Last updated on January 18th, 2026 at 04:10 am
Fish Tycoon Free for iPad – Simulation Game Review
Fish Tycoon Free for iPad is a Simulation/Family/Entertainment game from LDW Software, LLC, first launched in 4th November 2011.
It’s rated 4+ and currently has 454+ ratings on the App Store.
What Makes Fish Tycoon Free for iPad Stand Out
Fish Tycoon is the award-winning virtual fish breeding game from the creators of the acclaimed Virtual Villagers series. Fish Tycoon for iPad has been a top-selling simulation game since its release, and the game is now available in a free version!
Starting with $300 and a handful of eggs gathered from the fabled island of Isola, your goal is to unlock the genetic puzzle and discover the 7 Magic Fish of Isola. Along your journey to discovering the Magic Fish, you will breed and care for more than 400 species of fish, financing your operation by selling your creations to the eager customers who visit your Fish Store. A wide variety of aquarium supplies are available to equip and customize your tanks, care for your fish, and magically enhance your aquariums. The game continues to progress in true real time, even when your iPad is turned off, so don’t forget to check in regularly to feed your fish, cure their illnesses, and create the next generation of baby fish that will be another step in your pursuit of the legendary Magic Fish of Isola.
More about Fish Tycoon
- It’s a virtual pet: care for your fish in your own virtual aquarium.
- It’s a simulation game: maintain virtual fish in a persistent world.
- It’s a genetic puzzle: discover which breeding combinations will lead to the discovery of the 7 Magic Fish.
- It’s a tycoon game: test your business skills and aquarium skills at the same time!
- There are many approaches to solving the game, with over 400 species of fish to breed.
- The built-in screensaver allows you to display your fish in your own virtual aquarium.
- You can customize your tanks: purchase aquarium ornaments and place them where you like them!
- Experience real-time game play, with new surprises every time you turn on the game!
Free version features:
- Unlimited play
- Full access to fish supplies and research
- 2 fish tanks for breeding and selling your fish
Purchase the full version to get tanks that hold 3 times as many fish and the option to purchase a third customizable fish tank for even more fish breeding!
Visit our Official Fish Tycoon site at www.FishTycoon.com for instructions, strategy guides, and much more!
For the latest info, and to find out what else we're cookin' up, follow us on Twitter at: www.twitter.com/LastDayofWork
This Simulation game offers engaging gameplay and regular updates for mobile players.
Player Feedback
As a newer release, Fish Tycoon Free for iPad is building its player community. Early feedback suggests .
Recent Updates & Development
Latest Update: 13th December 2011
Recent improvements include:
- Fish Environment research is now possible in the free version
- Removed inadvertent inclusion of the second tank in the Supply Shop
- Changes in ad content
Download & Availability
Fish Tycoon Free for iPad is available through the official App Store for iOS devices.
Get Fish Tycoon Free for iPad on App Store
Requirements: Requires iPad Air / iPad Air (Cellular) / iPad Mini 2 (Retina) / iPad Mini 2 (Retina, Cellular) / iPad Air 2 / iPad Air 2 (Cellular) / iPad Mini 3 / iPad Mini 3 (Cellular) / iPad Mini 4 / iPad Mini 4 (Cellular) or later.
Compatible with iPhone and iPad devices.
Player Experience Highlights
Community Insight:
We have played this game for two years on the pc, and now three years on the iPad! A truly extraordinary game.
Us And our Family Plays This Game And we Miss This Game Like 10 Years Ago we Love It we Play It. It's A Great Game we'll Give You 5 Stars And Thank You.
The hint to this game is breeding the magic fish of fertility over and over and over. Make sure that is the only fish you have in either tank. After selling this fish over and over for 70$ a Piece, you have enough money to research the environment and food all the way, that way the fish do not die. Then after that keep doing this until you have enough money to buy the purple eggs for the supply store. Which is how we have managed to already find 3 of the magic fish!!! But make sure you keep two of the fertility fish at all times, in case you run out of money, you can keep this process going while finding the other fish!! Hope this helps.
