Last updated on January 17th, 2026 at 10:17 am
Plant Tycoon ® – Entertainment Game Review
Plant Tycoon ® is a Entertainment/Simulation/Family game from LDW Software, LLC, first launched in 2nd December 2010.
It’s rated 4+ and currently has 288+ ratings on the App Store.
What Makes Plant Tycoon ® Stand Out
Plant Tycoon® is a gardening sim game where you nurture plants and experiment with increasingly rare and valuable species. The object is to breed and cross breed plants until you find the 6 Magic Plants of Isola and solve the genetic puzzle. You start with limited cash, a handful of seeds, some soil and water. Grow plants, organize and harvest seeds, monitor your plants' health, age and maturity, and protect your plants from dehydration and infestations. Sell some of your creations to fund your research, buy better supplies to use in your Nursery, and purchase ornaments to customize your virtual garden. This is the same best-selling Mac and Windows game, now in a universal app for iPad, iPhone and iPod touch, so you can take your greenhouse full of plants with you wherever you go!
More about Plant Tycoon
- There are many approaches to solving the game, with over 500 different species of plants to discover.
- Inhabited by a wide variety of collectible insects to catch and display.
- There are dozens of different seeds to experiment with.
- Gorgeous artwork with detailed, dynamically-generated plants.
- You can prune your plants to customize the look of your creations.
- It's a genetic puzzle: discover which combinations will create the 6 Magic Plants.
- It's a simulation game: grow virtual plants in a persistent world.
- It’s a virtual pet: care for your plants in your own virtual greenhouse.
- It’s a tycoon game: test your business skills and horticultural skills at the same time!
- The built-in snapshot feature allows you to capture photos of your favorite plants in various display settings.
- Experience real-time game play, with new surprises every time you turn on the game!
Visit our Official Plant Tycoon site at www.PlantTycoon.com for instructions, strategy guides, and much more!
This Entertainment game offers engaging gameplay and regular updates for mobile players.
Player Feedback
As a newer release, Plant Tycoon ® is building its player community. Early feedback suggests .
Recent Updates & Development
Latest Update: 19th September 2017
Recent improvements include:
This app has been updated by Apple to display the Apple Watch app icon.
Hello fellow tycoons!
We've updated one of our classic titles to support the latest devices and iOS versions! With nearly a million downloads since we've launched Plant Tycoon, we want to make sure that you can continue playing your favorite apps on the newest devices. Cross-breed your discoveries, nurture your greenhouse, and unlock the Magic Plants of Isola!
Revisit the original Plant Tycoon today to solve this unique virtual garden, right in your pocket!
Download & Availability
Plant Tycoon ® is available through the official App Store for iOS devices.
Get Plant Tycoon ® 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:
Recently upgraded our iPad & we had a lot of plants / seeds / money / tokens & all that great stuff. How can we restore our previous game on our new iPad ? We dont have the old one to play on it anymore. Please help meee.
We really love playing this game. Its relaxing and etc. A few updates would be nice tho. Please do not get rid of this game, BOOOOOOSTING GAME.
No upgrades to anything, same basic game, now with added microtransactions. Gave it 5 stars so you will see it.
No big gimmick just good quiete short gameplay.
We should be able to see all the plants we have collected that would be a pretty awesome feature to add love the graphics its so calming.
Our family and we just got back into this game along with Fish Tycoon 2. Will there ever be a Plant Tycoon 2? Its been years and would be nice especially with HD quality.
Our first time playing this game was about 10 years ago and now here we are playing this again. We really love Plant Tycoon but it is quite stressful managing the seeds due to limited slot. It would be amazing if the developer can update the seed box up to 529 slots? The 120 slots cannot fit all variety of the plant. Please update it.
We love this game! We played it when we were a kid, and we're thankful that it's still available to play in its original form. We understand the aversion to in-app purchases, but we were able to get everything we needed with the $5 option. We're perfectly happy to give them a little money for making a great ad-free game.
This is one cool game the is time consuming we think this is a awesome game.
