Last updated on December 10th, 2025 at 03:26 pm
Idle Frontier: Western Tapper – Strategy Game Review
Idle Frontier: Western Tapper is a Strategy/Simulation/Entertainment game from Kongregate, Inc., first launched in 7th August 2019.
It’s rated 12+ and currently has 16,589+ ratings on the App Store.
What Makes Idle Frontier: Western Tapper Stand Out
Tap to explore new towns, build your empire & settle the idle frontier! Now with less dysentery!
Start exploring your first wild west town with the help of local town folk to mine for gold and cash you’ll need to become the tycoon of Tap Town!
Tap your way to idle tycoon status one town at a time, hiring interesting characters from various towns, and sit back and watch as your gold piles up! Can you reach Providence Valley?
FEATURES:
AUTOMATE your businesses and earn limitless cash while you're idle
INVEST your idle cash into your town and watch your profits multiply
COLLECT characters to help strengthen your town
PRESTIGE to continue your journey one town at a time
COMPETE in event leaderboards for profit multipliers
Reach Providence Valley and find limitless prosperity!
Please Note: Idle Frontier is a free-to-play game, but some extra game items can be purchased for real money. You can disable in-app purchases in your device's settings. Playing Idle Frontier requires a secure internet connection.
Got problems or issues?
email us at [email protected]
Kongregate User Agreement:
https://www.kongregate.com/user-agreement
This Strategy game offers engaging gameplay and regular updates for mobile players.
Player Feedback
As a newer release, Idle Frontier: Western Tapper is building its player community. Early feedback suggests .
Recent Updates & Development
Latest Update: 6th August 2025
Recent improvements include:
Stability improvements and bug fixes
Download & Availability
Idle Frontier: Western Tapper is available through the official App Store for iOS devices.
Get Idle Frontier: Western Tapper on App Store
Requirements: Requires iPhone 5s / iPad Air / iPad Air (Cellular) / iPad Mini 2 (Retina) / iPad Mini 2 (Retina, Cellular) / iPhone 6 / iPhone 6 Plus / iPad Air 2 / iPad Air 2 (Cellular) / iPad Mini 3 or later.
Compatible with iPhone and iPad devices.
Player Experience Highlights
Community Insight:
We like it a lot but Im not a fan of games that make you pay every month to get rid of ads. We would rather pay a one time fee to not have advertisments. Due to that, we play Magic Mart and Lumbercat more.
We used to look forward to when the hunting event cycled up. It was the only time we could complete an event with aggressive playing. With the last update the hunting event was changed to operate like all the others. This means we will get no higher than level 3 because each subsequent level requires managers to level up higher and higher. Problem is not enough cards are provided so the only way to level up is to pay cash. Another disappointment from this developer.
Cute graphics, interesting resource harvesting mechanism, but overall very thin. The main game might intrigue idle enthusiasts, but the events are not idle. During the events, the upkeep on managers to automate shops becomes very steep, very early, and you will not progress far unless you are prepared to manually click everything for hours at a time, or have a huge pile of money to burn on in-app purchases. If youre looking for a new idler, the main game may have something for you, but do yourself a favor and avoid the events.
Its a fun game, Im a sucker for idle games and this one checks all the boxes buuuuttttt we literally cannot see how much gold we have because the UI doesnt account for the iPhone 14 Pro front facing camera so Im unable to read it. Sure its not the biggest deal, just click till we cant purchase anymore. But we thoroughly enjoy watching the numbers go up. Kinda the whole point of idle games right.
Love this game its really fun.
Hi we realize everyone does not have the same phone but if yall could put in update in the code to format for phones that would be awesome. We have an iPhone 15 pro and the way the game is formatted we can not see how much money we have and we can only read half our pie balance because of our front camera.
A great game! Enjoy beautiful landscapes meet great managers and create your own business.
It is fun but it keeps telling us we are on the bronze medal with 0 players and 0 percent.
Cant see how much money you have with iPhone 15 camera covering where money would be visible.
The base game is manageable without spending money but the events you can't get far without spending money. So if you don't plan to throw money at it don't go into the events with the idea of making it far.
Ive been playing this gave since November of 2019 and we have to say Im still hooked! After nearly 4 years of playing (which is a feat for us!) this is definitely our favorite game. Ive watched the game develop over the years, watched events and characters being added, seen the change of company logos on the load screen, and watched as the developer grew and created more games. Im so happy Kongregate still has this game running after all these years! This is definitely our comfort game and we cannot praise the developers enough for designing this! Thank you for designing our happy game. :).
1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th, 6th, 7th, 8th, 9th, 10th, 11th, . . . . 20th, 21st, 22nd, 23rd. Ends in a 1 its st Ends in a 2 its nd Ends in a 3 its rd Others end in th.
So far the game is pretty enjoyable. Similar aspects to other town games but has a nice feel to it.