We originally played this on coffee break arcade. (Or similar) we love this game. There are things that need improved but it's fun. Would def purchase if we knew there would be improvements.
They get pregnant but then no new fish appear and they are no longer pregnant.
Ok this app is one of Last Day Of Work' s best app ever! It's fun and a great game to play when you have nothing to do . So if your looking for a good app to play this is the one!! It's awesome and we think it fully earns our five stars as a rating. LOVE FISH TYCOON.
Great app! Use for iPad only though. You can rains prices of fish and hold 14 at once.
Really cool looking game. We decided to get it based on our back-and-forth experience in the virtual families games, which we are still perfecting skills in, & we already see ourselves playing it for keeps. The fish are cool & colorful. We fell like we are stepping into the shoes of our favorite Animal Planet fish tank builders, Wayde King & Brett Raymer, by playing this game.
We've been playing this game on our computer for like 3 years and found it on the IPad, so we got it and have had it for 3 days on the IPad so far. It's amazing! The only glitch is that the current version doesn't allow you to buy a second tank, but the computer version does. We do not have the full version on the computer and can buy the research food, research environment, and that stuff. We would really like that fixed. But, it still gets the five stars it deserves because we really love the game so much! Thanks so much for bringing the game to the iPhone and iPad.
This is the best game ever!!!! We luv it! It is super fun to bread the fish! Tip:you can make the fish you sell worth more, if you put in isolation, and press species. Hard to sell fish though, so we just make some fish pregnit in the sale tank. Good.
You are only allowed to have 7 fish in the tank at one time so if you have 6 fish and get them all pregnant then only 1 baby fish is going to hatch. What we normally do is get all our fish pregnant and then put 3in the selling tank and put 3 in the normal tank. Hope this helped (:.
Every time we breed our fish 5 or so goes by…we go and check on them and we click on the fish and it says they arent pregnant. So we look around the tank for the babbies and they are no where to be found….PLEASE fix this. The game would be perfect, fun, and enjoying if this was fixed. Thanks :):).
Very fun game, but a challenge, maybe toooo much of a challenge. We had to start over again a lot of times to do itin another way. Also the music genre is AMAZING. Touches our heart <3 we would download it on iTunes if it was there and listen to it all afternoon.
Love it,' love it, love it every body should get and we're a child so trust us.
This is a great game but fish getting sick everyday is to much.
This game is very good. We personally am a fishlovers and this game is really great for long periods of waiting. But the downside of this game is that you have to research all levels of fish environment in order to get the magic fishes.
This game is surprisingly fun and with all the combos of fish, you won't get bored. The only problem we see is running out of room for fish far too quickly. Other than that, great entertaining game.
This game is great u just not be playing it right cause it works.
The game is fun to a certain point. It needs good quality, if u compare it with all the other games out there, it is not so good :/ Make it a little bit easier, fishes die quickly. And as u advance in the game you will need a second tank. The game has potential, it needs a lot of tweaking, try and add new things or new fishes just to keep the user entertained and not get bored after some time. KEEP UPDATING, IT HAS BEEN A LONG TIME.
But we really need a second tank for organization.
Fun, but you should make an upgrade where you can make an account with an avatar and then, while people have their shops open, you can look around. Or, you can sell fish to real people. And you should also make a 3x speed.
This is a great game, just like all LDW games. But we bought a second tank and it never appeared. 400 coins down the drain… We also can't get our fish pregnant. We'll exit the game and come back and they won't be pregnant.
We don't want your new freemium garbage we want to buy the first Fish Tycoon but it's not compatible with iOS 11 Update !! Don't just shove out some junk that's WiFi locked with iAP squeezed into every crack and removing features we loved! U are losing our trust.
We would rate higher if we were able to buy a second tank. Instead we have to use the selling tank as a breeding tank.
