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The Games app is a new addition coming to iOS 26 in the fall. Here's what it does, how it works, and who it's for.

There are a bunch of new features with iOS 26, but one that had us particularly interested was the new Games app. You'll find it automatically installed after updating to iOS 26, upon its release this fall.

This new dedicated app is a sort of central hub for all your gaming needs. It is an evolved version of Apple's GameCenter, you could say.

The idea is you can hop into Games, see what's going on, and get back into one of your favorite titles. Apple is adding some social aspects to it too, which is just as important these days.

Breaking down the Games app

Out of the gate, the Home tab gives you a scrolling view of relevant gaming news. That tab could be promoting new events, your recent achievements, or what your friends are doing on a rotating carousel at the top of the app.

Below that, you'll be able to pick up where you last left off in recent games, as well as browse for new games displayed in different lists.

The Arcade tab shows you all the featured Apple Arcade titles

The second tab is all dedicated to Apple Arcade. It's similar to what you'd view in the App Store and went to the existing Apple Arcade tab.

Invite players to join you in a co-op game or compete in challenges

Play Together, the third tab, houses your challenges and co-op shortcuts. You can see what challenges you've completed and how you stack up next to your friends.

You can also hop into multiplayer games or matches from Play Together. It lets you generate a code for shared games and invite people directly from here.

Play multiplayer games from the Games app

Apple has made it easy for devs to add challenges and more with iOS 26, so you should see a bunch more games supporting this after the release of the update. We got a few demos of this at WWDC 2025.

Finally, there is the library tab. You can go into Apple Arcade, events, or achievements at the top, or filter a list of all your installed games below that.

Filters are helpful because you can see any new ones you've downloaded or, for example, just the ones that require controllers. We've definitely installed games only to forget about them later.

So far in our testing, the Games app is very handy if you play a lot of games on your devices. It brings more sense of community and makes it easier to jump into any of your games.

Comparing Apple Games to Nexus & Backbone

For frequent gamers, the Games app might feel familiar — and we aren't talking about being compared to the early version of GameCenter. It's very similar to existing apps like Razer Nexus or the Backbone app.

Backbone and Razer both have similar apps for iPhone

Both of those apps are very good on their own and have particular benefits over Games. One thing we noticed, is that Razer and Backbone focus on bigger titles.

Razer Nexus app features bigger titles

For example, while Apple is hyping mobile-centric titles like Fruit Ninja and Harvest Town as you'd expect from a mobile game store, Nexus has Death Standing, Assassin's Creed Mirage, No Man's Sky, Mortal Combat, Oceanhorn, Badland, and more. It just feels more like desktop-style games are being presented on the third-party game aggregating apps.

Whether or not this is a good thing will depend on what kind of gamer you are. If you are into more lightweight mobile games, the Apple Games app seems a bit more tailored to that.

If you are into bigger titles, streaming from a console, or using emulators, Nexus and Backbone are better suited. Not saying one of those is better than the other, but they have different audiences.

Three requests to make Games even better

While we think the Games app is a solid improvement chock-full of new features for devs and gamers, there are three requests that we'd like Apple to consider.

First, bring back the wish list. We have so many games on our Steam or PlayStation wish lists.

Apple used to have a wish list feature. Bring it back, even just for Games so we can track what we want to buy, download, and play.

An offline filter would be helpful

Second, we want a filter option for offline games. We'd love to be able to filter to just games that work, in some capacity, entirely offline.

Apple Arcade titles largely fall into that, but we want it to be a piece of metadata any game can designate. That way when shown in the App Store or in Games, it's easy to see what requires an internet connection to work.

Finally, let's get a screenshot, screen recording library for the Games app. We'd love it if in the Photos metadata, Apple added something that identified a screenshot or screen recording as having been captured by a game, and not just a generic screen capture tag.

Managing game captures in the Photos app isn't the most convenient

Then all those could be shown inside the Games app, or an album in Photos. That way you can see all your accomplishments, finishing moves, or even your farm and more easily share them.

If we dug around, we'd find images we've taken in different games that have gotten buried. There is no good way to organize them or share them, other than through Photos manually.

Third-party controllers often even have screenshot buttons, so again, it would be fantastic to store these more easily. We have similar features on consoles, it would be great to see it come to iPhone and iPad as well.

Availability of the Games app

Apple Games is in beta as of July 15, 2025. It will be available on iPhone, iPad, and Mac with iOS 26, iPadOS 26, and macOS 26, respectively, likely in September.

Hopefully it also glows up to the Apple TV too, but maybe Apple is waiting for a more powerful set-top box before it makes the leap there. We'll have to wait and see.