City-builders are an interesting genre of games: You get god-like control over the growth and expansion of urban space and the ability to manage resources on a scale you’d probably never handle in real life (unless, of course, you were actually elected mayor of someplace). Have a look here at our curated list of the top 8 free city-building games on PC. You’ll be sure to have fun building up your virtual cities, looking after citizens, and even dealing with natural disasters.

Most of these are free to play and can be download either from Microsoft store or Steam. So, some of them should also work on Mac. With that out of the way, let’s begin.

City-Builder Games on PC

1. Cities Skylines

Okay, Cities skylines is not a free game but this list couldn’t be complete without this app. Plus, there is a free version of the game on the Microsoft store that you can try. Unlike other city building games, this one more modern and probably a bit easier to learn for beginners. Also, unlike most city building games that focus too much on money and budget, cities skylines are inclined towards increasing population and try to manage the traffic jams while managing infrastructure such as education, security, medicine, etc.

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Overall, it’s a good game for beginners, but if you are a pro, skip this one.

Download Cities Skylines (Steam, Windows Store)

2. Megapolis

Want something that’s a bit more substantial than Cities Skylines? Megapolis has you covered. This is a free city-builder that’s available across platforms, from Windows to Android to iOS, and supports cross-platform play, so you can keep building that city whether you’re in the subway or at your desktop. Megapolis has you building civic amenities, industrial buildings, and residential quarters to increase your tax revenue and population limit—you take your newfound resources and invest them towards scaling things up. Megapolis mixes things up by introducing water and electricity resource needs for specific buildings—you’ll have to ensure that the resource supply is adequate to allow your power plants and other structures to function. You will have to deal with IAPs, though.

Download Megapolis (Steam, Windows Store)

3. City Mania

City Mania is the first full-3D title in our list here. It’s got a good pedigree—it’s developed by Gameloft, the makers of a wide range of great free-to-play titles on iOS an Android, from Asphalt 9 to Modern Combat to, well, City Mania. The game has you playing as mayor and managing civic amenities, resources, and businesses. You need to keep your wits about you and scale resource production and residential sites as population and resource pressure increases. This is where the free-to-play elements come into the picture—you can buy resources which otherwise take a long time to accumulate. While this can slow down the pace of play for free players, we still suggest giving the game a spin: It’s a great mobile-centric city builder with a unique, painterly aesthetic to its 3D visuals.

Download City Mania (Windows Store)

4. Virtual City Playground

The biggest criticism we can leverage against Virtual City Playground is that it simply doesn’t do enough to set itself apart in the free-to-play city-builder segment. As a mobile title on iOS and Android, the game plays out very similar to City mania, albeit with 2D sprite graphics instead of polygonal 3D. You’re tasked with managing your city and building amenities and ensure that growth is supported as your population increases. There is one way that Virtual City Playground sets itself apart, though: You’re able to engage in a certain amount of micromanagement, allowing you to plan out individual bus routes among other small-scale tasks. Free-to-play mechanics operate the same as in other titles in the genre. How fast your city develops is directly proportional to how much real-world money you invest in it.

Download Virtual City Playground (Windows Store)

5. Pixel Worlds

Minecraft spinoffs have been a thing the past couple years, with everything from a Minecraft narrative RPG from Telltale to Minecraft battle royale. Minecraft mania’s hit the city-builder genre too. Pixel Worlds is less a city-builder and more a world-builder, where you terraform a barren world and build up a settlement and other developed areas. The main hook is the massively multiplayer component: You can trade with other players and cooperate with them, too: When there’s a large number of real-world players onscreen, it feels more convincing as an urban space than conventional city-builders since you know that you’re seeing is the product of a lot of collective effort. Pixel Worlds also has dungeons, exploration, and minigames like fishing to help keep things fresh. The game is free-to-play and you can purchase additional currency through IAP but the in-game means of earning are quite fair by themselves.

Download Pixel Worlds (Steam, Windows Store)

6. Township

This is another title that treads a bit off the beaten path as far as city-builders are concerned. Township is less a city-builder proper and more of a, well, town builder. It’s about building cozy settlements at the intersection of the rural and the urban, so farm management plays just as much a role as building civic amenities. The town you end up building is much more down-to-earth than the skyscraper-crowded screens of other city builders, but the payoff’s arguably more worthwhile—you didn’t just lay down roads and wait for settlers to arrive—Township’s very much a farm-to-fork experience, letting you touch on all aspects of the town-building process. It also has a wide range of side activities like mining which mix things up in the gameplay department.

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Download Township (Windows Store)

7. Worlds Builder

Are city-builders not ambitious enough for you? You might want to try Worlds Builder, which has you overlooking an entire world as its god. As farms and settlements come into the picture, you’re given a much wider toolset of options, including the ability to control forces of nature to shape destinies. You can also build up natural environments like forests as well as urban settlements. Because of its larger scale, it’s no surprise that Worlds Builder also has an exploratory element which has you sending out expeditions to discover treasure.