We like this game. It is fun to play, but we think the fish should not die so easily. We also think that the supplies should not be so expensive and the fish should be worth more money. Besides some minor problems, we think this is a good game.
We would like in app purchases for this game. Pretty good but we would like in app purchases.
It's an ok game just maybe better graphics b/c u guys never update ANYTHING.
Before anything buy the temperature controll and the air filter beside it or all your fish wil die.
This game is fun. The first batch of eggs that they start you off with grow up and when we impregnate them and come back to the game later it says they aren't pregnant but there are no babies. We sold all the fish from the first batch of eggs bought new eggs and the second batch was able to have babies. So after we figured that out this game is fun.
When we impregnate the fish and close out, but when we come back, their not pregnant and if we're lucky we have one baby that dies quickly. And how are you supposed to get money when a fish cost $15.
Good but we agree with everyone else. It takes FOREVER for your pregnant fish to have the babies. Our fish has been preggers for 2 years in game time! That's not normal! Plz FIX.
Fun app for awhile-then too frustrating. Hard to advance and keep fish from dying. Fish die without knowing why so hard to fix it. Must spend a lot of time breeding & selling one kind of fish before you get enough points to buy products. The fun is over- we're deleting this app.
We love it!! EXCEPT, they need 2 make it possible to buy a second tank…..that shud b UPGRADED ASAP.
Unlike the computer version though we don't get our baby fish from breeding.
Every time we breed our fish they get pregnant, but later aren't and there is not any babies! This glitch doesn't seem to happen to everyone, but please fix.
But here's our gameplay experience. You start to breed basic fish. Fish offspring die. Treat existing fish for ick. Game says you need to upgrade tank or fish will keep dying. Can't afford to upgrade tank. Treat fish for ick. Ick medicine not working after FOUR applications? Why? Sell a couple of fish that did not die. Treat fish again for expensive ick. Buy upgrade. Breed fish…FISH OFFSPRING STILL FREAKIN DIE. Quit and delete game. Write review. We do not recommend because we just summed up a weeks worth of play.
The fish won't have babies. They are pregnant but when we open the app later no baby fish. The game isn't great to begin but it was free.
It's a good game, but when we make a fish pregnant, and we exit the game, and like open the app again 10-15 minutes later, the fish's status is not pregnant but there is NO BABY FISHES, WHY?! If this is a bug, please fix it as soon as possible. Oh and we're using iPad one, just saying.
Why should we buy your apps? Your free apps most state not compatible .. Why should we give you our money to just find out it's not compatible? If your not gonna update these apps take them down! That is rude to leave your apps then people will buy them & find out they can't play .. That's a scam .. We were liking this app but every time we open it states a update is needed.. We do not like your new sequel to this app. It requires wifi every time to play ..that's not right so if we're away from home we can't play. Plus it pushes more on you need to pay, to get much play. Yuck.
We downloaded the free version to try it out but is soon as we click done anything to try to start playing it redirected us to the app store to purchase the game.
Not sure why but the calibration is completely off. We're using our iPad pro, so maybe that has something to do with we, but when we move our finger up and down it thinks we're moving side to side and the same for right and left, but only on most parts of the screen… Deleting until this glitch is fixed.
This isn't really the free game. It's more a trial. If u want to breed fish and get somewhere in the game you have to purchase the full game and they don't make that very clear on the app page.
We like this app, but have a couple of problems. Medicine that was supposed to have 3 doses, disappeared after only one dose. And it took us a little while to figure out that you can only have 7 fish per tank. Plus to do research to keep delicate fish costs way too much.
We used to get to at least the second magic fish but now we can't do research without buying the full version. Lame.
User feedback from Apple App Store
App Details
- Version: 1.1.1
- Size: 18.53 MB
- iOS: 3.2 or later
- Languages: EN
- Content Advisory:
- Developer: LDW Software, LLC
Last updated: 13th December 2011 | Genre: Simulation, Family | Developer: LDW Software, LLC