For Parents
Poplings is a free, ad-free balloon toy for ages 3 to 8. Balloons float up, a tap pops them, and hiding inside some of them are little creatures called Poplings. Everything below is written for the grown-up.
Something not working, or an idea for the next update?
[email protected]A real person reads every message. Please include your device (for example “iPhone 15”) and what happened.
If Poplings has been good to your family, a review genuinely helps. We have no marketing budget and no studio behind us, so a few honest words from a parent is how other families find it.
You can also rate it inside the app: tap Grown-Ups, answer the arithmetic, and the option is on the first tab.
What is a Popling?
Now and then a balloon has a little creature tucked inside it. Those are the Poplings, and finding one is the small surprise the whole app is built around. Each has a name, its own sound, and a spot in My Poplings, where the empty spaces stay visible so a child can see how many are still out there.
There are 37 to find in all, and every one of them comes with the app. Nothing is locked, nothing arrives later, and nothing is behind a purchase.
Where are the settings?
Tap Grown-Ups at the bottom of the home screen. It asks a simple addition question first, so a young child cannot get in on their own. Inside there are three tabs, one for each question a parent usually has.
Activity — is this healthy?
- Play timeHow long the app has been used today and this week, how long a typical visit runs, the longest one, and how the time splits between calm play and Pop Party. It is a plain read on usage, not a score to beat, and there are no streaks or rewards for playing more.
- Poplings foundHow many of the 37 your child has collected so far.
Settings — can I control it?
- How hard is itEasy, Just right, or Challenge, for the calm Play mode. Easy makes the balloons bigger, slower, and fewer, for a child still learning to point at a screen. It deliberately does not change Pop Party, so scores stay comparable.
- SoundA volume level, plus a quiet mode that softens the popping while keeping the little celebration sounds audible. Your device's volume buttons work too.
- VibrationHaptics on or off.
- Reduce motionCalms the movement on screen, for children who find a busy screen overwhelming. If you have turned on Reduce Motion in iOS Settings, Poplings follows that automatically.
- A gentle stopAn optional limit of 10, 15, 20, or 30 minutes. When the time is up the balloons drift away and a calm card appears, rather than cutting off mid-tap. It is a nudge for the adult, not a lockout for the child: tapping OK returns home and the app can be played again.
About — can I trust it?
- How this app worksThe plain statement that there are no ads, no in-app purchases, and no data collection, and that nothing leaves the device.
- Erase all dataClears found Poplings, scores, settings, and play-time history from this device.
Keeping a small child inside the app
Use Guided Access, not an in-app lock
Poplings has no exit lock of its own, on purpose. iOS has a proper one built in, it cannot be tapped out of by accident, and it works in every app rather than just this one.
To turn it on, once:
- Open Settings → Accessibility → Guided Access and switch it on.
- Tap Passcode Settings and set a passcode. Choose something your child will not watch you type.
Then, each time you hand over the phone:
- Open Poplings.
- Triple-click the side button (or the Home button on older devices).
- Tap Start. The phone is now locked to this one app.
- To get out, triple-click again and enter your passcode.
On Android tablets the equivalent feature is called Screen Pinning, under Settings → Security.
Why we did not build our own: an app that will not let you leave is a trap, and a lock a four-year-old can defeat by mashing the screen is worse than no lock at all because you would stop watching. The operating system's version is the honest answer.
My child got frustrated. Can they lose?
Not in the calm Play mode. Nothing to fail, no timer, no score. Balloons that are not popped simply drift away, and the app never tells a child they did something wrong. If the pace feels too quick, set Difficulty to easy in the Grown-Ups section.
There is one exception, behind its own button: Pop Party is a short timed run with a score, for older kids who want a challenge. It is the only place in the app where a round can end. It never starts on its own and never interrupts calm play, so a younger child handed the same phone will not fall into it.
The game is too loud, or too quiet
The app plays at full scale by default so your device's volume buttons are the real control, which is the slider you already know and the one that appears on screen when you press it. If you want the popping softer but still want to hear the little celebrations, turn on quiet mode in the Grown-Ups section.
What information does it collect?
None at all. No accounts, no ads, no analytics, no tracking, and no internet connection used during play. Which Poplings have been found, plus scores and settings, are saved only on your device and are never sent anywhere. The full details are in the privacy policy.
There are no in-app purchases and no subscriptions, so there is nothing a child can buy by tapping.
The Poplings we found are gone
Saved progress lives on the device rather than in an account, which is the trade we made for collecting nothing: a filled-in collection does not follow your child to a new iPhone or iPad, and deleting the app removes it. If the book emptied out on the same device without the app being deleted or erased, please email us with the device model and roughly when it happened.
Progress can also be cleared deliberately, from Erase progress in the Grown-Ups section. That is not reversible.
Which devices does it run on?
Poplings runs on iPhone and iPad, in portrait orientation only. The whole scene, the menu, and the way the balloons float are all designed tall, so landscape would letterbox everything.
Does it work without internet?
Yes, completely. Poplings never connects to the internet, so it behaves exactly the same in airplane mode, on a plane, in a car with no signal, or on an iPad that has never been on a network. Nothing to load, nothing to wait for.