Games like Bubble Island are bubble shooters: you aim a cannon, match three or more bubbles of one color and play short rounds for a score. Well-known relatives include Puzzle Bobble (called Bust-a-Move outside Japan), Bubble Witch Saga, Frozen Bubble and the many Bubble Shooter clones, while Wooga also made Diamond Dash, Jelly Splash and Bubble Island 2. This page compares them and then points you to other classic Facebook games on FB Games.
Here is the game: open it in your browser, create a free account and see how a 60-second bubble shooter with a weekly tournament feels.
Shoot bubbles from your cannon, clear the tropical island and climb the weekly tournament with your friends.
In beta: some sounds and part of the artwork are still missing, and you may run into bugs.
Bubble Island is built around short, timed rounds. A round lasts 60 seconds, and the field is fed from above with blocks of 12 rows by 18 columns taken from 140 layouts: 40 easy ones and 100 hard ones.
On top of that it is built for competing: a weekly tournament with Week, Global and Friends leaderboards, plus friends, gifts and chat. This edition has no campaign or map, so what you compare is the short-round, high-score style.
Puzzle Bobble was released by Taito in arcades in June 1994 and is known as Bust-a-Move outside Japan. Some other well-known bubble shooters are described as clones of it.
Bubble Shooter is the generic name of the genre, commonly described as a Puzzle Bobble clone, with a version dating from 2002. Frozen Bubble is a free software clone of Puzzle Bobble. If you want the plain classic idea, those are the names to search for. Bubble Island is built around a 60-second timer, four boosts and a weekly leaderboard.
Bubble Witch Saga, by King, launched in October 2011 on Facebook and on King's own portal, and got sequels in 2014 and 2017. Bubble Island reached Facebook earlier, in 2010.
Bubble Safari, by Zynga, launched on May 9, 2012 and closed on September 30, 2015, so that one is not an option anymore. If you miss Facebook-era bubble shooters, this browser edition of Bubble Island is one way to get a round going again.
Diamond Dash launched in 2011 and won Best Social Game that year. It is a tile puzzle, so it is a Wooga game but not a bubble shooter. Jelly Splash is a match-three puzzle that came to iPhone in August 2013 and to Facebook in September 2013.
Bubble Island 2 is another Wooga game, released on October 6, 2016. We have not checked where it is available today or how it plays, so we do not compare it with this edition.
FB Games offers several other Facebook-era games as independent browser editions, each with its own account. For strategy fans there are Social Empires (build a village, train troops and defend it from trolls), Social Wars (military strategy: build a base, train troops and vehicles and face other commanders) and Empires & Allies (build a base on an island, produce resources and send troops and vehicles into battle).
For other tastes there are Zombie Lane (farming and survival: defend your house from zombies, plant crops and complete neighbor missions), CityVille (city building with houses, businesses, farm plots and rentals), Bola Social Soccer (run a soccer club: build the team, upgrade the stadium and play the matches), Wild Ones Rebirth (turn-based artillery: pick a pet and fire on destructible terrain) and The Last Stand: Dead Zone (survival: run a shelter and go out for food, water and ammunition in an invaded city).
If you want short sessions, the 60-second rounds of Bubble Island fit into a few spare minutes. If you like to compete, the weekly tournament resets every Monday at 00:00 UTC, and you can compare yourself with everyone or only with your friends. If you want company, you can add friends by username, send gifts and chat.
If you would rather have a campaign or a map to work through, this edition does not have one: it has only the weekly tournament. For that style, look at the other titles on this page and check their current state yourself.
Create a free account at bubble.fbgamesweb.com and press Play. The how-to-play guide goes through the first round, scoring and boosts in order. Bubble Island is an unofficial beta in the browser, with no Flash and nothing to install.
Three steps and you're in.
From this home page. Each game opens at its own address, with its own start screen.
A quick sign-up inside the game. Your progress is saved on the server, not in your browser.
You play in your browser, with no Flash and no downloads, on a computer and, depending on the game, on your phone too.
Bubble shooters, mainly. Puzzle Bobble (called Bust-a-Move outside Japan), Bubble Witch Saga, Bubble Shooter clones and Frozen Bubble share the aim-and-match idea of Bubble Island, where you match three or more bubbles of one color to pop them. Other Wooga games, such as Diamond Dash, are a different kind of puzzle.
They share the core idea: you aim a cannon and pop groups of three or more same-colored bubbles. Puzzle Bobble was released by Taito in arcades in June 1994. Bubble Island is built around a 60-second round, four boosts and a weekly tournament, in a free browser edition.
Bubble Shooter is the generic name of the genre, commonly described as a clone of Puzzle Bobble, with a version dating from 2002. Bubble Island is one specific game by Wooga, with 60-second rounds, four boosts, friends and a weekly leaderboard, so the first is a category and the second is a single game.
Bubble Witch Saga, by King, launched in October 2011 on Facebook, and Bubble Safari, by Zynga, ran from May 9, 2012 to September 30, 2015. Bubble Island itself reached Facebook in 2010, and a browser edition is playable at bubble.fbgamesweb.com.
Both launched on Facebook: Bubble Island in 2010 and Bubble Witch Saga, by King, in October 2011. They are separate games from different studios, so check Bubble Witch Saga's own pages to see how it plays today. Bubble Island here is a free browser edition with no Flash.
No. Bubble Safari, by Zynga, launched on May 9, 2012 and closed on September 30, 2015. If you are after a Facebook-era bubble shooter, the Bubble Island browser edition is free, needs no Flash and has a weekly tournament and an account of its own.
Diamond Dash in 2011, a tile puzzle that won Best Social Game that year, and Jelly Splash, a match-three puzzle that reached iPhone in August 2013 and Facebook in September 2013. Wooga also made Bubble Island 2, released on October 6, 2016, and the original Bubble Island.
No. Bubble Island 2 is a separate Wooga game released on October 6, 2016. The edition on FB Games is based on the original Bubble Island and runs in the browser at bubble.fbgamesweb.com. We have not checked where Bubble Island 2 is available today or how it plays.
Social Empires, Social Wars, Empires & Allies, Zombie Lane, CityVille, Bola Social Soccer, Wild Ones Rebirth and The Last Stand: Dead Zone. They are strategy, farming, city building, soccer, artillery and survival games rather than bubble shooters, and each has its own account and runs in the browser.
Yes. Bubble Island on FB Games is free, needs no Flash and nothing to install: create an account at bubble.fbgamesweb.com and press Play. It is an unofficial beta, so some sounds and part of the artwork are missing.
Brand notice: Bubble Island is an original game by Wooga. Facebook is a trademark of Meta Platforms, Inc. Puzzle Bobble, Bust-a-Move, Bubble Witch Saga, Bubble Shooter, Frozen Bubble, Bubble Safari, Diamond Dash, Jelly Splash and every other game named on this page belong to their respective owners and are mentioned only for comparison. FB Games is an independent project and is not affiliated with or endorsed by Wooga, Facebook, Meta or those owners. This is a browser edition.
Creating an account takes a minute, and you play straight from your browser.