Customer Ratings & Reviews

It’s nice but the lag kills the experience for me but the controller is nice.

Would give it a 0 if I could. Bought this for my daughter and to this day it’s still unusable due to a known issue that still hasn’t been fixed. Total waste of money and customer service is just as bad.

So cool and awesome with my iPhone! More games to play on my phone!

Very fun to use with the phone. Works well and the kids love it.

Very cool gadget! Fits phone perfectly and has a very nice feel.

This was a Christmas gift for my grandson and he loved it!

Worked for a few months and now the right d pad gets mashed when not being pressed. Problem solving tutorial says factory reset but I can’t get into settings without a monthly subscription:(

Gave to someone as a gift and they can’t put it down!

The best way for me to play my Xbox games on the go

This is a nice way to convert your phone into a portable gaming device with physical controls. The controller is comfortable in the hands. It fits tightly to my iPhone and come with an adapter to accommodate the larger camera on the iPhone 13 Pro (which fits perfectly). The buttons on top and front give satisfying feedback when pressed. Actions are accurate. Getting started is easy—download the app, activate, pull up you favorite streaming gaming service. The controller is sturdy! But be careful with the lightning connection to your phone. The spring action of the controller is strong and will smash the phone at an old angle if you aren’t careful. My main frustration was more about the streaming services than the actual controller. More development is needed to make the cloud streaming run perfectly on a device that is used for so many other functions. Not having games auto save is a big oversight. The phone rings, you lose your game. The devs for several of the services need to get better integration with iOS to cut down on some frustration there. It will obviously not fit with a case. Not a drawback, just a statement. You’ll need to remove your case before each use. I can definitely recommend because this is a QUALITY controller and it really does make it easy to game on an iPhone.

This was a complete waste of money. Cannot get Steam games or XBOX games to stream to the phone. Absolutely pointless.

The first thing I realized when taking it out of the box, was that I would have to remove my phone case in order to use this controller. This wasn't something I thought would be an issue. I had one for a samsung device that did have the connector float a bit in depth so that it would allow for cases. I think Backbone should rethink this and more people would be happier to use. This controller doesn't require batteries since it uses the iphone power to run, but the power to use it was unnoticible. It didn't seem to drain the battery at all during game play. The buttons feel like my xbox controller. The joysticks are smaller and have smaller movements but other than that they are quality. The controller is comfortable to hold. Comes with a free month of xbox gamepass ultimate. This was so much fun to use and I love that it means I can take my gaming with me! When it comes to removing the phone from the controller, it's best to remove the lightning port end first to prevent damage to the controller or the phone port. Again the only drawback is having to remove the phone case but other than that I love it!

The Backbone One has turnned out to be significantly more awesome than I expected. While I do still question the high price tag of the device, the polish of the user experience (thanks to the Backbone app) really does contribute a lot to the value of the controller and makes it a home run purchase for gamers with an iPhone. I honestly went in to the experience expecting to hate the device - I have an Nvidia Shield TV Pro in my house and I had not had a great experience gaming with it through Geforce Now, and I also had a pretty crappy experience with Amazon Luna this winter. However, once I got the Backbone one set up I jumped into Steam Link and it instantly worked EXACTLY as expected - the Backbone app helps you map buttons to the software automatically, and in general it "just works." The controller itself feels similar quality to (if a bit smaller than) the joy cons for a Nintendo Switch. With an iPhone X in the frame, the size and weight are small enough that my hands didn't cramp as much as they do when holding a Switch for extended periods. The buttons are pretty clicky, though, so be aware this isn't exactly the most discrete device to game in bed or in a quiet room. The input lag for the controller itself is totally unnoticeable - when set to connect to a PC (without the iPhone in frame) it was just as responsive as a wired Xbox controller. In fact, I played some cyberpunk last night at my desk and was really surprised that it was playable on my monitor despite streaming through Steam Link to the Backbone One. I feel like there's an opportunity there for Backbone to make a PC companion app and make this a full fledged PC controller with a huge display for onscreen keyboard and mouse controls. It would be the perfect controller for a living room gaming PC in that guise. The Backbone software makes it really easy to take screenshots and record highlight videos. I recorded a video from CyberPunk a few days ago and the process of saving the video, then trimming it in the Backbone app and uploading to Youtube was incredibly easy. The video quality of the exported video is very good, as well. Of course, on the small screen of the iPhone the compression artifacts are even less noticeable. I definitely would include the Backbone One on your list of cool gift ideas for an iOS gamer in your house. The overall implementation is just really well done and kind of amazing that Backbone wasn't snatched up by a more established gaming company. Give it a shot!

If you have a camera protector on your phone (iPhone 14) it does not seat properly and makes it unable to be used

This takes you out the game suddenly and without warning I honestly have one of the best internet services out there and it still kicked me out mid game.. overall disappointing!!

you have to purchase both gamepass which i would expect and a service through backbone to actually use this for the price i feel i was robbed DO NOT RECOMEND.

You can only play certain games. Cod isnt that fun and it’s literally the only game we can okay with this remote.

Sadly returned it. There is lag on my iphone 11 and its not very easy to set up, plus there is a yearly fee after first year free.

I bought this thinking it was a wonderful thing I kept it for a day and then returned it.

It’s a payed for controller they want you to download more to your device. 100 dollars for something you can do with a regular controller