iBridgePlus Reviews

A comprehensive, well designed, computer bridge game with amazing customer support (real answers from people). As computer bridge games go, this is an exemplar program and kudos to the design team that keeps improving and polishing what was already a solid product. Critical comments about its failure to replicate “real” human play or about the complexity of its settings, miss the beauty of this program: its appeal and benefit to any bridge player. With minimal effort, It can be played by an absolute beginner and there is a wealth of beginner support and educational material within the program. Alternatively, there are extensive settings that can be used to personalize the game to individual preferences of bidding systems, signals, and types of hands; as well as tools for learning or defending against more unusual bidding systems. Add to this is a variety of features that allow players to measure their growth in performance at any skill level and you’ve got an awesome bridge program in all respects and the best value for the money of any Apple App I have ever purchased.

I am not an expert bridge player and this is the only computer tool I have used for bridge. But I have played with humans a lot. From my experience iBridgePlus does a good job 80 percent of the time in making the final call after multiple bids. I test iBridgePlus by asking for hint and 80 percent of the time it will make the logical suggestions. That is impressive in my mind but I would like it to improve more. The more major flaw (it seems) is that the dummy players refuse to get trapped. Often. It seems that the dummy players knwo exactly what cards held by each party. A lot of it is acceptable and understandable, since the initial bid is supposed to give a sense of card distribution. But there are cases when it seem to know a little too much about hands that should be unknown. If you could review that aspect and improve that will be highly appreciated.

Let me amplify: if you want to become a decent bridge player, avoid iBridgePlus. You will end up in bad habits. You will end up avoiding good no trump contracts because iBridgePlus makes you believe that weird defensive distributions are inevitable. You will become conservative in your bidding because you can't rely on your partner to bid according to the system you have selected, but you can depend on the defenders to play as if the hand was double dummy. And if you foolishly purchase their "assist" and even more foolishly follow the advice it gives, you will learn to bid incorrectly. Finally, you will learn to dread the game of bridge, rather than enjoying it.
Original review (2 stars): Look, I play the game. I get it, sometimes the distribution is screwy. But the number of 7, 8, or even 9 card suits you see in these hands (both yours and opponents') just have no basis in statistical reality. The "percentage" play is almost always the losing play; meanwhile, the opponents play the hand as if it were double dummy, eschewing the percentage play for the one that ends up working. I do not find this to be a useful tool to practice real, randomly dealt bridge hands (whether rubber or duplicate).

After years of Bridge Baron, it is so nice to finally play bridge and learn when I make an error, and more, to learn why another play makes better sense. I got so frustrated with Bridge Baron because of errors in bidding by dummy. Also, there were times the opener's suggested bid was absurd. I like the corrections and the choice of whether to play as suggested or as you originally wished. The customer support is amazing with two almost instant responses to issues of purchase, not the ap. Nice, polite follow up emails and very clear instructions on purchase issues for two devices. I’ve only had the ap a short time, but feel I could return to the bridge table with greater confidence. Worth every cent. Tremendous preparation for explaining the ap. Extremely well done and quite enjoyable.

Overall this is a great app. There are some issues with it on my iPhone 11 pro, but it is very useable since one of the iOS updates. It still is stuck in portrait mode. But this seems to be an iOS 13 issue. When I first tried to provide app feedback from iBridgePlus Store, I was unsuccessful.

Updating my review, I’m much happier with iBridgePlus since either the last iOS update or iBridgePlus update. The developer replied to my review with a note that they tried to show it was an issue with iOS 13. I’m sure it was, but my attempt to provide feedback about iBridgePlus failed. I did see later that there was a note regarding the issue.

Overall, this is a great bridge game and the developers have fixed the game in a timely fashion.

Edit: Got a quick response by email with acknowledgement of bug and temporary workaround. Thanks! Revised to 4 stars. Original review: After first time tapping a game in “my results” under completed games in duplicate, I can never get game results again by tapping again. “Tap to view” works only the very first time I tap. Killing and restarting iBridgePlus does not fix the issue. I tap everywhere, but nothing happens. I was going to buy a lifetime subscription before this happened. This needs to be fixed first.
iPad running iOS 14.2 - this app Version 5.5.5.2 - [0:24 ]

I’ve had this game on my iPhone a long, long time.
Have been a No ice Bridge player just as long.
Love this game software, and given I have little opportunity these days to play with 3 others, I play against this software—and have learned a lot—and have also bid different suits and a greater number of tricks to make a different contract than the software has recommended.
Usually, bower, the software “knows best”, and I get outsmarted from time to time. A great teacher and friend with whom to play Bridge. Thanks for offering it…am quite addicted to it every day.

I am a beginner Bridge player and find iBridgePlus not just fun, but helpful in learning more about bidding and play of the hand. It has an optional “hint” feature when you are stumped and offers brief tips. It offers options to set your level of expertise and conventions you use. I have tried other Bridge apps and find this one has the best interface for me and its performance is very fast. Additionally, I have reached to customer service and have get a reply within 24 hours. If find this service a bonus.

Technically, iBridgePlus is well constructed and free play was FUN. Only 9 hands were offered so I bought into the basic package.

My overwhelming sense is the play is VERY much geared to paying more money.

First, the ability to adjust E/W or N/S conventions ‘expired’ 🙄 unless I pay more.

