Getting a new handheld is always exciting. Opening the box, sliding out the newest shiniest toy in your collection – that feeling is the reason so many of us have absolutely massive handheld collections.
But once you’re done gawking at your brand new Retroid Pocket 5 or (other relevant handheld), what should you do next? Veterans of the hobby will know all the best apps to grab, but if you’re brand new to all this (welcome!) let us guide you through the best options for your hardware.
Table of Contents
Why Not Pre-installed?
Depending on what device you have, you may have a long list of emulators and games already pre-installed. So the first thing one might ask is, why not just use those apps?
Some of these pre-installed apps are custom-made and tailored specifically to lower-end hardware. For most emulators, however, this is not the case. Most of the apps you’ll find are outdated, ill-performing versions, and some of them are even shady redistributions of paid premium software.
Instead of relying on these old, shady apps, it’s best to grab new copies from the Play Store or Github for the latest updates and best performance.
Speaking of updates…
Updates: Obtainium
Obtainium on Odin 2
For the easiest way to grab bleeding-edge versions of all your favorite emulators, it doesn’t get much better than Obtainium. This app can pull updates from all the major Github repositories and emulator websites, making the job of managing all those apps a cinch.
Combine this with the Obsidian Emulation Pack, made by RJNY and Jess Telford, to easily grab almost all the emulators you’d want, including many of the ones on this list. Just download the .xml file, import it into Obtainium, and get downloading!
16-Bit and Below: RetroArch
You knew this was coming.
RetroArch is a frontend, compiling dozens of emulators, called ‘cores’, into one sleek unified interface. You can find cores for everything from DOS to PS2 in RetroArch, but we’ve listed some of our go-to cores for some popular systems below:
- Arcade: Final Burn Neo and MAME-Current cover a huge swath of the arcade library. Fighting games, shoot ’em ups, and all sorts of other quarter-munchers are supported between these two cores. For lower-end devices, try the Final Burn Alpha cores and MAME-2003 Plus. Final Burn Neo and FB Alpha also cover the Neo Geo.
- NES: Nestopia and Mesen are both great options.
- SNES: Snes9x Current works well on almost anything, but for devices with a bit more grunt, bsnes-hd is the way to go. Not only is it one of the most accurate emulators in existence, it’s also got a bunch of enhancement features, including upscaled Mode 7 graphics and widescreen hacks.
- Game Boy: Gambatte covers Game Boy and Game Boy Colour very well. For Game Boy Advance, mGBA is our go-to. mGBA can also run Game Boy and GBC if you only feel like downloading one core for all three.
- Genesis/Mega Drive, Master System/Game Gear, Sega-CD: Genesis Plus GX covers these systems wonderfully. There’s also a Genesis Plus GX Wide core if you want to mess with widescreen hacks for these systems. PicoDrive also covers those systems, as well as the Sega 32X.
- TurboGrafx-16/SuperGrafx/CD: Beetle PCE covers these systems wonderfully.
RetroArch (Website)RetroArch (Play Store)
Nintendo
N64: M64Plus FZ
For the classic Nintendo 64, M64Plus FZ is the best emulator on Android right now. It’s chock full of options for tweaking, and it has the best performance you can get – especially important for lower-end devices. The free version does have ads, but the paid Pro version is well worth the low price.
For higher-end devices, and for better portability between Android and desktop, you could go with the Mupen64Plus GLES3 core on RetroArch instead. Just know that you won’t be getting any better performance from that, though.
Nintendo DS: DraStic
DraStic has been the best DS emulator on Android for a long time, and even after not receiving any updates since February this year, it still handily beats the competition in terms of pure performance. It used to cost a couple of bucks, but now it’s completely free so you have no reason not to give it a shot!
As for other emulators, melonDS has a standalone Android version as well as a RetroArch core. Both are still somewhat underperformant, though melonDS is still very much in active development. Some games that don’t work on DraStic work on melonDS, and melonDS might just become the go-to emulator sometime in the future, so it doesn’t hurt to give it a shot as well.
GameCube and Wii: Dolphin
The Original and The Best. Dolphin has been around for longer than the Wii has, and the mainline build has developed enough that you can get very respectable performance on even mid-range devices.
For older and less powerful devices, there were once more performance-focused forks called MMJR and MMJR2. While you can still find copies of them out there, the devs stopped working on them a good while ago, and their code is quite outdated. We recommend giving the official mainline build a shot before trying to hunt down these forks.
