What’s the Best Game Boy Advance Emulator Out There in 2024
- The Game Boy Advance is renowned for its extensive game library and portability, contributing to its enduring popularity beyond just Pokémon titles.
- Emulators allow players to enjoy GBA games on various devices, with top recommendations including Visual Boy Advance for PC, My Boy! for Android, and Delta for iOS.
- While emulators are legal, it's crucial to obtain games legally to comply with copyright laws.
The Game Boy Advance (GBA) is one of the most beloved Nintendo consoles of all time. While the cause of its popularity might be Pokémon Emerald, that doesn’t altogether mean that it was the only reason for its success. The GBA was known for its expansive and memorable library of games, portability and relative expansiveness.
So, if you’re looking to relive the nostalgia of some Pokémon games, you’ve probably heard of emulators. Emulators are applications that can help you run retro games on the device of your choosing. And for the GBA, there are lots of emulators to choose from. Fortunately for you, we’re here to help you out and choose the best GBA emulator.
Table of Contents
The Current State of Game Boy Advance Emulation
Before we move on to which emulators are the best ones out there, let’s discuss the state of GBA emulation. The Game Boy Advance was first released back in June 2001. However, you’ll be surprised to know that emulators for the GBA were available in 2000. Yes indeed, that means they were around a year before the console’s actual release. But that doesn’t mean that they were functional.
The development may have started back in 2000, but it was only after the consoles release that they were able to run any games, and even those ran with graphical glitches and no sound. Since then, multiple emulators have been developed and the emulation has been perfected with nearly every emulator being able to run almost any game without hitches.
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The Best GameBoy Advance Emulators
So without further ado, let’s take a look at the best GBA emulators around:
↪ Best GBA Emulator for PC platforms: Visual Boy Advance
Visual Boy Advance (VBA) was first released in 2001, and has come a long way since then. Currently, VBA supports all GBA games and is able to run them near to perfection. It offers a lot of features like controller support, cheat codes, online and local multiplayer on supported games, speed hacks and save states. It’s also very user-friendly, so you can have it running in no time.
VBA is available on all platforms; Windows, macOS, Linux, Android and iOS. However, since it’s only available on mobile platforms via RetroArch, you’d best skip out on the mobile version. VBA is also completely free and open–source. Its requirements are pretty lax, so you can run it on just about anything, including that old laptop you have from 2008.
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↪ Best GBA Emulator for Android: My Boy!
While most emulators are free, there are a few anomalies that are exempt from this rule. My Boy! for Android phones is one such case. While you may be hindered by the fact that its a paid app, you won’t find a better GBA emulator on Android. Yes, there might be a few who come close, but none can compare to My Boy!’s feature-rich setting, built-in cheat libraries, stable speed hacks and multiple save states.
Trust us; My Boy! is well worth its $4.99 price tag, and it especially beats setting up RetroArch. With My Boy!, you can just load up the game and chill out. Oh, did we forget to mention that it supports multiplayer too? So get your buds to download it too and face off in epic Pokémon battles!
READ MORE: The Ultimate Guide to Emulating Pokémon Games on PC ➜
↪ Best GBA Emulator for iOS: Delta
For jailbreaking nerds, Delta is an old name, but for most of you; it’s the best thing that ever happened ever since Apple decided to allow emulators on the App Store. Delta has been around for quite a while and has changed its shape and form several times. It is an all-in-one emulator that supports multiple consoles, including the GBA.
Delta is completely free to download on the App Store and is open-source too. However, you will need iOS 14 in order to run it on your iOS device. That said, there’s nothing better than Delta on iOS with its user-friendly interface, save state support, speed hacks, controller support and more. Unfortunately, online multiplayer is not support, although local multiplayer on the same device is supported.
READ MORE: The Best Emulators for Nintendo Switch in 2024 ➜
Conclusion
Once all is said and done, we need to remind you that while emulators themselves are legal, it is important to get your games from legal sources. Make sure to stay on the right side of the law and boot up some good ol’ Pokémon!
FAQs
Currently, almost all the Game Boy Advance emulators are able to run all games perfectly, save for one or two games.
Visual Boy Advance is, without a doubt, one of the oldest and best GBA emulators out there. It is available on every platform, but works on mobile via RetroArch.
Using the GBA emulators itself is perfectly legal. However, the nature by which one acquires games for the emulator is usually illegal in nature, so make sure to get your games from legal sources.
