Comparison

Bit City vs City Island 5

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

Head to head
About

Bit City

Develop a small town into a bustling metropolis in this idle city-building simulation. Earn profits, invest in upgrades, and unlock new buildings and vehicles to expand your urban landscape. Customize your city with famous landmarks.

Highlights
  • City building simulation
  • Idle gameplay
  • Profit collection
  • Upgrade investments
  • Unlock new buildings
  • Vehicle collection
  • Landmark customization
Features
Read full description

Build your own Bit City! Start from a tiny town and grow to a thriving metropolis in this city building idle game from the creators of Tiny Tower. Collect profits and invest in upgrades that keep your city growing. Fill your city with new types of cars, planes and ships. Unlock cool new buildings, including famous landmarks to customize the look of your city. What are you waiting for? Start building YOUR own Bit City now!

About

City Island 5

Develop a small town into a sprawling metropolis by building on multiple unique islands. Explore the world via airship to discover new locations and expand your city-building horizons. Enjoy a rewarding offline experience filled with quests and content.

Highlights
  • Build and expand cities on multiple islands
  • Explore new islands via airship
  • Offline gameplay available
  • Complete quests and earn rewards
  • Upgrade and decorate buildings
  • Visit neighbors' cities
Features
Read full description

Build a city, your city “City Island 5 - Tycoon Building”, a new city builder game from Sparkling Society, will make you the mayor of a small town starting on just one island. Send your airship to explore the world and unlock beautiful new islands to build your new cities on. In most city-building games, you are just managing one city, but in “City Island 5 - Offline Tycoon Building” you will be expanding your horizon and skylines to new islands, each with a different theme and surface to build a city on. This city game is also playable as an offline game, so you can build your city without internet or when you have no wifi connection. Join millions of players with the most popular casual city-building game series on mobile! From a town, to a city, to a metropolis Your town will start small as a village, but your cities will grow larger by placing more buildings and unlocking new islands. Building games in the City Island sim games series are well known for their very rewarding free-to-play offline games, packed with quests and loads of content, with always something to do. Visit the towns and cities of your neighbours or visit my city. City building with a goal, with a purpose These simulation city builder games fall into the category: fun, casual, offline city building games for free. So this means that you’ll never get bored playing “City Island 5 - Offline Tycoon Building”! Next to the hundreds of buildings to unlock, this island city builder game has dozens of quests to earn treasure chests packed with very cool stuff. Design and build your island city the way you want, and play with friends to help each other. These casual tycoon simulation games come with a lot of cool buildings and islands to unlock and will definitely make you stick around for long sessions to collect loads of money to make your town and cities grow and design them however you want to build a city. “City Island 5 - Offline Tycoon Building Sim Game” City Builder Games Features: * Collect, upgrade, decorate, and explore in this complete construction simulation game! * Collect rewards and earn treasure chests! * Play this game offline or online. No internet connection required to play * City builder games made fun again with dozens of cool islands to build your city on! * Build your city and watch other players’ cities as well! * Don’t forget to rate us or give us feedback! Terms of Use: https://www.sparklingsociety.net/terms-of-service/

Screenshots

Bit City4 screens
City Island 54 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is update cadence: City Island 5 at every 3 weeks against Bit City's every 2 months. City Island 5 also leads on iOS requirement (13.0 vs 15.0). Bit City's advantage is review sentiment (79% vs 67%). On price, rating, ratings volume and ads 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. Bit City sells 5 one-off in-app purchases and City Island 5 sells 10 one-off in-app purchases. Whichever you choose, the download price is not the number that matters.

ReceptionRating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings

On the App Store both sit at effectively the same score — 4.6 for Bit City against 4.7 for City Island 5. Both are backed by a comparable volume of ratings — 8.5K and 10K respectively. Written reviews are what separate them: 79% of Bit City's written reviews are positive against 67% of City Island 5's.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

Bit City ships an update every 2 months, City Island 5 every 3 weeks. Both last shipped on September 24, 2026.