Honestly just got it for the nostalgia, it makes us really really happy? Just a happy game we love collecting bugs and clipping the dead leaves n stuff.
We love this game. Minus the plant bucks. Really you only have to spend one dollar because need the good soil to get ahead and don't need the other stuff. Now a days you have to buy something to get further. But we get they have to make money too. Other then that we LOVE this game our grandma loves it as well. We told her about it years ago and she was hooked!!! Ive played this since we were a child. Gives us the child like feels again.
When we saw this in the app store we screamed. This game was our absolute favorite as a kid, but we didn't remember much of anything about the gameplay. It's challenging, peaceful, and rewarding even still. We have such a good time watching and waiting for bugs to appear. Fantastic game, thank you for adding it to the app store.
Dont listen to the bad reviews its a great, lets give it 5 stars and support the game.
We remember playing this game when we were younger. We still enjoy playing it! We just wish they would update it or make a plant tycoon 2.
We know majority of the bad reviews here are about the plant bucks, which cost real money, but heres perspective: most supplies in the game cost 5 plant bucks or less. There arent that many supplies in the game to purchase to experience the full game. $5 purchases 60 plant bucks. We were able to buy every piece of equipment and still have some bucks left over. The PC game, which people are comparing the mobile game to, costs about $10. In the end, the mobile game is cheaper to play the full game. And, if you really want to play 100% free, most features are still available. The bad reviews here are simply people whining about the company needing to make money somehow, and, trust us, its not expensive.
One of the best plant game This game is goood.
We love playing this game because of the mystery behind it. You need to find the 7 magic plants of the land of Isola. Its very challenging to win this game if you plan to play for free. In order to have good or the bestsoil for the plants you would need to pay actual cash for bucks that are used in the game. Suggestions to the developers: Make a plant tycoon lite, so that players can understand what the game is all about. Then make an option for this game to be purchased, and turn in-game bucks into coins so that players dont need to re-purchase bucks every time they want to restart the game. (BTW, we love that feature) Please consider making a plant tycoon 2 (similar to what you did to fish tycoon) Also have you considered doing bird tycoon? Players need to find the seven magic birds of Isola to restore harmony in the sky of Isola. We would be one of you first purchasers of the game. ( of course after we play the lite version, so we know what the game is all about, we like to research before we make a commitment. Lol).
We remember this. It started as a game to pass the time. We were very small with not much knowledge of life. It quickly became a beautiful thing for us to watch life become beautiful from just a small seed. Now, its a memory of how things can become bigger and blossom from the seeds that we plant. Now, Im 21 and we are working and everything may seem different sometimes. But really, its just the same. Just newly blossomed. There are parts of life where it seems like everything is deaf, but then, the next minute, you are left with a garden of life. Never forget to plant those seeds of hope. Water your life with love. Plant them in a strong foundation built of kindness and innocence. -God promises to reward you.
Love the game; had this for years.
4 stars because you still have to buy plant bucks with real money. The PC version you Don't Have to spend money for upgrades. Hope that changes.
Im so glad we found this game again! It was our favorite when we were a kid, we just wish we could catalog all of the plants Ive grown. It would add a little more to game aside from just finding the magic 6.
We love the game so much that Ive spent money on it to help us. We had to reset our phone and have to start all over. We feel like our money was wasted.
Why is everyone complaining about the purchases.
We Need plant bucks but it cost money but we still Love tag game tho.
We like this game, havent played it since we were a little kid until we randomly found it on here some days ago. Is there any other way to get plant bucks without having to purchase them with actual money? We dont remember it being that way, but it has been a while since we played.
We 100% agree, with the person that titles their review A Love/Hate thing. We played this as a kid, on pc. It is the exact same game, but they honeypot you, by getting you to pay real money. Instead of earning cash in game: seed trays, soil, and seeds are required to buy. Id also rather pay a small fee (than to pay real dollars) for individual supplies. This game is nostalgic, we love it, but its disappointing at the same time.
