Alphabear Is Gone: 4 Games Like It You Can Play in 2026
Short answer: Alphabear and Alphabear 2 are both gone from mobile, but the PC version is still for sale. Alphabear was pulled from the App Store and Google Play in May 2019. Alphabear 2 followed, leaving Google Play in October 2023, and it is not on the App Store either. Alphabear: Hardcover Edition on Steam is the one surviving way to buy it.
I checked all of this on September 17, 2026 rather than trusting the older posts still floating around. Searching the US App Store for "alphabear" returns no Alphabear title at all, while Spry Fox's Triple Town and Bushido Bear are both still listed, so this is not a quirk of the search. Both Google Play listings return a 404.
I am writing this because I was one of the people who loved it. The art style got me first, all those blocky pastel bears sitting in the margins looking pleased with themselves, and then the spelling itself turned out to be the coziest version of a word game I had played. No clock, no opponent, just a grid and a bear slowly taking over it. Losing it to a store delisting is a rubbish way for a game to go.
So here is what actually happened, and the closest games like Alphabear you can play now. One of them is mine, and it is last on the list for a reason.
What happened to Alphabear
Alphabear launched in July 2015 from Spry Fox, won Standout Indie at the first Google Play Awards in 2016, and sat at 81 on Metacritic for iOS. The sequel, Alphabear 2, also sold as Alphabear: Words Across Time, arrived in September 2018 and added a story between levels.
Then both disappeared, and Spry Fox's own support pages are more specific about it than most of the coverage that repeats them. The studio says it removed the original "from the iTunes App Store and Google Play Store on 2019-05-15", and elsewhere that "we don't anticipate them coming back". For the sequel it says only that "Alphabear 2 is no longer available on the Apple App Store or on Google Play"; store trackers date that removal to October 10, 2023.
What Spry Fox has never published is a reason for either removal, so anything you read about the cause is guesswork, including the licensing theories. What is on the record is what happened to the studio: Netflix acquired Spry Fox in October 2022 and sold it back to its founders in December 2025.
What made Alphabear special, and what to look for in a replacement
Worth being precise about this, because it is the difference between a recommendation that lands and one that annoys you. Alphabear did four things at once:
- You spelled from a grid, not a rack. Using a tile opened the tiles next to it, so every word reshaped the board for the next one.
- Neglected tiles punished you. Letters you left alone too long decayed into stone blocks that clogged the grid. That was the whole tension.
- Bears grew into the space you cleared, which turned a good word into a visible, silly reward rather than just a number going up.
- It was unhurried and it was pretty. You could play a puzzle untimed, and the art made a vocabulary test feel like a picture book.
No game on this list does all four. The bears in particular are not coming back. So I have picked for the two things people actually miss: a grid that changes as you spell, and a cozy, illustrated, no-pressure feel.
| Game | Closest Alphabear quality | Platforms | Offline | Ads | Price |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Alphabear: Hardcover Edition | It is the actual game | Windows (macOS 10.14 and older only) | Yes | None | Paid, around $10 |
| Dave's Word Game | Grid of letters, daily habit | iOS, Android, Steam | Not stated | None on mobile | Free / $5.99 (Steam) |
| Birdigo | Illustrated and unhurried | iOS, Steam | Not stated | Not stated | $4.99-$9.99 |
| Scriver: A Word Game | Hand-painted tiles, collecting | iOS, Steam | Yes | None | $4.99-$7.99 |
| Everything Must Word | Cozy scoring, no clock | iOS, Android | Yes, fully | One banner ($2.99 to remove) | Free |
First, the one that is still the real thing: Alphabear: Hardcover Edition
If you have a Windows PC, stop reading the alternatives and go buy Alphabear: Hardcover Edition. It is the 2017 premium release of the original: the same game with the free-to-play honey system stripped out and an in-game dictionary added. It is still on sale, still sitting at Very Positive, and it is the only legitimate way left to play Alphabear.
