Comparison

Backgammon Boardgammon vs Backgammon Reserve

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

Head to head
About

Backgammon Boardgammon

Engage in classic strategy games with online play, AI challenges, and learning tools. Improve your skills with lessons, puzzles, and detailed analysis. Offers a modern, customizable digital board for both games.

Highlights
  • Online multiplayer matches
  • Four AI difficulty levels
  • English checkers included
  • Guided lessons and puzzles
  • Post-game analysis
  • Customizable board themes
  • Voice chat with safety controls
Features
Read full description

Play backgammon online with friends, talk as you play, and turn every match into a lesson. Boardgammon brings online competition, private games, optional voice chat, fair server-generated dice, four AI levels and powerful post-game analysis to one beautifully crafted table. PLAY YOUR WAY • Join rated online backgammon matches with server-validated moves. • Invite a friend to a private game and enjoy a real conversation while you play. • Use optional voice chat with mute, block and report controls. Boardgammon does not record your calls. • Send quick phrases and reactions without slowing down the match. • Practice against Easy, Medium, Strong or Expert AI. • Play correspondence games when you want more time to think. • Share one device with local pass and play. LEARN FROM EVERY MOVE A finished game is only the beginning. Match Analysis finds inaccuracies, mistakes and blunders, then shows what you played beside the best move so you can understand exactly where the game changed. • Compare “Your play” with “Best play” on the board. • Review performance rating (PR), equity loss, cube decisions and luck. • Replay the match move by move and revisit every costly decision. • Follow guided lessons from the opening roll to bearing off. • Solve daily backgammon strategy puzzles and build better habits. PROVABLY FAIR ONLINE DICE Online backgammon is server-authoritative: the server generates the dice and validates every move. Cryptographic commit-reveal proofs create an audit trail for every roll, ready for you to inspect after the match. CLASSIC RULES, REGIONAL TRADITIONS Play with the doubling cube and Crawford or Jacoby rules where applicable. Explore Tavla/Portes, Plakoto, Fevga, Nackgammon, Hypergammon, Acey-Deucey and Long Nardy in supported play modes. MAKE THE TABLE YOURS Choose boards inspired by walnut, Persian miniature, Turkish mosaic, Greek café, marble, neon and more. Build your profile, track your rating, collect achievements, climb leaderboards and earn seasonal rewards. Whether you want a relaxed game with a friend, a strong AI opponent or a serious review of your latest match, Boardgammon gives you a richer way to play and improve. Boardgammon is free to play. Optional purchases unlock Pro features, cosmetic table themes and non-cashable in-game coins where available. Coins have no cash value and cannot be redeemed for money or prizes. Terms of Use (EULA): https://www.apple.com/legal/internet-services/itunes/dev/stdeula/ Privacy Policy: https://boardgammon.com/privacy

About

Backgammon Reserve

This app offers a premium online backgammon experience focused on pure gameplay. Compete against real players with a live Elo rating, play daily games with flexible move times, or practice against AI bots. Enjoy a clean, ad-free interface designed for serious enthusiasts.

Highlights
  • Ranked online play with Elo rating
  • Daily games with 24-hour move timers
  • Fair, server-generated dice
  • AI bot practice modes
  • Pass & Play for in-person games
  • Friend challenges and head-to-head records
  • Full match history and stats
Read full description

Backgammon Reserve is backgammon the way serious players want it. Most backgammon apps bury the game under casino mechanics: coin balances, spin wheels, loud effects. This is the opposite. A quiet, premium table for people who already love the game and want a trustworthy place to play it. PLAY RANKED ONLINE Match against real players on a live Elo rating. Server-generated dice, a match clock, and full rules enforcement. The doubling cube, gammons, and backgammons all count. Your rating, global rank, and percentile are real, earned, and on display. PLAY DAILY Backgammon on your schedule. Up to 24 hours per move and up to twenty games at once, rated in the same pool as live play with the cube in full effect. A notification tells you the moment it is your move, and the app icon counts the games waiting on you. MATCHES TO 3, 5 OR 7 Play a proper match, not just a game. First to the target score, Crawford rule included, with the cube live throughout. Agree a format with a friend, or pick one against the bot and in Pass and Play. TAKE ON SIR REGINALD One opponent. The whole community trying to beat him. Sir Reginald plays matches to 3, 5 or 7 and never a single game. He is not a difficulty setting and nothing against him touches your rating: his ladder is its own contest, ranked two ways, most wins and best average performance rating. His judgement comes from a neural network that taught itself backgammon over 750,000 games against itself, with no strategy written by hand. A bot built from written rules can only be as good as whoever wrote them. One that learns from results is free to find plays nobody thought to teach it. SEE WHERE YOU WENT WRONG Every match against Sir Reginald ends with a full review. A rating for how you played, your costliest decision shown on the board with the better move beside it, and a chart of how your chance of winning moved with every decision. It separates the dice from the play, so you can tell being outplayed from being unlucky. STANDINGS See exactly where you stand. The global board ranks the strongest players by rating, and your own row stays with you whether you are in the top 25 or climbing toward it, with the exact gap to the player above. A separate friends board ranks the people you actually know. Every rated game moves you, live or daily, and one rated game puts you on it. FAIR DICE Dice come from a cryptographically secure random source with bias rejection. No streaks engineered to keep you playing, no rolls tilted toward anyone. Online, the server rolls, so neither player's device can influence them. Against Sir Reginald you need not take it on faith: his page charts every die face rolled against the mathematics. SHARPEN YOUR GAME AGAINST THE BOTS Four tiers, from Beginner to Expert, all driven by the same self-taught network. Each is defined by how much it may give away per decision, so a weaker bot plays weaker moves rather than random ones. Bot games never touch your rating. PASS AND PLAY Hand the phone across the table. A clean two-seat mode for playing in person, at a single game or a full match. CHALLENGE YOUR FRIENDS Add friends, send a direct challenge, and settle it in a rated match. Play live with a clock, or start a daily game and take it slow. Agree the format, from a single game to a match to 7. A RECORD OF EVERY GAME Full match history, win and loss stats, streaks, recent form, and an interactive rating chart tracking every rated game you have played. DESIGNED LIKE A MEMBERS LOUNGE Walnut and brass, ivory checkers, understated motion. No neon, no confetti, no noise. WHAT YOU WON'T FIND • No coins, chips, or gambling mechanics • No ads • No pay-to-win mechanics. Nothing for sale. • No engineered dice Full backgammon rules are enforced: bar entry, blot hitting, forced maximum-pip plays, exact and overshoot bear-off, and the doubling cube with proper gammon and backgammon scoring.