As stated in the title, we used to play the Mac version of this game and we loved it. When we had all the plants and bugs we would start over and play again. This current iteration of the game with In-app purchases doesnt make a lot of sense. Everything level 3 and up requires bucks (real world money) rather than coins to purchase. A significant component of the game is going to the nursery to sell your plants (for coins only). In the old version, discovering the magic plants was super helpful because it helped you make money that you could use to purchase useful items. In this version, by the time you are able to breed those plants, you have already purchased everything that is available for coins, other than fertilizer and plant food. That makes discovering the magic plants anti-climactic. Similarly, completing the bug collection provides you with a coin reward that is another useless drop in the bucket. What is the point of amassing more coins when there is nothing worthwhile to spend them on? As far as purchasing bucks with real money, we actually dont mind itas long as we know what Im getting. Breeding tier 4 plants requires spending bucks on seeds or mutation liquid. This is a gamble (like loot boxes) because it is random whether you will get something you need, or something you already have. We enjoyed playing the game, but we wont go back and start again like we used to because it would require making the same purchases again. We wish more thought had gone into adapting the game for mobile even if means charging for the game.
We love this game! We had it on our computer yrs ago. It desperately needs an update. More modern characters. Make it so the plants sell what they are worth, some require $100's of $ to keep alive but the will only sell for $15 at the most.
We started out playing this game on PC. It is without a doubt one of our favorites. But we have a dislike, on the PC game you could have several nurseries going at one time. The app doesn't allow that. We really wish it did.
Ive always loved this game but you guys have known forever that there needs to be more seed storage. It makes us quit playing every time.
We love this game….but when we go to buy the .99 cent bucks we put everything in and we dont have our bucks bc it says we purchased it.
We were going to be upset that we we had to buy plant bucks to complete the game, but we have now realized that we cant even buy plant bucks.
We rated it a 3 because you need plant bucks which cost real money. You can beat it without the gold soil and using only one plant box the tick is having the cheats near you. Only have the fourpetal maple till you get all the blue tools. After, you can breed the rose fern and the venomous grass. Use those till have everything but the gold soil. Have 2-3 thousand coins before breeding to get the rare magic plants. You will need to check on the plants every 10-20 minutes and put the rescue plant formula on them, so they dont die. Yes much of the money earned at this point would go to the formula. To keep a steady supply of money, only plant 1-2 of the rare magic plants. Plant lots of venomous grass too.
We are really disappointed that you HAVE to spend money to make it through the game. Id rather watch ads than pay for plant bucks.
Let us start this review by saying we LOVE THIS GAME. We played it on pc as a child and was delighted to find an app now, and have found it to be extremely relaxing and helps calm our anxiety. Way better than any gardening app made specifically for that purpose. Now, the bad part is that you will have to spend 5 plant bucks (the in game real money currency) to complete the game. You have to buy the top tier soil if you want to win the game by breeding ultra rare plants, and there is no way to occasionally win one or two of the real money currency, like other games. This is very frustrating because there should be a way to win the game without spending money if the game is advertised as free. We dont have a problem buying plant bucks to speed along the game or buy extras, like the other plant bucks items, but the soil is over the line annoying. In addition, we wish there was a plant index or something where we could look at all the plants we have collected and check them off!! Would love that.
Fun game, but you cant win without plant bucks that you purchase with real $they should just offer a free game with ads or be honest and tell people it costs money or charge up front. You could win the old pc game by earning bucks. We kept racking up coins on this app, but no way to earn bucks without buying them. Lame.
Its a fun game, but becomes overwhelming because there doesnt seem to be a way to keep track of what youve done. If we just havent found that feature, let us know, but as it is, theres no way to know which plants youve crossbred unless you make an excel spreadsheet. Hahaha. This makes it all feel scattered.
Okay so we have not gotten very far but from what we have read and seen this is a pretty crappy game. You have to pay to finish the game apparently? We dont care much because our goal is not to finish the game its just to breed plants and see what we can find. The reason we gave it 3 stars is because of the dang nursery. When you are selling your plants you have to be in the nursery for sometimes 15-30 minutes and you cant do anything in the nursery! Its just sitting there making sure your phone stays on. We would not spend that kind of time waiting for one thing to happen for anything, deleting the game today.
