15 best sports games for Android

Sports games have had a hard time keeping up with other genres in terms of quality. These days, you’ll find games with a little bit of polish, but the biggest, most in-depth titles are generally free-to-play games. That is disappointing. The sports games genre still has a lot of growing to do, even in 2017. Despite a relatively weak selection, there are some decent games in the sports genre.

We tried to include as many pay-once games as we possibly could. You can also search for yourself in Google Play. Some games have great graphics. However, the free-to-play style makes the games difficult to truly enjoy. Anyway, let’s take a look at the best sports games for Android!

The best sports games for Android

FIE Swordplay

Price: Free to play

FIE Swordplay is one of the surprisingly popular sports games. This one involves fencing. You pick a weapon, fine-tune your gear, and fight opponents. The game features real fencing techniques, good-looking graphics, easy controls, online PvP, a story mode, and official support from the International Fencing Federation. That makes it a natural choice for this list. Fencing isn’t the most popular sport, but this is definitely a great sports game.

FIFA Soccer

Price: Free to play

FIFA Soccer is the latest game in the FIFA franchise. It’s also one of the most popular sports games. It features full rosters of over 550 real teams. That includes past and present stars. The game also include some of the best graphics in a mobile game that we’ve seen. It is an EA game. Thus, you should prepare for all of the free-to-play stuff. Don’t expect a completely perfect game, but it is definitely above average. Plus, it gets yearly refreshes with things like roster updates and occasionally even some mechanic changes.

Grand Mountain Adventure

Price: Free / $5.49

Grand Mountain Adventure is a surprisingly good-looking skiing game. Players ski around an open world with very good graphics, easy controls, and plenty of stuff to do. You avoid various obstacles and try to keep from wiping out. The game includes five mountains to explore, various challenges, and even an online leaderboard for speed runs and flawless runs. It’s also playable offline, has its own Discord server, and includes no free-to-play game mechanics. It’s just a gorgeous game with some good skiing. Those who enjoy winter sports should definitely check out this one. Plus, it’s free to play if you use Google Play Pass.

Madden NFL 22 Mobile Football

Price: Free to play

Madden NFL Football is the most popular football game on mobile. It features decent graphics, simple gameplay, up-to-date rosters, and more. The game also has weekly tournaments. Unfortunately, this is mostly a simulation game. You take over a team and add players to the roster. Players level up and improve in various ways. It’s yet another EA Sports free-to-play game. Unfortunately, in this space, EA simply pays more attention than other big-name developers. The free-to-play elements are very heavy. However, the game does get yearly refreshes and some feature updates.

MLB 9 Innings 22

Price: Free to play

MLB discontinued its RBI Baseball franchise, leaving third parties to cover baseball games on mobile. MLB 9 Innings is about as good as it gets, even if it’s just okay. The game includes roughly 2,000 MLB players, all 30 MLB ballparks, and plenty of animations to cover everybody’s quirky throwing and batting stances. The game is a gacha-style game. You obtain baseball players to build a team and play that team against opponents. You can progress more quickly if you spend real money, but progression is tolerable without real money.

NBA Jam

Price: $4.99

NBA Jam is what it looks like when EA Sports makes a good game for once. This is an arcade basketball game. Players go at it two versus two. The gameplay includes relaxed rules, optional online or local multiplayer, hardware controller support, and even support for Android TV. It’s a port of the arcade game from the 1990s. However, it’s still better than all but a few sports games. It’s $4.99 upfront with no ads or additional in-app purchases. This is easily the best basketball game on mobile and definitely among the best sports games.

NBA Live Mobile

Price: Free to play

NBA Live Mobile is actually a fairly decent basketball game. It has that popular mix of simulation and an actual sports game. Players construct teams and then play it out against one another. This one has simple controls, and decent graphics. The game lets you build your own team. It also lets you play with that team on the court. It is predominately online PvP. There are also a few decent game modes. It’s a free-to-play game and a rather aggressive one. That should be expected with EA games. This is a more realistic game than NBA Jam. However, we like the overall experience with NBA Jam a little more. You can also try NBA 2K18. It’s a slightly more premium basketball experience from 2K Games.

