Report updated May 7, 2026

Paint by Number: Coloring Game is an established games app that is free with in-app purchases. With a 4.8/5 rating from 99.3K reviews, it shows polarized user reception. Users particularly appreciate relaxing coloring mechanics provide a calming daily habit for long-term users, though false advertising regarding offline play and ad-free experience causes user frustration remains a common concern.

What is Paint by Number: Coloring Game?

Paint by Number is a casual coloring and puzzle game for mobile users, featuring a number-guided interface and a library of 30,000+ images.

Users hire the app for low-stakes creative relaxation, using the number-matching mechanic to create a consistent daily decompression habit.

Current Momentum

v5.1 · 1w ago

Active
  • Shipped restoration feature for subscriptions.
  • Added new image content library.

Active Nemesis

Happy Color by Numbers Game

Happy Color by Numbers Game

By X-Flow

Other Rivals

Pixel Art - Color by Number
Zen Color - Color By Number
Jigsawscapes® - Jigsaw Puzzles
CodyCross: Crossword Puzzles
Paint.ly: Color by Number

7-Day Rank Pulse 🇺🇸

Games

No ranking data

GamesPuzzleGrossing

Rating Pulse 🇺🇸

Recent User Mood

What makes this app unique?

What Does It Look Like?

What Are The Key Features?

Number-Guided ColoringStandard

Tap-to-fill interface mapping specific color palettes to numbered segments.

Premium Art LibraryDifferentiator

Access to 30,000+ curated coloring pictures.

Story-Driven ColoringDifferentiator

Narrative-based coloring progression unlocking sequential story chapters.

How much does it cost?

Freemium
  • Free tier with ad-supported gameplay
  • Premium subscription for full content access

Freemium model utilizes ad-supported play for the free tier and subscription gates for content library access.

What do users think recently?

High confidence · Latest 100 of 113 total reviews analyzed · Based on 113 reviews. Signal may be noisy.

How did the latest release land?

Overall
4.8/ 5
(99.3K)
Current version
4.8/ 5
+0.0 vs overall
(96.4K)
Main signal post-update: relaxing coloring mechanics provide a calming daily habit for long-term users.

What is the recent mood?

Mixed

Recent user voice shows a mixed sentiment. Users appreciate relaxing coloring mechanics provide a calming daily habit for long-term users, but report false advertising regarding offline play and ad-free experience causes user frustration.

What Users Love

Relaxing coloring mechanics provide a calming daily habit for long-term users

What Frustrates Users

False advertising regarding offline play and ad-free experience causes user frustration

What Users Want

Addition of simpler coloring templates to accommodate younger children

View the full user-sentiment analysis

Mood gauge, ratings & review-volume history, every praise / complaint / request, and sentiment over time.

Go deeper

What is the competitive landscape for Paint by Number: Coloring Game?

Where is it available?

Localized markets (10)

United StatesBrazilGermanySpainFranceItalyJapanSouth KoreaMexicoPortugal

How's The Games Market?

How does it evolve in the Games market?

The app maintains a high 4.83 rating, but the limited 113-review sample size suggests a fragile user base following the latest update. The high rating contrasts with specific complaints about ad-frequency, signaling that monetization is currently outpacing user tolerance.

Rank progression

188 active rankings tracked — 30-day window

The rivals identified

Nemeses(1)

This app is the dominant market leader in the exact same color-by-number niche with massive scale and consistent update velocity.

Differentiators

  • Maintains a massive library of daily updated content that creates a strong habit-forming retention loop
  • Offers a highly polished social sharing integration that turns individual coloring sessions into viral content
  • Utilizes a sophisticated subscription model that gates premium artwork while keeping the core experience accessible

Head to head

The target app must pivot toward community-driven features or exclusive artist partnerships to differentiate from the sheer content volume of this nemesis.

Contenders(2)

Zen Color - Color By Number icon

Oakever Games

4.8(378.9K)

Directly competes in the coloring niche with a strong emphasis on relaxation and mindfulness-based UX.

Differentiators

  • Positions the product as a mindfulness tool with calming soundscapes and minimalist interface design choices
  • Prioritizes a 'zen' user experience by removing aggressive ad interruptions during the core coloring flow

A major player in the coloring niche that successfully differentiates through a distinct pixel-art aesthetic.