Dolphin (Website)Dolphin (Play Store)
3DS: Lime3DS (For Now)
Lime3DS is a continuation of the late 3DS emulator Citra. It, alongside another fork of Citra maintained by PabloMK7, is getting very regular updates and is improving every day. 3DS is another demanding system, however, so temper your expectations when it comes to lower-end devices (especially when upscaling).
Speaking of citrus-themed emulators, you might have noticed the absence of a certain console from this list. Due to recent events, we’ve decided to avoid talking too openly about said console or corresponding emulators. In the wake of the absolute whack-a-mole this past year has been, however, we will say this; it’s worth branching out and trying new things, but sometimes sticking to what’s tried and true is the way to go. Good luck with your search.
With the news that Lime3DS and PabloMK7’s Citra fork are being merged into Azahar, we’re hopeful that this will end up as the “ultimate” 3DS emulator. However, we’re still waiting for that to be released, which has opened the door for alternatives to enter the scene. This includes Borked3DS, which combines the PabloMK7 fork with Lime3DS and includes a few features from Mandarine.
Citra (PabloMK7)Lime3DS (GitHub)
Wii U: Cemu (Experimental)
Not ponytails, or cotton tails, no…
One of the more surprising additions to the list of Android emulators in 2024 was Cemu. However, this doesn’t come directly from the same team that works on the Wii U emulator for x86 devices. Instead, it’s simply a fork that has been compiled to work with Android devices.
That being said, at the time of this writing, the last update was released in October 2024, and the GitHub project hasn’t been worked on since November. Even still, you should be able to get some Wii U games running, but it’s very much a story of “trial and error.”
What About Switch?
I went back and forth about whether to include a section for Switch emulation here. And while it seems that Nintendo has calmed down a bit, there are a couple of emulators that are worth trying out. Or at the very least, keeping an eye on.
With Yuzu and Ryujinx gone, Citron and Sudachi are the two main players left. There are a few other forks still making the rounds out there, such as Ziunx and Pine. But Citron and Sudachi seem to offer the best performance and most compatibility of the bunch.
In late January, Citron v0.4 was released, bringing it with a bunch of new changes, including “frame generation.” This is huge as it should make it much easier to achieve at least 30fps in your favorite Switch games. On the Citron website, it says that more than 1,500 games have been tested, with 85% of them being “playable,” and 60% of those games being labeled as “Perfect.”
The Sudachi developer kept a low profile after the emulator was mentioned in one of Nintendo’s lawsuits. That quickly changed after the calendar flipped into 2025, as we’ve seen both v1.0.12 and v1.0.13 released in January. These updates include bug fixes while ensuring support for some recently released Switch games.
Sony
PlayStation Portable: PPSSPP
PPSSPP is a marvel of software engineering. This is the premier PSP emulator, and with good reason – it will run on damn near anything. Even if there were other PSP emulators out there, there’s no reason to look anywhere else – unless you’re looking to pick up PPSSPP Gold, which is the exact same excellent emulator but with a fancy logo and a warm fuzzy feeling for supporting the dev’s hard work.
PPSSPP (Website)PPSSPP (Play Store)
PS Vita: Vita3K
Occasionally, you’ll run into an emulator that does such a good job that there’s no need for anyone else to try and create their own version. That’s exactly what’s happened with PS Vita emulation courtesy of Vita 3K. Although the Android build isn’t updated nearly as frequently as the Windows version, it still works incredibly well across practically all of your Android devices.
Vita3K (GitHub) Vita3K (website)
PlayStation 1: DuckStation/SwanStation
DuckStation is the best standalone PS1 emulator available on Android. Controversies aside, there’s no denying the performance this emulator provides or the multitude of enhancement features available.
If you’d prefer to keep it within RetroArch, you can get very similar performance from the SwanStation core, which is a fork of DuckStation.
DuckStation (Website)DuckStation (Play Store)
PlayStation 2: NetherSX2
Speaking of abandoned emulators, AetherSX2 was the best PS2 emulator on Android until it was abandoned due to some drama quite a while ago. Luckily, a small and valiant team has taken up the mantle of keeping Aether’s flame alive with NetherSX2.
Installing NetherSX2 is a bit more complicated than the other emulators on this list. You’ll have to use the patcher tool found on their Github to download a copy of the old Aether emulator, then apply the new Nether patches. It’s not nearly as painful as it sounds, though, and NetherSX2 team member EZOnTheEyes put out a video tutorial that will guide you through the process.