Price: Free, with IAPs

Download SimCity 4 (Windows Store)

8. SimCity 4

No list of best city building game is complete without SimCity, the most popular game in this genre. When you start the game, the tutorials do a pretty good job at covering the basics. My favourite thing about the game is its realism. For example, if you build a city with high-value residential neighborhoods, you get more tax money without taking up more space. But if you apply a high tax rate on low-income residents, you soon see strikes on the street. This game almost reflects the life of an actual city.

Sim city 4 is a bit harder than other city building games, so if you are just getting started, it’s not the best game to pick up (I recommend Sim City 2000 instead), but if you are looking for some challenge it’s a must-have. It’s a paid game, but I’ve seen it on heavy discount on steam most part of the year.

Download SimCity 4 (Steam, Website)

That’s all for this list! Which free city-builder did you find the most fun? Let us know in the comments below! If you want to try out more games and get a little smarter in the process, check out this handy list!

Do you like City Builder Games where you can design amazing cities, communities and settlements?

These type of games are the perfect way to express yourself and be creative, sometimes without restriction. City management games or general management games on the other hand let you manage everything, whether it’s a city, a business or any kind of system.

It is also very similar to strategy games, but the main difference is that in city builder games or management games your success is not physical survival, but more financial survival.

The main goal is to make money and reach your goals. Most city building simulators have a sandbox mode meaning you can build with an unlimited budget and don’t have to worry about balancing your finances.

These type of games also give you problems to solve, whether it is traffic related or managing your resources, it is always fun to come up with a solution. Build bigger, better and become virtually rich! Here is a list of the best City Builder Games and Management Games you can play!

What is your favorite city building game? Tell me in the comments. If you like this post, please share it with your friends.

The Best City Builder Games

1. Cities Skylines

Cities Skylines is the ultimate city builder game you can play right now.

It has so many possibilities and features for players to create their dream city.

Cities Skylines challenges the player’s management and creative skills, whether you play with money or in sandbox mode.

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In the beginning of every city create you will experience the need to expand quickly and get more people to move there.

Until… traffic becomes a problem!

That is one of the main challenges in the game, to find innovative way to solve traffic and expansion problems.

Traffic management, policies, taxation, infrastructure planning, resources, city connections ect. are only a few things you’ll manage during the game.

It also has massive modding capabilities and a big community with a number of awesome DLC content, so customization is virtually unlimited.

What are you waiting for, the people want to move in.

Don’t miss the latest DLC, Industries, which is definitely one of the best!

Find it here – Industries DLC

Get building!

Buy Cities Skylines

2. ANNO 1800

ANNO 1800 is a real-time city building game and it’s the latest edition into the series.

The ANNO Series has the ultimate blend between being a city builder and a city management game while you play through some super interesting campaigns.

The setting is focused around the 1800’s of the Industrial Revolution highlighting colonial trade with a touch of Victorian Era style.

You will have to manage many different aspects to conquer ANNO 1800, like production, supply chains, trade routes, political management and keeping your people happy.

You will ultimately decide what kind of ruler you will be.

Will you be an innovator or an exploiter?

Are you a liberator or a conqueror that rules with an iron fist?

Whichever you choose, be ready for an epic journey. Enjoy this city builder in singleplayer, multiplayer and sandbox mode.

ANNO has visited a few different eras, both historical and future, each giving you a rich storyline which will give you hours of playtime.

My favourite so far was ANNO 1404, but the new ANNO 1800 will definitely be one of the best. What is your favourite?

Buy ANNO 1800

3. Tropico 6

When you are looking for a fun city builder game that is not too serious, the Tropico series might just be perfect for you.

Tropico 6 is one of the latest city building and management games for the genre, with a list of new features.

You are taking the role of “El Presidente” the mayor on your very own little island, build a community from the ground, manage resources, politics, trade and much more.

Playing the main campaigns takes you through 4 time periods all with unique ways to build your settlements:

• The Colonial era
• The World Wars era
• The Cold War era
• The Modern era

Tropico 6 is a super fun game and you can play it in a variety of ways with several outcomes by implementing different policies, making decisions based on various factors and growing your rule in across your islands.

A new feature allows you build on various small islands throughout the 4 time periods and later connect them together, which was not the case in previous titles.

Even enjoy some multiplayer city building games with up to four friends.

Will you manage to keep your people happy, balance your production and supply, grow your empire?

You are the major and the choice of how to build, manage and rule is up to you.

So go and create an economy that your virtual people will be proud of!

Buy Tropico 6

4. Banished

Banished is a city building strategy game that lets you build and manage an isolated society. You literally start with nothing except a few people to control.

The main goal of this village building game is to develop a sustaining settlement for your people to survive through the various conditions.