Scorecard3 real differences · 7 level
Bit City versus City Island 5: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterBit CityCity Island 5
PriceFreeFree
Rating4.6 (8.5K ratings)4.7 (10K ratings) — better
Positive reviews78.8% of reviews — better67.0% of reviews
Number of ratings8.5K10K — better
Update frequencyEvery 2 monthsEvery 3 weeks — better
AdsYesYes
In-app purchasesYesYes
MonetizationFree with in-app purchasesFree with in-app purchases
DevicesiPhone, iPad, iPodiPhone, iPad, iPod
Requires iOS15.013.0 — better
Further details — not scored
Size288 MB338 MB
Age rating4+4+
DeveloperNimbleBit LLCSparkling Society Games B.V.

Customer experience

Bit City

All ratings8,469 ratings
Positive90.8%
Neutral4.2%
Negative5.0%
Written reviews931 reviews
Positive78.8%
Neutral8.9%
Negative12.2%

City Island 5

All ratings10,330 ratings
Positive92.6%
Neutral3.6%
Negative3.8%
Written reviews1,259 reviews
Positive67.0%
Neutral11.8%
Negative21.2%

User reviews

Bit City

From 8.5K App Store ratings

What we love

  • 👍 Simple and easy to play
  • 🚀 Addictive gameplay
  • 💎 Great for casual time-wasting
  • 🎨 Charming pixel art style

Room to improve

  • 🕰️ Slow progression and repetitive gameplay
  • 🔀 Inability to rotate buildings
  • 🤑 Expensive special buildings
  • 🤔 Prestige feature not as beneficial as expected

City Island 5

From 10K App Store ratings

What we love

  • 🚀 Addictive gameplay
  • 🎨 Great graphics
  • 👍 Relaxing experience
  • 🎉 Entertaining
  • 🌆 Variety of buildings and islands

Room to improve

  • 💰 Expensive in-app purchases
  • 🕰️ Slow progression without spending money
  • 🔍 Difficult to earn in-game currency
  • 🤖 Excessive ads
  • 🐛 Crashes and bugs

Bugs and requests

Bit City

Reported bugs

3 issues
  • Prestige feature not working as intended
  • Occasional crashes and progress loss
  • Ads sometimes freeze the app

Requested features

5 requests
  • Ability to rotate buildings
  • Option to choose building types
  • Ability to visit and upgrade past cities
  • More city themes and building variety
  • Collect all vehicle earnings at once

City Island 5

Reported bugs

4 issues
  • Game crashes on startup
  • Ads prevent gameplay
  • Disappearing in-game currency
  • Inability to access saved progress

Requested features

5 requests
  • Ability to delete/move roads
  • Automatic money collection
  • More variety of buildings and landscapes
  • Easier way to earn in-game currency
  • Nighttime and day/night cycle

In-app purchases

5 purchases

Bit City

One-time5
  • Pension Pig$2.99
  • Stack of Bux$4.99
  • Infinite Double Time$4.99
Show 2 more
  • Bag of Bux$9.99
  • Vault of Bux$19.99
10 purchases

City Island 5

One-time10
  • Silver Chest$1.99
  • 5,000,000 cash (SALE)$4.99
  • 2,500,000 cash$4.99
Show 7 more
  • Silver Chest$4.99
  • 50 gold$4.99
  • 100 gold (SALE)$4.99
  • Pack of 2 Cranes$4.99
  • Gold Chest$8.99
  • 200 gold$13.99
  • 400 gold (SALE)$13.99

Questions

Is Bit City free?
Bit City is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Is City Island 5 free?
City Island 5 is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Which has better reviews, Bit City or City Island 5?
City Island 5 is rated higher. Bit City averages 4.6 out of 5 from 8.5K ratings, while City Island 5 averages 4.7 from 10K ratings.
Do Bit City or City Island 5 have ads?
Both Bit City and City Island 5 show ads.
Which is updated more often, Bit City or City Island 5?
Bit City ships an update every 2 months, and City Island 5 every 3 weeks. Most recently, Bit City was updated on September 24, 2026 and City Island 5 on September 24, 2026.

Other comparisons