Once you get through all that, though, you’ll have a lean and performant emulator that can run all your favorite PS2 games on a surprisingly wide variety of hardware. Generally speaking, though, PS2, GameCube, Wii and newer consoles are quite demanding to emulate, so if you’re using an older or weaker device it’s best to temper your expectations.
SEGA
Dreamcast: Flycast
Dreamcast runs pretty well, but this D-pad makes fighting games hard.
Flycast is a performant Dreamcast emulator available on many different platforms, including Android. You can get it as a standalone app or as a core within RetroArch, although RetroArch cores tend to be less performant than their standalone counterparts.
Redream is another option for Dreamcast on Android, though it hasn’t been updated in over a year and it lacks some features like resolution upscaling behind a paywall. However, it performs better on lower-end hardware.
Flycast (GitHub)Flycast (Play Store)
Saturn: Yaba Sanshiro 2
This one’s on me. When we originally published this guide, I knew something was missing, but couldn’t put my finger on it. Thanks to the wonderful Retro Handhelds community, I was quickly reminded that I overlooked SEGA Saturn emulation. Although you could stick to RetroArch via the Mednafen core, Yaba Sanshiro 2 is the de facto choice for those who want a standalone Saturn emulator. It offers excellent performance and even includes the option to load games from a cloud storage service such as Google Drive or Dropbox.
Yaba Sanshiro 2 (Play Store) Yaba Sanshiro 2 (Direct)
Frontends
Once you’ve got all your apps and emulators set up, you’ll need a nice front end to tie everything together. Here are a couple of options that we think you should take a look at:
ES-DE
ES-DE is an Android port of a frontend that has emblazoned our Linux handhelds for many years – and that maturity really shines through. Featuring an incredibly robust theming engine, extensive amounts of customization, and an absolutely massive emulator support list, ES-DE offers the quickest and most thorough way of completely transforming your Android handheld experience.
Daijishou
The RA Widget running in Daijisho
If you’re looking for a free frontend option, Daijishou provides an exceptionally good experience. While retro handheld enthusiasts flocked to ES-DE in spades once it was released, that doesn’t mean Daijishou doesn’t still hold its weight.
A simple, easy-to-use yet well-featured frontend that feels uniquely Android might be just what you want. Daijishou provides exactly that, and for Free.99 there’s no harm in giving it a try.
Console Launcher
Physical Media Scraping – Practical? Nah. Awesome? Absolutely
Console Launcher has been around in some capacity for a while now, but in 2024, it got a design and feature overhaul that has quickly become a favorite around here. Although it’s still technically in an “Alpha” state, Console Launcher 2.0 offers a level of customization and flexibility that you won’t find elsewhere.
If you want to get an idea of what it’s like to use Console Launcher 2.0, be sure to check out Nick’s impressions.
Beacon Launcher
Beacon Launcher landed on the scene back in 2023, but it seems to have really hit its stride in 2024. Admittedly, I haven’t personally tested Beacon out yet, but we’ve added it to the list after seeing quite a few comments about it missing from the list. In addition to constantly adding support for new emulators that land on the Play Store, Beacon is also one of the few (if not the only launcher) that also offers Winlator integration. The only caveat is that you’ll need to use one of the Winlator forks that supports launchers.
Conclusion
You’ll notice that there’s one section conspicuously missing from this list, and that’s x86/Windows emulation. This is in part due to the complexity of getting something like Winlator set up, even for lightweight games. However, with Winlator forks such as GameSir GameHub and Pluvia, we’ll be updating this list of best Android emulators after we’ve had more time with these options.
If you’re looking for more things to install, why not check out these native Android games?
What did you think of this article? Let us know in the comments below, and chat with us in our Discord!
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You should add Beacon game launcher to your list. Its easy to use, is the only option I know that allows vita bubbles, and it’s easy to add, delete, or organize things.
You forgot Saturn emulation whether through Yaba Sanshiro 2 or RetroArch, and also forgot Beacon Launcher. It’s up there with ES-DE, Daijishō, and Console Launcher for sure & is personally my frontend of choice!
I also prefer Beacon over all the other front ends for a much faster and cleaner experience. I still use es-de for game manuals. However, as my home launcher, Beacon is probably the best for Android because it supports touchscreen and has a section for your Android apps.
Thanks for the feedback from those who have commented. I’ve updated this guide adding both Beacon Launcher and Yaba Sanshiro 2.