It sounds easy enough right, but the thing is people will die if they are not fed or warm enough in the Winter.

You should order them to build, gather, farm and mine to keep your people alive. Banished has all the seasons where you will face challenges during each. For example, in Spring and Summer you need to grow food and gather wood to build houses and have enough firewood.

During Autumn and Winter, people will die if they are not warmed from fire and starve if they run out of food. The game has a few complex systems to understand and overcome before you can really build a large town, but it’s worth every minute.

If you like a real challenge and want to build your own little settlement, Banished is a great game to play.

It’s time to gather some firewood for the Winter!

Buy Banished:

5. Surviving Mars

From the same publisher’s as Cities Skylines, Surviving Mars is another challenging builder.

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It is more focused around colony building and survival the different conditions than your usual city builders. Your mission is to build a sustainable settlement on Mars and survive the challenges that is thrown at you.

Being on Mars, there are a lot of factors that can affect the way you build your city which is really fun when you start to understand what needs to happen.

Surviving Mars has a lot of exciting gameplay, challenging environments and many customization to enjoy.

If you like a good colony builder game, this will be perfect for you.

Buy Surviving Mars

6. Frostpunk

The end of our civilization as we know it came fast during the 19th Century, which was supposed to be the peak of human achievement.

Frostpunk is a survival city building game that puts you in charge of managing the last city on earth. With a great story and many different ways to play it, you are fighting to survive while its your duty to manage both the people and the infrastructure.

There are many things that plays together, from workers, resources, building strategy, politics and much more.

What decisions will you make to ensure the survival of the human race?

You must do whatever it takes, just survive!

Buy Frostpunk

7. Aven Colony

Aven Colony is a city building game for PC, Xbox and Playstation. You find yourself on Aven Prime, an alien planet several light years from earth, where you need to build a new human colony and survive the conditions.

Like many city builder games, Aven Colony has a lot of challenges in store for you to overcome like the management of resources, environmental factors and the aliens themselves. It can be quite a hard game at first, but when you get into the phase where you know how to balance everything it can be great.

In order to keep your people alive, you need to mine resources, set up defenses and do research in order to overcome some of the challenges you may face. One moment the sun can be shining and the next moment a giant sandstorm approaches to blow everything away.

There are also a variety of different aliens that can attack your colony, from plague spores, hovering guardians and cultist airships. You can defend against attacks by building defensive buildings and do research to improve them.

With all that going on, you will also have to deal with and balance the morale of the people in your colony, as they will hold elections and can vote you out if you don’t take care of their needs. These can be things like crime, food supplies, living conditions, social policies and more.

There are also the option to expand your colony into sub-colonies and grow your population. That is a whole other challenge on it’s own.

Aven Colony can be really challenging at times, but offers you the satisfaction when you keep going.

Go save your people and build your settlement on a totally unknown planet.

Buy Aven Colony

8. Life is Feudal: Forest Village

Life is Feudal: Forest Village is extremely similar to Banished I listed earlier, just with a few more advanced features like the management systems and graphical enhancements.

The key is to build your settlement from nothing with a few peasants, by gathering, harvesting, mining and a lot more.

The setting is in the medieval time with a realistic world, famine, disease and harsh winters. The game has a dynamic ecosystem with changing weather and the world you play on is randomly generated which gives you a unique experience for every town you build.

Life is Feudal is a great game to relax and not take everything too serious, so do you have what it takes to build your own medieval settlement?

Buy Life is Feudal: Forest Village

9. Rise of Industry

Rise of Industry is a complex strategy game in which you are the CEO of your own blossoming company – building an industrial empire that produces and delivers essential products to a growing population

Gather resources by building farms, mines, oil and gas wells and many more.

From the most basic materials there will be a wide range of products you can manufacture and ship to towns.

Keep the economy moving and keep the masses’ needs fulfilled.

Facilitate the transportation of both raw and finished products at every stage of production with the help of roadways, trucks, trains, ships, and even zeppelins.

Each mode of travel has its own advantages and drawbacks, and it’s up to you to sort the logistic puzzle.

Rise of Industry is complex enough to keep you entertained for hours and the development team seem to be very active and trustworthy.

So if you love complex strategy game and building your own successful business sounds good then Rise of Industry is a game for you!

Buy Rise of Industry

10. Simcity Complete Edition

Buy Simcity Complete Edition

11. Stonehearth

Buy Stonehearth

12. Kingdoms and Castles

Buy Kingdoms and Castles

13. Urban Empire

Buy Urban Empire

14. Cities in Motion 2

Buy Cities in Motion 2

Conclusion

What is your favorite city builder game?

Did I miss one?

Share it in the comments!

Now that you have a long list of great city builder games to choose from, you can be sure to have hours of fun! I listed the best city simulation games you can still play in 2019.

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