We have been playing this game for several years and overall its our favorite idle game that Ive found. We have noticed improvements to the events such as you can generally get to 2nd or 3rd stage and have one normal business and the two transport businesses running. And then certain events the managers stay at Level 1 and its just higher cost to upgrade them. We personally would prefer this style every time or at least more frequently. We spend more time playing the game when its like that. Overall happy with events and enjoy playing them each week. The problem is that we have progressed far enough in the main game that it takes too long to finish. Ive been in the same town for about 6 months or so and based on the progress it will probably take us a year or more just to get the last crate. One crate is earn 50AE and the max we could get off one haul is about 2AD, but the average haul is more like 100AB given how stores have varying speeds. After 6 months Ive earned 13AE. The other two crates are even less attainable. The main game has pretty much become worthless and our experience playing the game has just shifted to events which only run for 5 days.
So ive been playing this game for 3 years and we just got the iphone 14 pro max a few days ago and discovered that the front camera on this iphone covers up the top middle part of the game (where it says how many coins you have, its quite difficult to play the game with important information covered up thanks,.
Our hats off to the artist and graphic designers by far the best graphics and the game designers the storyline and game are by the best idle game we have seen.
Our only downfall is how nearly impossible it is to keep managers during the events. Thats the only reason Im not giving 5 star.
Please make the game support the iPhone 14 Pro Max screen format. The gold info is covered up and cannot be seen with the selfie camera placement of this phone. Please address this soon.
Game is good love how it gets harder as you go along but the game freezes when we try logging into our account please fix.
Ive been playing this game for over a year. We even do the monthly subscription. We always looked forward to the Thursday events but the more we play, the more we realize the events are designed to completely drain your bank account. Like you can be on level 8 but the special dudes are at level 12 to automate. We cant even imagine the amount of money youd have to spend to even get to that level of automation. Also the majority of events dont go past level 10 so why am we supposed to upgrade to a level we cant even reach?? Just uninstalled and canceled our subscription. Too much of a grind.
Not sure if there is a link to the same issue another reviewer made, but the app stopped working all together. Ive progressed past 3 towns and have now completed 3 events and the app is not connecting to server at all. No we dont have an account with kongregate. It shouldnt matter if we do or not. Just like we shouldnt have to spend money to advance in events. Ive played this game before but uninstalled it. Why? The events. Theyre obviously rigged to be cash cows, because thats the only way you could possibly advance further in the events. The level requirements for managers are ridiculous, just like the exchange rates for building upgrades during the events. Please fix this. Ill uninstall and reinstall the app to see if that works, but still, kongregate, you need to fix the building upgrade exchange for events. EDIT: reinstalled it and it works but obviously deleted our progress lol.
We want to love this game but like people have said before us the events kind of kills the game for us. Its hard to get managers in the events once you get pass the first milestone unless we are on the game literally all the time. Its so frustrating because Im so far in the main game the events just ruins it.
Its been a couple of days now.
We have been playing for two weeks. First week we noticed our device heats up really hot while playing the game. They make you sign into krogenate which is almost fraudulent in our opinion. Once you give your email address the app freezes and when you shut it down even closed the music and app continues to run. We need to hard shut down our device for it to turn off the app. There is zero way to contact support. We won an event yesterday, first place prize was a legendary chest. In the chest are several hero cards and 2500+ pies. We did not receive any pies. Game won't let us communicate with customer service. Next to impossible to upgrade heroes as in order to get the needed pies you are forced to spend hundreds and hundreds of dollars to obtain gold to then buy pies. Event rewards do not make game worth playing. Best bet is to stay away from Idle Frontier!! Not worth playing and getting into the game. Plus their log in screen indicates slavery with black man driving a wagon yet in game there are no black heroes. Very poor image and very poorly ran game and no means of communicating problems.
Loud, unmuted, and most are so poorly made you have to restart the app. There are also a huge volume of ads required to enjoy the game in between.
Any game that makes you watch a 1 minute ad to collect anything is GARBAGE.
We have been playing this game for two year or more it is entirely too hard to level up on the main game and the events. We pay monthly for the no ads which we are no longer doing since we deleted the game. Im done playing and supporting a game where the creators do not listen to suggestions from the players. If you would make it to where on the events that you only level up the characters to earn more instead of not even being able to automate them because you cant upgrade them because the task runs out and you have to wait 4 hours to MAYBE get the cards you need. Should also keep the task going instead of ending it and making them move to the next town on the main game and events. We liked when you had the events to where it just cost a lot of money to get the characters automated instead of having to hope that you might get the cards you need. And the birds giving a little more every now and then.
We are not getting any birds during this event.
We got logged out, and when trying to log back in, we logged into the wrong account, and now that we want to switch back, the game freezes every time, and we cant log out of the old one. Please fix this.
Purchased monthly support and even though it says still active suddenly makes us watch ads again- support link locks and doesnt even allow us to enter email address or issue. Frustrating as heck.
This is a good game, and we would like to rate it higher. The problem with the ads locking up the game 90% of the time is really annoying. This is the only game that we play where this happens. We are close to just deleting this app.
