Here is the best-kept secret in the genre: most of the greatest roguelikes ever made are completely free. Rather than hand you my favorites, I read thirteen Reddit threads of players asking for the best free ones, counted every upvote on every game anyone suggested, and let the totals decide the order. Dungeon Crawl Stone Soup took the top spot, with Tales of Maj'Eyal right behind it, and the rest of the top ten reads like a hall of fame: NetHack, Brogue, Cataclysm: Dark Days Ahead, Angband, all of it free, across 48 games and 2,825 votes.
None of this is my personal ranking. I did not score these by what I like. Every spot is the sum of real Reddit upvotes from the threads people actually find when they search this, so the order is the community's, not mine. I just counted.
If you only want a recommendation, take the quiz below and it will match you to a game based on the kind of roguelike you are after. If you want the full picture, keep scrolling. One ground rule kept the list honest: every game here is genuinely free, so the paid favorites people sometimes mention (Caves of Qud, Cogmind, and the like) are not counted, no matter how good they are.
8 questions, matched to 48 community-ranked games.
Question 1 of 8
How much do you care about graphics?
Question 2 of 8
New to traditional roguelikes?
Question 3 of 8
Where do you want to play?
Question 4 of 8
What flavor are you after?
Question 5 of 8
How long should a run be?
Question 6 of 8
Do you want a story?
Question 7 of 8
How do you feel about difficulty?
Question 8 of 8
Does open source matter to you?
Your community-ranked match
If you have read one of our other roundups, this will look familiar, because the method is the same every time. The whole point is to keep my taste out of the ranking. I am not telling you these are the best games because I played them and you should trust me. I am showing you what thousands of other players upvoted, and counting it honestly.
I searched Google and Reddit the way anyone would, with phrases such as best free roguelikes and free roguelike recommendations, then collected the threads that ranked and read them directly on Reddit. They came mostly from r/roguelikes and r/roguelites, the genre's two home subreddits, plus a couple of free-focused threads from elsewhere. Thirteen qualifying threads made the cut.
A game's score is the sum of upvotes on every comment that suggested it, added up across all thirteen threads. So if one comment recommending Dungeon Crawl Stone Soup earned 35 upvotes in one thread and another earned 29 in a different thread, it is credited with both. A comment naming four games hands its full upvote count to all four, which is how one thoughtful, highly-upvoted reply can lift several picks at once. Nothing is ranked by hand beyond that counting.
One note on terminology: roguelike and roguelite get used interchangeably in these threads, and so does this list, since the community votes the same way regardless of the label. The only filter I applied by hand was the free one. The votes decide the rest; I just count them.
These ten lead the community vote. The names link to each game store page if you want a closer look, and we do not earn a cent from your purchases.
| 1 |  | Dungeon Crawl Stone Soup | 317 votes |
| 2 |  | Tales of Maj'Eyal | 266 votes |
| 3 |  | Cataclysm: Dark Days Ahead | 213 votes |
| 4 |  | Brogue | 210 votes |
| 5 |  | Angband | 163 votes |
| 6 |  | NetHack | 160 votes |
| 7 |  | Ancient Domains of Mystery | 138 votes |
| 8 |  | Infra Arcana | 126 votes |
| 9 |  | DoomRL | 98 votes |
| 10 |  | Shattered Pixel Dungeon | 88 votes |
How the Votes Stack Up
Every total below is the sum of upvotes from each of the 13 Reddit threads that recommended the game. Each colored segment is one thread. Hover to see its contribution, or click any segment to open the source thread.
| Game | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | Total |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Dungeon Crawl Stone Soup | 8 | 78 | 78 | 42 | 69 | 2 | 1 | 32 | 7 | 317 | ||||
| Tales of Maj'Eyal | 97 | 103 | 41 | 4 | 2 | 19 | 266 | |||||||
| Cataclysm: Dark Days Ahead | 93 | 58 | 38 | 17 | 7 | 213 | ||||||||
| Brogue | 3 | 116 | 19 | 54 | 11 | 1 | 6 | 210 | ||||||
| Angband | 37 | 6 | 47 | 42 | 29 | 1 | 1 | 163 | ||||||
| NetHack | 51 | 55 | 46 | 6 | 1 | 1 | 160 | |||||||
| Ancient Domains of Mystery | 80 | 5 | 42 | 10 | 1 | 138 | ||||||||
| Infra Arcana | 83 | 43 | 126 | |||||||||||
| DoomRL | 47 | 13 | 38 | 98 | ||||||||||
| Shattered Pixel Dungeon | 4 | 2 | 19 | 38 | 7 | 11 | 2 | 5 | 88 |
Every free game suggested across the thirteen threads, ranked by total upvotes. Sort by any column to find your fit.
