A cribbage app without ads for iPhone: what to look for

Card Table, our cribbage and gin rummy game, has no ads: not between hands, not at the bottom of the board, not as a video to earn something. That’s the short answer if you’re looking for one. The rest of this page is how to check any cribbage app before you install it, since many players come to it after giving up on one that showed a video every few hands.

How do you know whether a cribbage app has ads?

The App Store doesn’t say. Google Play puts “Contains ads” under an app’s name; Apple has no such label. So look in two places on the app’s App Store page:

1. The description. Apps without ads say so, because it’s what players ask for. An app that never mentions ads in its description usually has them.
2. App Privacy, further down the page. If it shows Data Used to Track You, or lists third-party advertising as a reason for collecting data, an advertising network is built into the app. An app with no advertising has no reason to track you across other companies’ apps.

The second check can’t prove an app is ad-free, but it rarely misses one. Card Table’s App Privacy section says Data Not Collected.

Then look at what a purchase does. “Remove ads” as a purchase means the free version has them. In Card Table there is nothing to remove: the purchases unlock the Medium and Hard computers, more decks and cloths, and two more pegging boards, each paid once.

How do you know the computer plays fair?

This is the other complaint cribbage players have, usually after the computer gets a 24 hand twice in a row. Inside most apps you can’t check either way.

Card Table is built so you can. The computer sees only its own cards and what has been played on the count, never your hand or the rest of the deck. At the show, both hands and the crib are laid out and counted line by line: fifteens, pairs, runs, flushes and nobs. If a deal looks too good, Replay this deal plays the same shuffle again, and you can see whether it was the cards or the play. If the counting itself is the part you want to get quicker at, how to count a cribbage hand works through hands of 8, 23 and 29.

What else matters in a cribbage app?

• Offline, with no account. Card Table needs no sign-in and plays without a connection. Your wins and hands are kept on the phone.
• A computer you can grow into. Easy is a relaxed opponent while you learn; Medium and Hard weigh the crib and play the count with care. The free download has Easy and one whole game against each of the others in each game, so you can try them before buying.
• Two players, one phone. Pass it between turns; a cover screen hides each hand until the other player is ready.
• No timers. Take as long as you like over a discard.

Card Table also plays Gin Rummy to 100; how to play gin rummy covers the rules. It’s on the App Store for iPhone and iPad, not on Android. See Card Table or get it on the App Store.