OK Golf

Price: $2.99

OK Golf is one of the newer sports games. This is an ode to the arcade golf games of the past. You drag back and release to shoot the ball. It operates on a simple perspective. There are no clubs to choose from or things to tinker with. The game is just a nice relaxing game of golf. It comes with a few courses, decent graphics, and some secret stuff to find on your own. The game reminds us of those old arcade golf games you found in restaurants and bars. It’s a pay-once game with no additional ads or in-app purchases. It’s also free if you use Google Play Pass.

PES 2021

Price: Free to play

PES 2019 is a soccer game very much like FIFA. It gets yearly roster updates and it actually looks pretty good. It features a lot of the same gameplay elements. You craft a team from existing players, actually play soccer, and build your dynasty from there. It has a bunch of real players from a bunch of real teams as well. That is always a plus and the game has teams from all over the world. The controls are simple and the graphics are decent. Additionally, it’s just a tad less aggressive on its free-to-play offerings than FIFA. You can play either one. They’re both decent sports games. This one also gets yearly refreshes for things like rosters, new players, and other such things.

Rapala Fishing

Price: Free to play

Rapala Fishing is one of a few reasonably competent fishing games. We chose this one because it’s a little less aggressive with its free-to-play strategy than its competitors. The game features various fishing locations, easy controls, and daily tournaments. The game boasts no energy bar. That means you can play all day if you want to. We appreciated that.

Otherwise, the graphics are decent and there isn’t much to complain about. The game gets boring over time, but what game doesn’t. FishingStrike from Netmarble is a newer fishing game from 2018 that is also surprisingly good. In fact, it may overtake Rapala on this list eventually.

Skateboard Party and Snowboard Party

Price: Free to play (usually)

Maple Media is yet another developer on Google Play with decent sports games. These developers focus more on extreme sports like snowboarding, skateboarding, and they even have a hockey fighting game. Skateboard Party and Snowboard Party are Maple Media’s marquee franchises. Skateboard Party plays fairly close to how Tony Hawk did on old consoles. There are a variety of tricks, a create-a-skater mode, and a story mode to play through. The latest in the series, Skateboard Party 3, also includes controller support and customizable controls. Snowboard Party is much the same except it is snowboards instead of skateboards. We’re also big fans of Mike V: Skateboard Party and Tony Hawk’s Skate Jam.

Stick Sports games

Price: Free / Varies

Stick Sports is a developer on Google Play. They make some decent and niche sports games. Their collection includes games for cricket, tennis, and soccer. They don’t have the most impressive graphics. However, they are easy to play, kill time effectively, and they’re generally fun. They are all free to play games as far as we can tell. Each game has its own set of features and mechanics, but they all share a common feel about them. They’re free to download at least.

True Skate

Price: $1.99 with in-app purchases

True Skate is one of the most popular skateboarding games. It uses your fingers to control the board. Thus, you swipe your fingers around to do various tricks. The graphics are decent and the controls are really fun. Some other game features include slow motion and rewind functions, replays, and various challenges. It’s not a free-to-play game. However, the DLC strategy is fairly aggressive. The base game comes with one skate park. The in-app purchases unlock other parks, missions, customizations, and other stuff. Touchgrind 2 is another decent game in this genre. Nyjah Huston: Skate Life is another newer entrant into skateboarding games.

World of Tennis: Roaring ’20s

Price: Free to play

World of Tennis: Roaring ’20s is a surprisingly popular tennis game. It’s also fairly new. You start your career as a new tennis player. There is a career mode as well as an online multiplayer mode. Players can improve their player’s stats, train the AI to play like them, and unlock a ton of customizations. It’s all wrapped up in a charming 1920’s aesthetic. Of course, you do get the occasional events and such to keep the game interesting over time. There are some balancing issues and the occasional game play bug that frustrates players. However, it is otherwise a good experience.

Yahoo Fantasy Sports

Price: Free

Yahoo Fantasy Sports isn’t a game like you would generally see. However, it is, at its core, a tabletop simulator for sports fans. You and others join leagues for various sports, draft a lineup, and duke it out every week to see who’s team is the best. Yahoo Fantasy Sports is better than most in this space. It has baseball, football, basketball, and hockey. There are also the Daily Fantasy and Tourney Pick’em modes if you want to try something different. There are other fantasy sports app here if you want to try other options.

If we missed any of the best sports games for Android, tell us about them in the comments. You can also click here to check out our latest Android app and game lists.