| #^ | Game | Votesv | Mentionsv | Platforms |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Dungeon Crawl Stone Soup | 317 | 32 | PC, Mac, Linux, Browser, Android |
| 2 | Tales of Maj'Eyal | 266 | 23 | PC, Mac, Linux, Browser |
| 3 | Cataclysm: Dark Days Ahead | 213 | 17 | PC, Mac, Linux, Android |
| 4 | Brogue | 210 | 26 | PC, Mac, Linux |
| 5 | Angband | 163 | 23 | PC, Mac, Linux, Browser |
| 6 | NetHack | 160 | 22 | PC, Mac, Linux, Browser |
| 7 | Ancient Domains of Mystery | 138 | 15 | PC, Mac, Linux |
| 8 | Infra Arcana | 126 | 7 | PC |
| 9 | DoomRL | 98 | 4 | PC, Mac, Linux |
| 10 | Shattered Pixel Dungeon | 88 | 15 | Android, PC (paid), iOS (paid) |
| 11 | The Ground Gives Way | 80 | 6 | PC |
| 12 | Sil-Q | 78 | 8 | PC |
| 13 | Dwarf Fortress | 76 | 8 | PC |
| 14 | Elona | 69 | 7 | PC |
| 15 | UnReal World | 65 | 5 | PC |
| 16 | IVAN | 62 | 4 | PC |
| 17 | Pathos | 60 | 7 | PC |
| 18 | POWDER | 58 | 5 | PC |
| 19 | Slice & Dice | 55 | 6 | PC |
| 20 | HyperRogue | 43 | 2 | PC |
| 21 | Drakefire Chasm | 43 | 1 | PC |
| 22 | Demon | 42 | 2 | PC |
| 23 | HoloCure | 40 | 10 | PC |
| 24 | Wayward | 39 | 2 | PC |
| 25 | Liberal Crime Squad | 38 | 1 | PC |
| 26 | Disfigure | 30 | 7 | PC |
| 27 | Omega | 15 | 2 | PC |
| 28 | Triangle Wizard | 15 | 2 | PC |
| 29 | GnollHack | 14 | 3 | PC |
| 30 | Hoplite | 14 | 3 | PC |
| 31 | Cardinal Quest | 14 | 2 | PC |
| 32 | PokeRogue | 11 | 4 | PC |
| 33 | Shadow of the Wyrm | 10 | 2 | PC |
| 34 | Buriedbornes | 9 | 4 | PC |
| 35 | Caves (Roguelike) | 9 | 2 | PC |
| 36 | Smart Kobold | 9 | 1 | PC |
| 37 | Realm of the Mad God | 8 | 3 | PC |
| 38 | Elewar: Fused Survivors | 8 | 2 | PC |
| 39 | Prospector | 7 | 2 | PC |
| 40 | Larn | 5 | 2 | PC |
| 41 | Moonring | 4 | 2 | PC |
| 42 | Death Skid Marks | 4 | 1 | PC |
| 43 | Rogue Fable | 3 | 1 | PC |
| 44 | Soul Knight | 3 | 1 | PC |
| 45 | Lost Labyrinth | 2 | 1 | PC |
| 46 | Path of Exile | 2 | 1 | PC |
| 47 | .Forty-Five | 1 | 1 | PC |
| 48 | Pogo Rogue | 1 | 1 | PC |
Dungeon Crawl Stone Soup topped this vote as the free roguelike the community recommends above all others. It is a turn-based dungeon dive that strips away the genre's busywork (no tedious item identification grind, generous quality-of-life) while keeping enormous build variety across dozens of species and classes. People describe it as the rare roguelike that is both deeply tactical and genuinely approachable, and it has been polished for almost twenty years.
It is completely free and open source, playable as a standalone download, in your browser on the official servers, or on Android, so there is no barrier to starting tonight. The presentation is functional rather than flashy (tiles or ASCII), which is the only thing that puts some players off. But on gameplay, replayability, and value, it was the clear winner here.
Tales of Maj'Eyal, or ToME, placed second as the free roguelike people are amazed costs nothing. Its base game is free on the developer's site (te4.org), and it is enormous: dozens of classes and races, deep skill trees, and combat-focused tactical play with no hunger clock to manage. It is many players' on-ramp into traditional roguelikes precisely because it has tiles, a readable interface, and an adjustable difficulty.