Now I can honestly say that the game is biased against the player in a verifiably lop sided manner. I wonder if that would change if I upgrade. Hand after hand either is anemic- 0-5 points and no bidding except by the computer.. otherwise its hands with no bids (why not program that out.. how dumb), 13-15 point hands with outlandish perfect distribution for the computer to set, or lopsided distributions designed for the computer to set.

Don’t get me wrong, in an average rubber my side wins a few. but after 2... 6... 10 anemic hands in a row of less than 6 points I did a 50 ‘next’ clicking and found it was not my emotion or imagination. Roughly 1/15 hands could open, and maybe 3 could respond.

There is a lot of push for upgrade. So, despite a fun venue and VERY sophisticated design, I smell a rat. No more money from me.

The bidding seems to be a little weak. It is probably OK for beginners, but if my partner would bid like iBridgePlus does, I would change partners. I could stand the way iBridgePlus bids if there was an undo function or a change bid function. But those options don’t exist. After you have played a long time, you would appreciate having access to such functions. Bridge Baron does a much better job of play of the hand and bidding. It also has tons of useful options. But it costs $20. That $20 is well spent. I’m going to delete iBridgePlus from my iPad now.

This is the best Bridge App around! It has several modes of play: duplicate, rubber, Chicago, community hands. The Assist is a teaching no aid that has helped my game because it has the explanation to go with it. The cards are easy to read (unlike some apps). I've used iBridgePlus for a few years now and my game has greatly improved. A few times, I contacted customer support with questions or issues and a prompt, friendly response follows. I highly recommend iBridgePlus! Warning: you might spend too many hours playing Bridge, iBridgePlus makes it very enjoyable!

I play bridge baron almost all the time even though I like most of the features in ibridge much better. But bridge baron shows how iBridgePlus would have bid and scored on every hand. I really like seeing that. Ibridge already has the auto bid and auto play function so they have the data. They just need to add a second column to the score page like bridge baron does and ibridge would be my perfect app. One other small thing. I like the one click redo in bridge baron. In ibridge it can take two or three clicks to redo or get to the next hand

I thought that by now and with the number of critical ratings iBridge has received, the algorithms would have changed, but I was wrong. If anything they’re worse. I’ve never seen hands like I see far too frequently- nearly every deal has one or more players with 7 or more cards in one suit, sometimes in two. Probability just doesn’t work that way - there are far more ridiculous hands than those with reasonable distractions. Bidding becomes a guessing game at best. To top it off my “partners” have doubled and redoubled with absolutely no foundation, tanking our score, and their leads make no sense. This is my second time trying to play iBridgePlus - I quit. FunBridge is far more fun and more realistic.

It’s an OK way to practice. iBridgePlus will often recommended overbidding. If you let iBridgePlus play all the cards, it won’t make contract. So that’s not so helpful.

There was an old bridge game for PC - Bridge Baron? - now THAT was an amazing play..unfortunately that program became incompatible as Microsoft changed and finally just ‘went dark’. A loss. I kept a pc just to use that program. It was a superb learning tool.

I’d be willing to pay more $ for a more accurate curated app

I'm certainly no expert. Enjoy learning. I've been playing for 5 years and basically learning through playing with better players. Bless their patience. That said I have also improved by using a CD by Hoyle. Just upgraded computer and no more cd capability. Thus my search for an app. In just a couple of days of using ibridge plus I see where I need to learn more in regards to leads and yes a little bidding improvement. I'm impressed with the variety of iBridgePlus from assist, rubber games, duplicate, and the ease of playing. 👍

This ap is challenging and fun to play and it is a great early morning brain exerciser to get yourself awake and alert, ready for your day. I learn from observing other players choices, from the coaching advice and from my own poor choices when I compare myself to others. And i do not have to find 3 other competent players to enjoy my bridge. There are several in ap purchase options that are worth the price so this is a 5 star ap. If you are going to use it, purchase the whole package.

THIS IS MY FAVORITE AP!

I have tried a few bridge game apps and I can say that I think IBridge is the absolute best. I have been impressed at how easily I can email them about any question and receive an answer quickly which is helpful and even at times entertaining...yes they have a sense of humor. They have covered every detail that an excellent app could possibly do and I especially enjoy the duplicate games where I can see my progress compared to other players without worrying that I might be embarrassed. Thanks IBridge!

It is no fun using iBridgePlus. Too many messed up deals in bidding because the dummy uses cue bid without a trump fit, or with less than 10 points. Or with partner passing twice, forcing a game, playing part, lead single on NT deals— not partner bid. Not returning partner lead, delete all messed up hands— don’t need too muchhands — just keep the good ones. If your app has 80% good hands, only 20% bad messed, that is normal. But right now, it is 60% messed. Keeping 2 million hands is more than enough, no need 2 billion.
I suggest you allow user to report bad hands that help you clean up.
I even had a hand with physical 6, or even 2 point, bidding 4nt,or 5 level cue bid of Singleton, which bidding system allows that!?!!

I enjoy this game, the best Bridge game I've come across to date. Its myriad of settings are a bit dense, but give one control over nearly everything one could want. It offers something for everyone, with duplicate hands and playing assistance for private play. I don’t always take its advice, but usually do worse when I don’t. Customer support is responsive and the interface has greatly improved since I started using iBridgePlus . Highly recommended.

I’ve been playing iBridge Plus for a couple of years and I’ve never had a problem. It’s a great teacher and worth every penny. The other day when they experienced problems due to excessive streaming brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic. Their IT team got after it and fixed it right away. What more can a User ask for. Great support for a fabulous product. These folks are world class!