Best game backlog tracker: LaterRex vs Backloggd
One for your games, one for your whole backlog
Backloggd is the better choice if you want a dedicated games tracker with a real community attached: ratings, reviews and a feed built entirely around what you play. LaterRex is the better choice if your backlog is bigger than games, because it keeps your Steam pile in the same place as your watchlist, your reading and your podcasts, and helps you swap recommendations with friends. Same word, "backlog," two pretty different problems.
Here's the part nobody admits about a game backlog: you know exactly what's in it. There are 214 games in your Steam library and you've opened maybe 30. The trouble shows up on a Tuesday night, when you've got two free hours, and you spend forty minutes scrolling and start nothing, because the game you'd actually pick is buried in a list you never open. That's the version of the problem a backlog tracker is really for, and it's worth being clear-eyed about which tracker handles which.
What Backloggd gets right
Backloggd figured out something smart early: games are more fun to track when other people are tracking them too. It's often described as Letterboxd for games, and that's a fair shorthand. You log what you've played, what you're playing and what you want to get to, you give each game a rating, and you write the kind of short review that pins down what a game actually meant to you. Every title carries a community average, so you can size up a game at a glance, and the people you follow show up in an activity feed with their reviews, lists and progress. Make too many lists and you can file them into folders. It's free, with an optional Backer plan from $3 a month that adds a personal stats page, removes ads and allows some widget customization.
If your relationship with games is partly social, partly about writing and reading reviews, Backloggd is hard to beat at that, and the community is the best part. Worth knowing before you commit: it runs in a browser, on your phone or desktop, not as a native app. For some people that's a shrug. For others it decides the whole thing.
The catch: a backlog is rarely only games!
So picture that Tuesday night again. You froze because the game you'd pick was competing for those two hours with the show you're three episodes into, the novel on your nightstand, and the podcast a friend keeps recommending. All four live in separate apps that have no idea the others exist. A games-only tracker, however good, can only ever speak for one of them.
That's the gap LaterRex is built around. It holds your games next to your movies, TV, books, podcasts and music, so on a free evening you can answer "what do I actually feel like tonight" in one place. On top of that, you get to choose from games your friends recommended to you - making it that much easier to select! Your Steam library imports straight in, and it lands beside films from IMDb, Letterboxd, Trakt and TV Time, books from Goodreads, and music from Apple Music. One pile, finally, instead of five.
The part Backloggd's design points away from
There's a second difference, and it's the one most people end up caring about. LaterRex treats recommendations as a first-class thing. When a friend won't shut up about a game, you save it the second they say it, and it waits for you with their name attached so you remember whose fault it was when you love it. You can see what friends are playing and reading, and they get a notification when you finish something they sent you.
It's not a feed and not a review wall. Backloggd's whole shape is public and community-facing, which is exactly why people like it, and LaterRex goes the other way on purpose: closer to a group chat of taste than a social network, with lists you can keep private, share with a few friends, or publish to the web if you want to. There's also a hand-built Discover section for when you want a prompt instead of a blank slate, and Rex, our funny mascot, plus collectible fan art from credited artists that you unlock as you track. And you won't run into ads anywhere in it. Backloggd's free site is ad-supported, with the Backer plan there to switch them off, while LaterRex stays ad-free on both the free and paid tiers. That one felt non-negotiable for something you open to wind down.
Backloggd vs LaterRex at a glance
| Backloggd | LaterRex | |
|---|---|---|
| Built for | Logging, rating and reviewing games inside a player community. | Keeping your games in the same place as everything else you watch, read and hear, and trading picks with friends. |
| Media covered | Games only. | Games, movies, TV, books, podcasts, audiobooks and music, plus your own custom items. |
| Where it lives | A website, in a desktop or mobile browser. | A native iOS app that securely syncs over iCloud. |
| Bringing your stuff in | Imports your played games from Steam. | Steam for games, IMDb, Letterboxd, Trakt and TV Time for screen, Goodreads for books, Apple Music for music. |
| The social side | Public reviews, follower activity feed, community lists. | Private recommendations with the sender's name attached, a nudge when a friend finishes your pick, and no public feed or chat. |
| Ratings and reviews | A community average on every game, plus your own written reviews. | Your own ratings, reviews and journals per item, re-plays and re-watches included. |
| Finding the next thing | A big game database with trending and popular titles. | Hand-picked Discover collections, a Trending feed, New Releases, or a classic ol’ search. |
| Stats | A personal stats page on the paid Backer plan. | Taste profile plus play, watch and listen time, with all-time tops and fun facts, included. |
| Ads | Free site has ads | None, ever, on the free or the paid tier. |
| Price | Free, optional Backer plan from $3 a month. | Free, optional upgrade at $2.99 a month. |
Which one's for you
Go with Backloggd if games are the only thing, full stop, and half the joy is rating them, reviewing them and seeing what other players thought. It's an excellent home for exactly that. Reach for LaterRex if "my backlog" is really shorthand for everything stacking up across your free time, and you'd rather those recommendations live in one app than vanish from your memory or notes. The deciding question is whether the pile you're trying to tame is only made of games.
Frequently asked questions
Is Backloggd free?
Yes. Backloggd is free to use, with an optional Backer plan from $3 a month that adds a personal stats page, removes ads and allows some widget customization.
Is LaterRex free?
Yes. The core app is free, and there's an optional $2.99 a month upgrade for a few extras. The free version holds up on its own.
Can I import my Steam library into both?
Backloggd can pull in your played Steam games, and LaterRex imports from Steam as well, alongside IMDb, Letterboxd, Trakt, TV Time, Goodreads and Apple Music, so your games arrive sitting next to everything else.
Do I have to track more than games to get anything out of LaterRex?
No. Many people use it mainly for games. The difference only matters the day you want your shows, books or podcasts in the same place, which is usually the day it earns its keep.