Buying it on Steam supports the developer and unlocks optional cosmetic DLC and bonus content, but the free version is the whole adventure. The depth and class variety are the draw, with a modding community extending it even further. If you want a big, modern, approachable roguelike for free, the threads point here right after DCSS.
Cataclysm: Dark Days Ahead landed third, the free roguelike for players who want simulation depth that borders on absurd. It is an open-world post-apocalyptic survival game where you scavenge, craft, drive, build, and fight zombies and stranger horrors, with a systems density few games of any price match. It is free and open source, with paid Steam builds existing only for convenience.
Its huge mod ecosystem lets you tailor it to almost anything: pure survival, magic, sci-fi, or zombie-only. The flip side, which the community openly debates, is that it can be opaque and tedious, and recent balance choices split players (some prefer the Bright Nights fork). But for sheer free depth, nothing else on this list compares.
Brogue is the community's favorite for elegance, the traditional roguelike people most often hand to newcomers. Where others bury you in commands and menus, Brogue is famously clean: a small command set, no grindy inventory busywork, and beautiful, readable ASCII with rich color. Underneath that simplicity is genuinely deep, emergent tactical play where the environment itself is a weapon.
It is free and open source, with the Community Edition the version most people play, and it runs on anything. Runs are short enough to be a coffee break yet punishing enough to keep you coming back. The minimalist look is not for players who want flashy graphics, but as an accessible, brilliantly designed free roguelike, it is near-universally loved here.
Angband is the Tolkien-themed grandparent of the dungeon dive, and the community calls it one of the comfiest ways into traditional roguelikes. The goal is simple: descend through the dungeon, grow stronger, and eventually slay Morgoth at the bottom. It is forgiving by genre standards (you can retreat to town and rebuild any time), with a smooth early curve that lets casual players have fun before the late game bites.
It is free, and its real superpower is variants: FrogComposband, FAAngband, Gensouband, and dozens more remix it with wildly different classes, monsters, and rules, many playable in your browser at angband.live. The ASCII presentation is old-school, but for a relaxed, endlessly replayable free roguelike, it is a perennial recommendation.
NetHack is the genre's most famous classic, the free roguelike where the running joke is that the developers thought of everything. It rewards experimentation above raw tactics: almost any verb works on almost any object, and the game reacts in ways that produce legendary stories. That depth of interaction is why people have played it for decades and still discover new things.
It is free and open source, playable as a download or in your browser on the public servers, and there are graphical forks if ASCII is a dealbreaker. It is famously hard and obtuse, and the plain interface asks for patience. But as a foundational, bottomless free roguelike, it is essential, and the community still reveres it.
Ancient Domains of Mystery, ADOM, is the free roguelike for players who want a story wrapped around their dungeon crawl. It has an actual overarching plot, a corruption mechanic that ticks against you, a D&D-style perk system, an enormous range of race and class combinations, and many distinct endings to chase. That structure makes it feel more like a roleplaying epic than a pure dungeon grind.
The original ASCII version is free; ADOM Deluxe on Steam is a paid edition with tiles and extras, but the classic remains fully playable for nothing (and a free tiles version exists too). It is deep and punishing, and the breadth can intimidate, but for a free roguelike with genuine narrative ambition, it is a standout.
Infra Arcana is the free roguelike that keeps getting named when people want atmosphere and dread. It is a Lovecraftian survival-horror crawl where sanity, scarce resources, and lurking cosmic horrors make every floor tense, and firearms and a 1920s setting give it a flavor most roguelikes lack. Fans describe it as a hidden gem they cannot stop playing.
It is free and open source, focused and self-contained rather than sprawling, which makes it an easier commitment than the genre's giants. The presentation is classic ASCII and the difficulty is real, but for a horror-soaked free roguelike with a strong identity, the community recommends it warmly.
DoomRL (now known as DRL) is the free roguelike for players who want speed and a gun. It reimagines Doom as a turn-based roguelike: fast, punchy runs, a deep trait and assembly system for building your marine, and a slick interface that makes it one of the most accessible entries on this list. It is the classic shooty roguelike, and it remains a community favorite years on.
It is free, runs on anything, and its shorter run length makes it perfect for a session between other things while still hiding real depth in its builds and challenge modes. The Doom license means it stays unofficial, but it has been lovingly maintained, and for a fast, free, action-flavored roguelike, nothing else quite matches it.