We loved this game for a long time. We looked forward to the special events. They are challenging and have a fun theme. However, recently, we have a few major concerns. The main gameI cant level up anymore, we have been trying to level up one business for over 6 months! 6! Then the stupid birds! We assume this is how we will level up more quicklybut most birds contain an add to watch to gain anything. We accidentally click them often. Second, the events that we look forward to have been soooo much more difficult to level up. We are all for a good challenge, but obtainable goals would be nice. Without spending money. Lastly, remember those damned birds in the main gamethey now have appeared in the events! Stop already.
We have a trader on auto pilot and it keeps taking away all our resources and putting them back to zero. After all our hard work we just wanted them to fix it. So we went to the support tab (had to create an account) and when we went to submit a ticket, it keeps crashing. This game used to be fun and we even paid monthly for it, but now its to buggy to even play or contact support. Its like the devs gave up. Not worth your time and effort for it to just disappear.
After several hours of waiting, the download is still stuck. We hope it gets fixed soon. We miss playing.
Please helpmy game will not open..we have been playing for yearsnow it acts like it is going to open then closes back up so 8 cant even go to supportI am joejoebailey and we need help pleaseI have spent lots of money and enjoyed this game for years.
Game was fine until last update. Now every time we start the game it immediately crashes.
It starts out with a decently-based tutorial, but once you really get going. Its absurd how much game money has to be spent to upgrade merchants. You quickly get to where youre paying $60,000,000,000,000 to upgrade shops so that they can output an extra $15,000,000,000. The values really need to be adjusted.
Fix the glitch!!!! Our vip pies hasnt worked for over a week.
Any time a new event starts the game wont load or freezes after it loads in. Makes the events harder to complete since it takes more than a day for the issue to resolve. This game has just continued to get worse and worse over the years.
The game counter does not go past Trillions to AA when collecting money from shops. Its all about watching ads for nothing… And the ads can give serious migraines! Please update game. Im not playing anymore before serious update, if ever.
Ive been playing for a couple months and we really enjoy it. Ive put some money into it as well. Worth it to us. But it keeps crashing every time we try to log in. We lost all our progress.
Its supposed to be an idle game but you cant automate any of your businesses in the event except when you first play it then after that you cant why call it IDLE frontier if you cant let it IDLE which is stupid.
The game plateaus eventually. Ive been stuck at level 97 for well over a year. We finally earned enough pie to automate the collection and trade businesses so that we can actually play the game idly. However, we calculated how long it would take to complete one of our quests on idle production alone and the required amount of gold is several magnitudes more than our businesses can produce so it would take something like 80 YEARS to complete this Earn Coins quest. The other 2 quest similarly require magnitudes more coin than we can produce. Even with events and tapping non-automated businesses, it will likely take several years to make it to the next town. If we wanted to spend money to buy the resources we need, it would take several hundred, if not thousands, of dollars to keep up with the required amounts of pie to upgrade managers to automate businesses and have any hope of keeping up with quest requirements. Idling is mostly impossible at a decent production rate. There are events every week that run from 4pm Thursday to 4pm the following Tuesday. Those are the only interesting thing to do, but they are decently hard because they suffer from the same issue as the main game in that the required amounts of coin and pie increase much too rapidly for production to keep up. Automation is impossible after the first half of the towns available (usually 10-15 we think). This provides a decent amount of pie if you can get far enough, but at 1 event per week and given the difficulty and time commitment, it still means weeks and months of to get enough pie to upgrade managers enough to automate.
We loved the game to start with. And and now it is all about the money. We dont mind paying money sometimes. We started to give them money to stop ads and get a few perks. Cool. Then pay us it is pay more to get more. We like the events but they make it so you have to play nonstop to move on or pay money to move on. Starting at about 10 dollars all the way to 20 dollars. Really. And the main part of the game has slowed way down.
Cant give a good rating as we have not even been able to start. The app crashes almost immediately when we open it.
Just downloaded the game and every time we open it within a minute and a half it force closes itself. Tried using it on/off WiFi restarted our phone basically everything. Ive loved all the other games by kongregate but cant play this one its very disappointing.
On 7/29 we purchased a pack for 9.99. We did not receive it. We have tried 11 times to contact support but the page freezes up.
Bought premium with calendar rewards. Did not receive for 3 days. Tried to contact support but screen kept freezing then kicking us out of app. Happened 3 times. Cancelled premium and received refund from Apple for app not working as expected. Without premium is mind-numbingly boring. Our 12 yr olds iPad died and gave him our phone to play this game. He handed our phone back within 2 minutes and just said no. We asked him what he didnt like about it, and he said it was boring. That was WITH premium. Nuff said.
Seems like you have to pay to win if you have to level your manager up every time you move to a new town, other than that the game is fun.
Why is the new icon of a guy in a Captains Hat? Sailors dont quite fit in with the Western Theme, it sends the wrong message about the game Besides that this is 5 stars.
User feedback from Apple App Store
App Details
- Version: 1.095
- Size: 273.90 MB
- iOS: 14.0 or later
- Languages: EN, FR, DE, IT, PT, ES
- Content Advisory: Infrequent/Mild Alcohol, Tobacco, or Drug Use or References
- Developer: Kongregate, Inc.
Last updated: 6th August 2025 | Genre: Strategy, Simulation | Developer: Kongregate, Inc.