay. 6. Discover some of the Colourblocks' favourite things, making the connection between the things around us and what colour they typically are. 7. Enjoy video rewards and songs from the brilliant Colourblocks episodes. 8. Become a Colour Explorer and play along with arts and crafts videos! 9. Build confidence as an artist with new colouring pictures and videos - updated every month! 10. This app is entertaining and safe, being COPPA and GDPR-K compliant and 100% ad-free. Privacy & Safety At Blue Zoo, your child’s privacy and safety is the first priority for us. There are no ads in the app and we will never share personal information with any 3rd parties or sell this on. You can find out more in our Privacy Policy and Terms of Service: Privacy Policy: https://blocks-website.webflow.io/privacy-policy Terms of Service: https://blocks-website.webflow.io/terms-of-service * Requires paid monthly or annual subscription

Screenshots

PLAY4 screens
Colorblocks World4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is monetization model: PLAY at free with in-app purchases against Colorblocks World's subscription. PLAY also leads on rating (4.4 vs 4.2) and iOS requirement (13.0 vs 15.0). Colorblocks World's advantage is update cadence (every 3 weeks vs every 2 months) and ratings volume (152 vs 25). On price, review sentiment, 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. PLAY sells 2 one-off in-app purchases and Colorblocks World sells 5 in-app purchases, starting at $3.99 per month. Whichever you choose, the download price is not the number that matters.

ReceptionRating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings

PLAY holds the better App Store score, 4.4 against 4.2. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: Colorblocks World has 152 ratings behind it against 25, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews point the same way: 51% of PLAY's written reviews are positive against 43% of Colorblocks World's.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

PLAY ships an update every 2 months, Colorblocks World every 3 weeks. The most recent releases landed on August 28, 2026 and September 2, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard5 real differences · 5 level
PLAY versus Colorblocks World: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterPLAYColorblocks World
PriceFreeFree
Rating4.4 (25 ratings) — better4.2 (152 ratings)
Positive reviews51.2% of reviews — better43.4% of reviews
Number of ratings25152 — better
Update frequencyEvery 2 monthsEvery 3 weeks — better
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesYesYes
MonetizationFree with in-app purchases — betterSubscription
DevicesiPhone, iPad, iPodiPhone, iPad, iPod
Requires iOS13.0 — better15.0
Further details — not scored
Size243 MB713 MB
Age rating4+4+
DeveloperPlayDate DigitalBlue-Zoo

Customer experience

PLAY

All ratings25 ratings
Positive84.0%
Neutral0.0%
Negative16.0%
Written reviews84 reviews
Positive51.2%
Neutral2.4%
Negative46.4%

Colorblocks World

All ratings152 ratings
Positive77.6%
Neutral6.6%
Negative15.8%
Written reviews53 reviews
Positive43.4%
Neutral15.1%
Negative41.5%

Bugs and requests

PLAY

Not enough reviews yet to summarise bugs or requests.

Colorblocks World

Reported bugs

16 issues
  • Cannot access membership after paying
  • Mixing factory won't allow mixing white, black, or gray
  • Charged on day one before trial ends
  • Cannot access premium features
  • Restore purchases pop-up is broken
Show 11 more
  • App crashes after paying for subscription
  • Subscription pop-up appears even when paid
  • Cannot get past brown color
  • Cyan arrow is gone
  • Blue is not unlocked even though it is paid for
  • Cannot pause videos
  • Videos go too fast
  • Subscription link is broken
  • Cannot report errors
  • Unable to subscribe due to insufficient funds error
  • App doesn't accept subscription completion

Requested features

9 requests
  • Add season 3 characters
  • Make creative coloring have light, dark, dull, and in-between colors
  • Add color mixing to creative coloring
  • Create a game to make your own Numberblock, Alphablock, or Colorblock
  • Add red to the sorting express game
Show 4 more
  • Make premium access free
  • Remove subscription requirement
  • Make more content free
  • Allow color mixing for coloring

In-app purchases

2 purchases

PLAY

One-time2
  • Remove Ads$1.99
  • Unlock All Alphabets$3.99
5 purchases

Colorblocks World

Subscriptions5
  • Monthly Subscription4 variants$3.991 Month
  • Monthly Subscription7 Days trial$3.991 Month
  • Yearly Subscription4 variants$39.991 Year
Show 2 more
  • Yearly Subscription7 Days trial$39.991 Year
  • Unlock All7 Days trial$39.991 Year

Questions

Is PLAY free?
PLAY is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Is Colorblocks World free?
Colorblocks World is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Which has better reviews, PLAY or Colorblocks World?
PLAY is rated higher. PLAY averages 4.4 out of 5 from 25 ratings, while Colorblocks World averages 4.2 from 152 ratings.
Do PLAY or Colorblocks World have ads?
Neither PLAY nor Colorblocks World shows ads.
Which is updated more often, PLAY or Colorblocks World?
PLAY ships an update every 2 months, and Colorblocks World every 3 weeks. Most recently, PLAY was updated on August 28, 2026 and Colorblocks World on September 2, 2026.

Other comparisons