Shattered Pixel Dungeon rounds out the top ten as the community's favorite free roguelike for your phone. It is a polished, actively developed successor to the open-source Pixel Dungeon, with clean tile graphics, four classes, and turn-based dungeon runs that look simple but reward learning deeply. Players repeatedly call it their GOAT free game and one of the best turn-based roguelikes anywhere.
It is free on Android (the Steam and iOS versions are paid, with the money going to support the developer, and add nothing mechanical). It is famously hard and sometimes feels brutally random, but fans insist it is actually extremely fair once you learn it. For a free, modern, genuinely great roguelike you can play on the bus, this is the pick.
Dungeon Crawl Stone SoupNetHackThe two pillars of the free traditional roguelike, and the genre's oldest friendly argument about what a roguelike should be.
| Category | Dungeon Crawl Stone Soup | NetHack |
|---|---|---|
| Focus | Streamlined tactics and builds | Deep interaction and discovery |
| Friendliness | Cuts the busywork | Obtuse, wiki-driven |
| How to play | Download or in-browser | Download or in-browser |
| Best For | Players who want focused depth | Players who love experimenting |
DCSS is the easier, more streamlined way in; NetHack is the bottomless classic for players who love to experiment.
BrogueShattered Pixel DungeonThe two most beginner-friendly free roguelikes, one a minimalist PC classic, the other a polished mobile favorite.
| Category | Brogue | Shattered Pixel Dungeon |
|---|---|---|
| Where it's free | PC, Mac, Linux | Android |
| Look | Elegant colored ASCII | Clean tile art |
| Feel | Minimalist and emergent | Structured, class-based |
| Best For | Desktop purists | Phone players |
Brogue is the elegant desktop entry point; Shattered Pixel Dungeon is the one to put on your phone.
It surprises newcomers, but the roguelike genre has more world-class free games than almost any other, and there is a reason. The classics here are passion projects and open-source labors of love: NetHack, Dungeon Crawl Stone Soup, Brogue, Angband, and Cataclysm: Dark Days Ahead have been built and refined by volunteer communities for years, sometimes decades, with no price tag. Because they lean on deep systems rather than expensive art and animation, a small team or even one person can keep adding to them indefinitely, which is exactly why they run so deep. A few games on this list have a paid Steam edition that supports the developer (Tales of Maj'Eyal, ADOM, Shattered Pixel Dungeon), but a genuine free version exists for every one of them, and that is the only kind that made the cut. The flip side worth knowing: some beloved roguelikes are paid-only (Caves of Qud, Cogmind, Tangledeep), so they are not on this list by design. For the wider, includes-paid picture, our best roguelike games ranking and the roguelike vs roguelite explainer go deeper, and our Risk of Rain 2 recommendations cover the action-roguelike side.
By the community's count, Dungeon Crawl Stone Soup, with Tales of Maj'Eyal a close second. DCSS is the near-universal answer: free, open source, almost twenty years of polish, and deep enough to sink hundreds of hours into. NetHack and Brogue round out the most-loved free classics right behind those two.
Genuinely excellent, often better than paid ones. Because the genre is built on deep systems rather than expensive art, its biggest classics (NetHack, Dungeon Crawl Stone Soup, Cataclysm: Dark Days Ahead) have been refined by volunteer communities for years and cost nothing. Several have a paid Steam edition to support the developer, but the free version is the full game.
Brogue is the friendliest traditional roguelike, with a clean, minimal interface that hides real depth. Tales of Maj'Eyal and Angband are gentle on-ramps too, and on mobile, Shattered Pixel Dungeon is free on Android and very approachable. Any of those is a softer start than NetHack or Cataclysm.
Shattered Pixel Dungeon, which is free on Android and frequently called one of the best turn-based roguelikes anywhere. Dungeon Crawl Stone Soup also has a free Android version, and Pathos and Cardinal Quest are solid free mobile picks. The Steam and iOS builds of Shattered are paid, but Android is free.
Because they are not free. Caves of Qud, Cogmind, and Tangledeep are paid-only, and Steam favorites like Hades, Balatro, and Slay the Spire are excellent but cost money. This list only counts genuinely free games, so paid picks were left off no matter how often they came up.
Entirely by Reddit upvotes. I read thirteen threads asking for the best free roguelikes, tallied the upvotes on every comment that suggested a free game, and added them up across all of them. The total decides the order, with no personal scoring. Every source thread is linked at the bottom of the page.
Hunting for your next obsession? These guides go deeper on the games and genres above.
Vote totals compiled from public Reddit threads. Quotes belong to their original authors. Game names and cover art remain the property of their respective developers.
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