Screenshots

Backgammon Boardgammon4 screens
Backgammon Reserve4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is in-app purchases: Backgammon Reserve at none against Backgammon Boardgammon's 10. Backgammon Reserve also leads on ads (none vs shown) and update cadence (every 3 days vs every 2 weeks). Backgammon Boardgammon's advantage is iOS requirement (15.0 vs 17.0). On price, rating and device support 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. Backgammon Boardgammon sells 10 one-off in-app purchases. Backgammon Reserve asks for nothing beyond the download.

ReceptionRating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings

On the App Store both sit at effectively the same score — 5.0 for Backgammon Boardgammon against 5.0 for Backgammon Reserve. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: Backgammon Reserve has 15 ratings behind it against 2, so its average is the more settled of the two.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

Backgammon Boardgammon ships an update every 2 weeks, Backgammon Reserve every 3 days. The most recent releases landed on September 24, 2026 and September 25, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard6 real differences · 4 level
Backgammon Boardgammon versus Backgammon Reserve: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterBackgammon BoardgammonBackgammon Reserve
PriceFreeFree
Rating5.0 (2 ratings)5.0 (15 ratings)
Positive reviews—100.0% of reviews
Number of ratings215 — better
Update frequencyEvery 2 weeksEvery 3 days — better
AdsYesNo — better
In-app purchasesYesNo — better
MonetizationFree with in-app purchasesFree — better
DevicesiPhone, iPad, iPod — betteriPhone, iPad
Requires iOS15.0 — better17.0
Further details — not scored
Size142 MB16 MB
Age rating12+12+
Developerpayam ghader kurehpazBenjamin Taylor

Customer experience

Backgammon Boardgammon

All ratings2 ratings
Positive100.0%
Neutral0.0%
Negative0.0%

Backgammon Reserve

All ratings15 ratings
Positive100.0%
Neutral0.0%
Negative0.0%
Written reviews9 reviews
Positive100.0%
Neutral0.0%
Negative0.0%

In-app purchases

10 purchases

Backgammon Boardgammon

One-time10
  • 10K Boardgammon Coins$1.99
  • Rescue Offer$1.99
  • Starter Bundle$2.99
Show 7 more
  • Kurdish Mahabad$3.99
  • Arabic Calligraphy$3.99
  • 30K Boardgammon Coins$4.99
  • 75K Boardgammon Coins$9.99
  • 170K Boardgammon Coins$19.99
  • 500K Boardgammon Coins$49.99
  • 1.15M Boardgammon Coins$99.99
None

Backgammon Reserve

No in-app purchases

Questions

Is Backgammon Boardgammon free?
Backgammon Boardgammon is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Is Backgammon Reserve free?
Backgammon Reserve is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Which has better reviews, Backgammon Boardgammon or Backgammon Reserve?
Backgammon Boardgammon and Backgammon Reserve are both rated 5.0 out of 5 on the App Store, from 2 and 15 ratings respectively.
Do Backgammon Boardgammon or Backgammon Reserve have ads?
Backgammon Boardgammon shows ads; Backgammon Reserve does not.
Which is updated more often, Backgammon Boardgammon or Backgammon Reserve?
Backgammon Boardgammon ships an update every 2 weeks, and Backgammon Reserve every 3 days. Most recently, Backgammon Boardgammon was updated on September 24, 2026 and Backgammon Reserve on September 25, 2026.

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