🔞 Indie game store · itch.io review
itch.io: a huge indie adult shelf, still recovering from 2025.
An open indie game store with more than 20,000 games tagged NSFW, many of them free. How it works, what changed after the 2025 delisting, and the best sites like itch.io.
ViceHunt’s take: The best place to find small, odd and free adult games, often straight from the person who made them. Since the 2025 crackdown, paid adult games are harder to find and some creators have stopped selling there.
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Chat nowPros & cons
The good
- Thousands of free adult games
- Most of your money goes to the creator
- Pay-what-you-want pricing on many games
- Browser games plus downloads for Windows, Mac and Linux
The bad
- Far fewer paid adult games since the 2025 delisting
- Quality varies wildly, with lots of demos and short builds
- Stricter content rules that changed with little warning
- Finding good adult games takes some digging
itch.io vs the alternatives
The full itch.io review
What is itch.io?
itch.io is an open marketplace for independent games, started in 2013 by Leaf Corcoran. Anyone can upload a game, set their own price and choose how much of each sale goes to the site.
Adult games have always been a big part of it. Its NSFW listing shows more than 20,000 games behind an 18+ age check, from short visual novels to long RPGs, mostly made by solo developers and small teams.
How itch.io works
Many games play right in your browser; others are downloads for Windows, Mac, Linux and sometimes Android. A free account keeps everything you’ve bought or claimed in one library.
Adult pages ask you to confirm you’re 18 or older, and creators add content warnings to their games. Read them before you download, because tags and quality are entirely up to each creator.
What’s free and what you pay
A huge share of the adult games are free or pay what you want, often demos or early builds that point you to the creator’s Patreon or SubscribeStar for more. Paid games set their own prices, and many go on sale.
itch.io uses what it calls open revenue sharing: the developer decides how big the site’s cut is, so most of your money reaches them. Payments run through Stripe and PayPal, which is exactly where the trouble started.
The 2025 adult-game delisting
In July 2025, after the Australian group Collective Shout lobbied payment processors, itch.io pulled all adult NSFW games from browse and search. It stopped Stripe payments for 18+ content, published a list of banned themes and warned that some pages would be removed for good.
Free adult games came back to search within a week. Paid ones have returned slowly: in late 2026, fewer than 1,000 of the 20,000-plus NSFW listings are paid, and some creators made their games free instead of fighting the new rules.
Is itch.io safe?
itch.io is a legit store, but indie downloads still call for some care:
- Download only from the creator’s official itch.io page
- Read the content warnings before you play
- Scan downloaded games with your antivirus
- Skip re-uploads of paid games on other sites
Read our safety guidelines for more.
ViceHunt’s verdict
itch.io is still the best place for indie adult games, especially free ones, and one of the fairest stores for creators. The 2025 crackdown left scars: paid adult games are harder to find, and the rules can change with little warning.
Want polished, bigger adult games? Try Steam. Prefer Japanese titles? Johren and MangaGamer are the specialists.
itch.io FAQ
Is itch.io free?
Signing up and browsing are free, and thousands of adult games cost nothing. Paid games set their own prices, and many are pay what you want.
Does itch.io still have adult games?
Yes. Free adult games returned to search about a week after the July 2025 delisting, and some paid ones are listed again. The paid adult catalogue is much smaller than before, and some themes are now banned.
Is itch.io safe?
The store itself is legit, and payments go through Stripe and PayPal. Games come from independent creators, so download from the official page and keep your antivirus on.
Why did itch.io remove adult games?
In July 2025 its payment processors raised concerns after a campaign by the group Collective Shout. itch.io hid all adult content to protect its payments, then brought free games back first.
What are the best itch.io alternatives?
Steam for bigger, polished adult games, Johren for Japanese titles, and MangaGamer for translated visual novels.
More sites like itch.io
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