We loved this game on the PC years ago and was super excited that it was available for iPad. But this is not a free game. You cant event get the second seed tray without paying real money, and you cant get very far in the game at all with space for only 8 seeds. Id so much rather just pay up front and be able to really play the game than get a free game that we have to repeatedly dump money into just to continue playing.
This game is full of people shopping the nursery and ever single one is pale or dark beige. Seems pretty messed up. We dont like the plant buck system either, its way overpriced and kinda prohibits certain game progress.
We hate how you have to buy plant bucks. We need plant bucks for some important stuff. If you didnt have to buy plant bucks with real money then the game would be a lot better.
You guys should either make it easier to sell the plants for reasonable prices or make the infestations less often. Ive lost so many plants and cant make enough coins to buy the spray. So please change one or the other or maybe both.
We loved Fish Tycoon and the other games surrounding the island of Isola. This one falls super short though. Thought it would be really fun to mix up plants and find the magic ones but there isnt enough information on each screen to do this. You get the plant names on the main screen but not in the seed tray. Nor do they show you the names so you know which plants made a particular seed – just the images. So unless youre writing down or remembering what the seeds and plants all look like theres no way to keep it all straight! The main and seed screens need to show the image, the plant names, and what youve crossed to make the seed. All at the same time. OH and no way to earn bucks! You must buy them. So the only way to get a lot of the supplies and extras is to pay money. Disappointing.
We played this game back when it was available on pocket pc. So you can imagine how excited we were to discover this game from our childhood. It plays great and brings us back but we dont think we can play it any longer. Some plants wont last long enough to do anything with even with the 2nd tier (of 3) soil. The only way to remedy this is either buy loads of health restoratives or use real money to buy the top soil. Im not sure if building up a massive amount of money and going the health route is the intended design. And there isnt a way to earn the in game currency to buy the top tier soil. So then it appears as if it is a pay to play game. Which is fine, its free. But it really let us down to find this out after downloading it and expecting to be able to progress through the game.
This game was great until it restarted FROM THE BEGINNING without us asking it to. We lost money because we had purchased bucks, we lost all our supply upgrades, collections, seeds and our progress. This is ridiculous and if we could give zero stars, we would. Its just not okay.
We played this game several years ago on PC and decided to get the app for iPad. We played one day and decided to delete it. In app purchases are ridiculous. Not fun like it used to be.
You cant actually complete the game without spending real money. There's a certain point where all your plants will die if you don't buy the special soil which costs real money. Not cool.
Im so sorry to say this but by the time we found out we need real money to win the game, we deleted it. Because we were so shocked to see the real important items needed to be paid. We mean the decorations and stuffs are okay without being bought. But the soil? It is so sad when this game played as a favorite role in our childhood and we spent almost everyday as a kid to see these beautiful plants grow. The background music is such a nostalgia. We were so happy when we found this on app store because our PC was gone, the one we used to play this game when we were a kid. The developers should put ads instead. How terrible.
We are SO upset with this game, Ive been playing for a few days now and even bought the second seed box yesterday. Everything was great and we were progressing well. Stopped our time last night so our plants wouldnt die while we slept and went to bed. This morning we wake up, turn our time back on, click on play, and it completely started us over!!!! For no reason!! We are so upset over this! We just spent money on the game and put all that time into what we had and then just POOF! Gone! It started us over.
Wish this game was more like fish tycoon because you can finish it without spending money, but you cant breed 4th tier plants, only buy them. Wouldnt recommend if you want to actually finish a game.
User feedback from Apple App Store
App Details
- Version: 1.1.4
- Size: 47.11 MB
- iOS: 8.0 or later
- Languages: EN
- Content Advisory:
- Developer: LDW Software, LLC
Last updated: 19th September 2017 | Genre: Entertainment, Simulation | Developer: LDW Software, LLC