Differentiators

  • Specializes in a distinct pixel-art aesthetic that appeals to a specific retro-gaming and nostalgia-driven audience
  • Integrates advanced tools like a camera-to-pixel-art converter that allows users to create custom coloring pages

Same space(2)

A major casual gaming peer that utilizes a thematic world-building narrative to differentiate standard word puzzles.

Differentiators

  • Wraps standard crossword mechanics in a narrative-driven world exploration theme to increase long-term player retention
  • Employs a unique 'word-reveal' mechanic that provides immediate feedback to keep players in a flow state

Shares the same casual puzzle category and high-frequency update model, though the core mechanic is jigsaw-based.

Differentiators

  • Implements a high-velocity release schedule for new puzzle packs to maintain daily active user engagement
  • Uses a sophisticated progress-tracking system that gamifies the completion of complex, multi-piece jigsaw puzzles

New entrants(1)

Paint.ly: Color by Number icon

Picfun, Inc.

4.7(146.9K)

Shows high operational velocity with 11 releases in the last six months, indicating aggressive feature iteration.

Differentiators

  • Rapidly iterating on social-first coloring features to capture younger demographics through frequent content updates
  • Testing experimental monetization models that blend rewarded video ads with low-friction micro-transactions for specific art packs

Compare Paint by Number: Coloring Game against every rival

All rivals in one side-by-side table — identity, store metrics, ratings & sentiment, and strategic intel — plus a head-to-head page for each.

Go deeper

The outtake for Paint by Number: Coloring Game

Strengths to defend, gaps to attack

Core Strengths

  • 30,000+ image library creates high content-variety retention
  • Story-driven progression creates a long-term habit loop

Critical Frictions

  • Aggressive ad-cadence drives high-frequency user churn
  • Offline-play marketing discrepancy triggers negative sentiment

Growth Levers

  • Untapped B2B partnerships for educational coloring content
  • Wearable integration for mindfulness-focused user segments

Market Threats

  • Zen Color's ad-light UX siphons relaxation-seeking users
  • Happy Color's daily content cadence outpaces current updates

What are the next best moves?

highPivot

Audit ad-frequency triggers because high-frequency complaints are the #1 churn driver → stabilize rating baseline.

Sentiment analysis identifies excessive ad frequency as a primary cause for negative ratings.

Trade-off: Pause new content library expansion — ad-retention has higher immediate impact on churn than library volume.

mediumMaintain

Correct offline-play marketing copy because false advertising claims drive 1★ reviews → reduce refund surge.

Users report frustration specifically regarding the mismatch between advertised offline features and actual connectivity requirements.

Trade-off: Same-quarter capacity available — no major lever displaced.

A counter-intuitive read

The app's #2 chart rank is a liability, as maintenance-mode at the top of the category makes it more vulnerable to a single live-ops rival than a smaller, climbing app.

Feature Gaps vs Competitors

  • Ad-light core experience (available in Zen Color but missing here)

Key Takeaways

PBN retains users through a massive content library, but aggressive ad-monetization and misleading offline-play claims erode trust, so the PM must prioritize ad-cadence auditing to prevent churn to ad-light rivals.

Where Is It Heading?

Mixed Signals

The casual coloring market is consolidating around ad-light experiences, leaving PBN exposed to rivals that prioritize user flow over immediate ad-impression volume. The PM must pivot from aggressive monetization to retention-focused UX to prevent the current sentiment drag from eroding the user base.

The discrepancy between marketed offline features and actual connectivity requirements drives churn, which compounds the rating drag already visible on Android.

The latest release added restoration features for subscriptions, showing active maintenance of the core revenue-generating infrastructure.

Disclosure: Independent intel to help mobile builders succeed.

AI-powered analysis with editorial review, built from publicly available sources. Marlvel.ai is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or sponsored by Paint by Number: Coloring Game, its developer, the app publisher, Apple, or Google Play. All trademarks, logos, and screenshots referenced remain the property of their respective owners.

What's new

The app transitioned to a freemium model and introduced narrative-based features, but now faces significant user pushback regarding ad-monetization and offline-play discrepancies.

shifted

Freemium Model Adoption

declined

New Friction Points

added

Story-Driven Coloring

added

Competitive Threats

Cite this report

Marlvel.ai. “Paint by Number: Coloring Game Intelligence Report.” Updated May 7, 2026. https://marlvel.ai/apps/paint-by-number-coloring-game

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