A totally unbiased comparison
Leaves of Blocks vs. Block Blast
2.3 million ratings versus 5. Zero ads versus a lot. Whitman energy versus none. You decide.
Block Blast is the most-downloaded block puzzle game in the world. We say that not as a complaint but as a starting point — it has the highest rated count in its category on the App Store, an audience in the hundreds of millions, and a team of professional engineers and game designers behind it. We respect what they have built.
Leaves of Blocks is the deliberate opposite of that, on every axis that is not the puzzle itself. It is a free, ad-free, privacy-first take on the same 10×10 block puzzle format, built and maintained by one developer in the United States. There are no banner ads, no interstitial videos, no rewarded videos, no in-app purchases, no third-party analytics SDKs, no ad-network trackers, and no shared advertising profiles. The full source is published on GitHub under the MIT license, so every claim on this page is auditable rather than just promised.
This page is written for the specific person who searched "Block Blast without ads," "block puzzle no tracking," or "Block Blast alternative for iPhone" and ended up here. If that is you, the scoreboard and table below are the short version of why we exist. If you are perfectly happy with Block Blast and want to keep playing it, no hard feelings — it is genuinely good at what it does.
Zero. Absolutely none.
No banners, no interstitials, no "watch a video to continue." Just the game.
Oh, there are ads.
Block Blast is widely known for aggressive ad placements between rounds. Enjoy your puzzle with a side of unskippable 30-second videos.
We collect nothing.
No tracking, no analytics in the app, no ad identifiers, no third-party data sharing. By default, your game stays on your device — Apple Game Center is supported as an opt-in feature, off unless you turn it on.
Knows more about you than you might expect.
Block Blast tracks your device, your gameplay habits, and how you interact with every ad — then shares that profile with advertising partners. You can ask it to stop personalizing ads, but ads never actually stop. At least four separate companies receive your data just from playing the game. They are upfront about this in their privacy policy. We just think you should know.
One guy. Tim. USA.
A real solo indie developer based in the United States. You can email him. He will probably respond.
Hungry Studio. Hong Kong.
Founded in 2021, headquartered in Hong Kong, with corporate presence in Singapore and Beijing. A company. With a team. And multiple offices across Asia. They are very good at making popular games. We are not them.
Public on GitHub.
The full source is at github.com/timveil/leaves-of-blocks. You can read every line, file an issue, fork it, or just verify for yourself that the privacy claims on this page are real. Open is the only way to prove "no tracking."
Closed source.
Block Blast is proprietary. You take the privacy policy at its word — there is no way for an outside party to confirm what the binary actually does at runtime. Not unusual for a free-to-play game; just worth noting when "trust us" is the only option.
5 ratings.
Mostly family and friends. One is definitely his mom. Possibly two are his mom on different Apple IDs. We're working on it.
~2.3 million ratings.
The undisputed #1 puzzle game in the App Store. They have more ratings than some countries have citizens. Respect.
Named after Walt Whitman.
"Leaves of Blocks" is a direct homage to "Leaves of Grass" (1855). Likely the only puzzle game you will ever play with a connection to 19th-century American poetry.
Named after a thing that blasts.
"Block Blast." Descriptive, effective, and entirely devoid of Whitman energy. No judgment. Just facts.
Genuinely endorsed by the developer's mom.
She plays it every day. This is not a bit. She actually loves it. This is our most credible celebrity endorsement.
Unknown.
We have no data on whether anyone at Hungry Studio's mom plays Block Blast. We assume she does. She has plenty of ad breaks to think about it.
Block Blast is a trademark of Hungry Studio. We have nothing against them personally. Their game is genuinely very popular. We just think ours is better for a specific kind of person.
Common questions about this comparison
How does Leaves of Blocks compare to Block Blast on actual gameplay?
The core gameplay is nearly identical — drag pieces from a tray of three onto a 10×10 grid, clear complete rows or columns, lose when nothing fits. If you have muscle memory for Block Blast, you will have it for Leaves of Blocks immediately. The differences live entirely outside the board: no ads between rounds, no countdown timers, no "watch this video to continue," no banners pushing in-app purchases. The puzzle itself is the same well-loved format that made Block Blast popular in the first place.
Are the privacy claims on this page accurate?
Yes. The claims about Block Blast are based on its App Store privacy nutrition label and its published privacy policy, both of which disclose device identifiers, gameplay interaction data, and advertising identifiers as collected and shared with third-party advertising partners. The claims about Leaves of Blocks are independently verifiable in the open source repository on GitHub — there are no analytics SDKs, no ad networks, and no third-party trackers compiled into the build. You do not have to take our word for it.
Did you contact Hungry Studio before publishing this page?
No. Comparison pages of this kind are well-established as fair use under US trademark law when the statements are factual and the trademark is acknowledged. Block Blast is credited as a trademark of Hungry Studio in the footnote of this page. We are not affiliated with Hungry Studio, do not speak for them, and have no commercial relationship with them. If they would like to publish a counter-comparison, we will gladly link to it from this page.
What about other ad-free block puzzle games?
Several exist. Blockudoku offers a paid ad-free upgrade. Wood Block Puzzle, 1010!, and Block Puzzle Jewel are all popular variants of the same format, most with ad-supported free tiers and optional removal of ads via in-app purchase. Leaves of Blocks is genuinely free of both ads and trackers with no unlock fee — that is the specific niche we are aiming at. If a different game fits you better, that is fine. We are pro-choice on block puzzles.
Will my Block Blast progress transfer if I switch?
No. The two games are made by different developers and store their progress entirely separately — there is no shared account, no cloud import, and no migration path between them. Your Block Blast score history stays in Block Blast. Leaves of Blocks starts you at zero, which, depending on your current Block Blast high score, may or may not be a feature.
So which one should I actually play?
They are optimized for different things. Block Blast is optimized for session engagement, retention, and ad-revenue density — and it is genuinely excellent at all three. Leaves of Blocks is optimized for being something you can play quietly on the couch without anyone, including us, monetizing your attention or your data. If "better" means "more polished, more popular, more content updates," Block Blast wins. If "better" means "respects your attention and your data, runs offline, and is auditable on GitHub," we are the safer pick. Both can exist.
The verdict
We're not the biggest.
No ads. No data collected. No corporate machine behind it — just one developer, a literary name, and a mom who plays it every single day.
If you want a clean, quiet puzzle game that respects your attention and your privacy, Leaves of Blocks was made for you.
Or play it free in your browser — no install needed.
(Walt Whitman is unavailable for comment. He passed in 1892. He probably would have liked it though.)