All thirty-two, free, from the first launch

All thirty-two counties are in Gaelic Star and all thirty-two are free. Every one of them is there the first time you open the game. Nothing is locked and there is nothing to buy. There is no in-app store and there are no ads, and no county has to be unlocked by winning something first.

Gaelic Star is a free Gaelic football manager game for iPhone. It came out on 4 September 2026 and it runs on iOS 15.0 or later. You take one county and you manage it. You pick the fifteen, you set how they play, and you play the matches yourself in 3D under the 2025 rules. You can simulate a match instead when you would rather see the result than play it.

Where a county starts, and where it can finish

Every county starts at one of four levels: Emerging, Developing, Strong or Elite. That level is a starting position and it is not a verdict on the county. It sets how good the panel is on the day you take the job, how hard that job is to get in the first place, and how much credit you earn for beating a county ranked above you. A provincial final with an Emerging county does more for your name than a quarter-final with an Elite one.

It also sets what the county board asks of you in your first season, and you are told the ask on the day you take the job. An Elite county asks you to win silverware. A Strong county asks you to reach the provincial final. A Developing county asks you to finish in the top half of the division, and an Emerging county asks you to stay in it.

After that it moves. The other thirty-one counties are being managed as well, and they are judged the way you are judged, so a well-run Emerging county climbs and a badly-run Elite one slides. The strongest counties in the game a few seasons in are not the same ones you started with.

Which county should you take?

There is no right answer here, and no county is a tutorial. An Elite county hands you a panel that can win now and a county board that expects it to. An Emerging county hands you a weaker panel and a longer job, and far more credit for anything you win with it. If you want the simplest way in, take the county you are from, because you will care about the result.

The four tables below list every county, its colours and where it starts. The colours are the real county colours. Ten of the thirty-two carry a shade that was read off a studio photograph of the actual jersey or sock rather than a value typed in from memory, and Kerry is one of them. Kerry's green came back darker and warmer than the green the rest of the country shares, so Kerry has its own now. Every county has two strips in the game, a home and a change, and three of them have a third.

Leinster

Twelve of the thirty-two are in Leinster. Dublin start Elite. Kilkenny start lower than any county in the game, because Kilkenny is a hurling county and the panel you inherit says so.

Munster

Munster has six. Kerry start with the strongest panel in the game, and with a board asking for silverware in the first season.

Connacht

Connacht has five. Galway and Mayo start Elite, and Leitrim starts lower than every county except Kilkenny.

Ulster

Ulster has nine. Donegal and Tyrone start Elite, Armagh and Derry start Strong, and no province begins with more counties in the top two levels.

County colours, and no crests

The colours are here because colours are facts about places, and a fact about a place is free to use. A crest is not a fact about a place, it belongs to somebody, so there is not one in the game and not one on this page. Every kit in Gaelic Star is an original design built out of the county's own two colours.

Get it on iPhone

Free. iOS 15.0 or later.