Stack the States®
Education
Ratings
Age
4+
Category
Education
Languages
English
Wed Sep 25 2024
* Updated Minnesota flag
Stack the States makes learning about the 50 states fun! As you learn state capitals, shapes, geographic locations, flags, and more, you can actually touch, move, and drop the animated states anywhere on the screen. Carefully build a stack of states that reaches the checkered line to win each level.
Dinsun Expert Review
Our Expert Score
Stack the States is quite simply one of the best educational games ever made. It succeeds because it uses a physics-based 'reward' system that makes kids actually want to learn geography. By answering questions about capitals, shapes, and borders correctly, you earn a state that you can then drop onto a platform. The goal is to build a tower high enough to reach the line.
The genius is in how the states are shaped realistically; trying to balance a narrow Hawaii on top of a bulky Texas is a fun challenge in itself. It turns 'dry' facts into a tactile puzzle. With unlockable mini-games and multiple user profiles, it’s a robust package that provides hours of value. It’s a rare game that parents will be happy to see their kids playing for hours on end.
Features
Hundreds of unique questions
Physics-based stacking gameplay
Interactive map of the USA
Multiple player profiles
Tips & Walkthrough
First, answer a question about a state correctly. Once you do, you get that state! Drop it onto the platform. The goal is to stack them high enough to reach the goal line without the pile falling over.
Gameplays
As you earn more states, you'll unlock four unique mini-games: Map It, Pile Up, Puzzler, and Capital Drop, each testing your knowledge in different ways.
Screenshot
Q&A
While designed for students, many adults find it a great way to brush up on their US geography.
Ratings & Reviews
Fun, quick, educational
Sun Sep 11 2016 0072012There are absolutely no advertisements or pop-ups in this app. I play it on i-phone and iPad. There are several games in Stack The States, but you cannot play them all immediately. You have to win enough states to advance to a new game, so success relies on some prior knowledge. This is not going to teach kids to identify the states if they are clueless to begin with, but it will reinforce what they know, and add to their sense of confidence or self-efficacy. Playing the Stacking game is educational because you have to identify the state given 4 choices, but it's also funny. I love watching the states' facial expressions — the look in their eyes — as the stack wobbles or falls. My only quibble is that the state flags are too small to read clearly. I wish they would expand quite a bit larger when I tap it. There is another game where you have to place the states on a map as fast as possible, but with 3 strikes you're out. Good fun. Works better on iPad than iPhone, due to size. The other games in the app are okay, too, but stacking and mapping are my favorites.
Worth the Money but...
Fri Aug 09 2019 Blank789I downloaded stack the states when I was only 9. In just 2 or so weeks of obsessively playing it, I knew so much more about the states than I did before and had collected over 120 states! I do wish that the updates were placed on the same app, because I wouldn’t pay anything for the second version now that I know quite a bit about the states, but still like the new elevation maps and mini games the second version provides. Also, I wish that you could transfer the app between two devices. I got stack the countries on my Samsung Galaxy S9 phone and want to transfer it to my iPad without having to buy it again. I also got pretty far in the app (received over 120 countries) and don’t want to start over. Thank you for reading this review, I really love the app!
God sent this to us
Sun May 15 2022 xX_StateStacker_XxThis game is my childhood. I love this game so much that I got all three of the bunch! Sure, the later eterations of the game didn’t have as many mini games other than stacking, but I love just making it sound like the states are interacting! There are almost endless possibilities for this game! If there was something I would like to add, it would be a story mode with 50 levels trying to rescue states and every 10 levels a boss was blocking a minigame, and you had to answer questions and get to the finish line before the boss to win! Then the final boss would be blocking your avatar, and you had to do every single minigame, along with the speed stack, to save him! The developers don’t have to add this, but a future game of yours could be based around this. But hey, it’s already really fun how it is. That’s all from me!
Stack the States
Thu Apr 28 2022 DiAmoNdBuLl66This educational game has been part of my school for many, many years. And I still play it to this day. When I first got it, I couldn’t answer any of the questions except for a few that were obvious for me. I regretted getting it and thought I would never be good as it. I became better and better at it and learned everything about the states. That’s the point, right? This game is fun to play and doesn’t really feel like school. The interactive map and flash cards can teach as well, but I pick up information faster by playing the game. There should be a hard mode for stacking mode where questions are harder and there’s a time limit for questions for more experienced players. But that’s about all I want from this. Without this game, I would have known NOTHING about geography.
Helpful, no adds, best game I ever downloaded!
Tue Jul 23 2024 Carry berryThis app has no adds. It does not require Wi-Fi. I have played so much, I have played all mini games on hard, beating my big sister, and got all the states on 2 accounts. The game is to answer questions about states. Duh. So, I love it, because i was never taught much about states. This game reinforced my knowledge! Now I could tell every state and its capital. I swear, my childhood was playing this game! The map it game is my favorite! I started out, only identifying the locations of a couple states, then quickly only got the top scores, by identifying them all! I highly recommend downloading this app! By the way, if you want to, if you move a state you’re about to drop on top of a state you’ve already placed, sometimes they merge (developers: don’t get rid of this feature!).
Amazing app, but...
Mon Nov 09 2020 SprawkI love this app so much that I actually posted about it on Facebook and encouraged friends to get it too. I got it for my kids but I play too. I do have one complaint... when playing the hard level of puzzler, Rhode Island is placed on the far left edge of my screen and I find it impossible to grab and drag. This is on an iPhone 11. If it were on the right side, I could at least put the rest together and then hover them over it to pick it up, but it’s too far on the left. It often takes me 20+ seconds to keep stabbing my finger at it to get enough contact to move it. I would hope it could be corrected, but with the last update being four years ago, I’m not holding my breath...
Great geography app
Mon Oct 18 2021 DAEaronThis app is fun, has NO adds and is very educational. My son enjoys playing this game. It has really helped him improve his geography knowledge. It’s great for teaching names of states and capitals, shape of state, postal abbreviation, famous landmarks and more. I use it as a supplement to our homeschool geography course. It’s fast and the kids really enjoy it. I downloaded it at least two years ago and my son still plays it and my daughter is getting old enough to start. Everyone is happy when it is on the schedule for the day. It starts off simple and progressively gets harder so they continue to learn. Hope you appreciate this app as much as we do!
My children love this game!
Sun Jan 23 2022 Lena KryzhThey are learning while having fun, and they is the most important thing to me as a mom. I look over and they are smiling and learning the right way. There are absolutely no ads, which lets them focus on what they are currently doing. I have actually tried playing it and it has a variety of questions, levels, and different learning games! They can learn where the states are on the map, their names, flags, abbreviations, capitals, and many more. There are no glitches whatsoever so they are always having fun! All in all I totally recommend this game!