The catch, and it is a real one: the Steam page states it will not run on macOS 10.15 Catalina or higher. Apple dropped 32-bit support in Catalina in 2019 and the Mac build never moved past it, so on any Mac bought in the last several years this is a Windows-only game. Check the current price on Steam before you click, since regional pricing and sales move it around.
There is no phone version of this, and no amount of wishing makes one. That is what the rest of the list is for.
1. Dave's Word Game - the closest grid, and it is free
Platforms: iOS (Free), Android (Free), Steam ($5.99)No ads on mobile, where a $4.99 premium upgrade unlocks additional modes.
If what you miss is the specific act of staring at a grid of letters and finding the word that unlocks the rest of it, this is the nearest free thing on both phones. It is a daily grid word puzzle, so it also replaces the habit Alphabear had, the two-minute thing you did while the kettle boiled.
Where it differs: no bears, no decay, no collection. It is a cleaner and more austere game than Alphabear was, and the charm is in the puzzle rather than the presentation. It is free with no ads on mobile, which for a daily habit matters more than it sounds.
2. Birdigo - the one that feels like Alphabear looked
Platforms: iOS ($4.99), Steam ($9.99)
Swap the bears for birds. Birdigo is a word deckbuilder about shepherding a flock across a migration, and it is the closest thing on this list to the feeling of playing something illustrated and gentle that happens to be a word game. If the art style is the part of Alphabear you are actually mourning, start here.
Where it differs: it is paid rather than free, iOS only on mobile, and it is a deckbuilder, so the strategy sits in what you collect between puzzles rather than in the board itself. I wrote about it at more length in my roundup of nine new word games.
3. Scriver: A Word Game - hand-painted, no ads, fully offline
Platforms: iOS ($4.99), Steam ($7.99)No ads; fully playable offline.
Scriver is word-building with hand-painted art tiles and a collection to grow, which covers two of the things Alphabear did: something pretty to look at, and something that accumulates across sessions so a good word feels like it mattered beyond the score.
Where it differs: it is structured around escalating runs rather than standalone puzzles, so it asks more of you per sitting than Alphabear's untimed mode did. Paid, iOS only on mobile, and no ads at all.
4. Everything Must Word - the cozy, no-clock one (and it is mine)
Platforms: iOS (Free), Android (Free)Ad-supported; a $2.99 upgrade removes ads, gives more hints, lets you replay past Daily Challenges, and unlocks cosmetics.
Disclosure: I made this one, which is why it is last rather than first. Judge it accordingly.
Everything Must Word is a solo anagram game where you write speeches for a small-town mayor during re-election season. You draft letter tiles, spell the best word you can find in them, and spend the score on upgrades that change what a good word even is. It is built in short levels rather than long runs, so a session fits a commute or a coffee and you can pause mid-level and come back. It came partly out of missing the unhurried end of word games, the Alphabear end, where nothing is chasing you and you can sit with an awkward pile of letters until it cracks.
What it shares with Alphabear: no clock, no lives, no energy meter asking you to come back in four hours. Upgrades that accumulate, so a streak of good words compounds into something. Definitions built in, so a word you half-recognized becomes a word you know, and they work offline along with the rest of the game.
Where it differs, honestly: no grid. You are working a hand of tiles, not a decaying board, so the specific Alphabear puzzle of "which word opens up the corner I am stuck in" is not here. And there is one banner ad unless you pay to remove it, which is one more than Alphabear's premium edition has.
Which Alphabear alternative should you actually install?
On a Windows PC, buy Hardcover Edition and play the real thing. On a phone, it depends what you are missing. Missing the grid and the daily ritual: Dave's Word Game, free, both platforms. Missing the art and the calm: Birdigo if you are on iOS and happy to pay. Missing the feeling of a word game that is not in a hurry and does not want your money every four hours: mine, free on both.
And if none of those land, I keep a wider list of new word games worth playing, plus a shorter one for people looking for Bananagrams, which turns out to be missing from mobile too.
Prices are in USD and may change. Store listings were checked on September 17, 2026: the US App Store returns no Alphabear title, both Google Play listings return a 404, and Alphabear: Hardcover Edition remains on sale on Steam. Store catalogues are region-specific, so it is worth checking your own.