We have done both, but I try not to have redundant play sets when we get new ones. If I have Playmobil Pirates, I don’t need Lego Pirates, too. We do accept hand-me-down toys, so these are, of course, accepted happily and graciously no matter what we already have.

We do both as well and all the boys play with them all, sometimes together, but in general the younger kids get Playmobil already assembled by Santa and the older boys get Lego in the box.  Some Lego sets are just too difficult for the younger kids and they want to play right away.

We do only Legos but since we have so many, way too many, I put a moratorium on buying any more.

Ahhh… the happy memories both bring up! Our boys (now 25 and 23) are 2.4 years apart. the eldest was started on (it is like an addiction!) lego at 4 cuz he was so dang good with his hands. little bro needed some great little guys to play with too, easily differentiated as his own, NOT his brother’s, so playmobil made sense. they each collected their respective sets (unlike Jen, theirs were by choice “redundant”) and the play was endlessly imaginative. it was a sad day (not until 8th grade, mind you) that we packed those wonderful figures away for the next generation.

I’ve heard of playmobile, but I’m not very familiar with it.  We have one basic set of legos, and will get more intricate sets when my son gets older.

BOTH!
BOTH!
BOTH!

Both!  Playmobil hold up to more strenuous play without falling apart.  They have a 1/2/3 series for very young children that doesn’t have all the extra pieces.  That was our first set.  Our last set we bought was an Egyptian ship - this was requested by all my kids aged 21 - 10!  My kids have spent more hours setting up elaborate neighborhoods, castles, etc. with the Playmobil.  And guess what?  The older kids have used it to make movies to post to Youtube or Teachertube.  My kids always had fun with Lego’s too - but it was mostly the putting together they enjoyed.  They didn’t play with them as much once they were put together as they did the Playmobil.  I like the idea about not duplicating themes.

We just have legos, but I wonder how much of this is due to the fact that our oldest boys are twins. They have never been into characters or action figures, always preferring to be the characters in their interactive play themselves instead of through figurines. I don’t remember a time when this wasn’t the case. We have tons of legos but they have never shown any interest in Playmobile. We had Little People during their preschool years and they never really played with those either but my now preschooler loves them. Hmm, interesting question.

Our boys are 9, 11 and 12.  They are in the Lego only camp.  They are in general not action figure or pretend play kids though.  They love to build the sets or design their own things and make elaborate displays with them (never mind that we don’t have room for the displays).  My oldest son has graduated to Lego Mindstorms now, which is their robotics line.  I can’t believe what he has built with them, and the computer programming that he has taught himself to do it.  They are not cheap though.  Luckily he has a godmother/aunt who is a teacher and Lego lover herself and she had a bunch of the sets laying around that she gave him to get him started.

We have both and for both genders.  I try to keep the Legos in the bedrooms and the Playmobile in the toyroom, because I can’t tell what goes with what, and that bugs me.  The kids always know though.  And my 8th grader still plays with both of them, generally, though, he likes to set up scenes and then photograph them.

We have both toys, but the boys gravitate towards the Legos, especially as they get older.

We enjoy both.  My boys were very excited when we discovered Playmobil.  They have accumulated quite a few Playmobil things and actually mix with Legos to create very elaborate lands for their gerbils and hamsters to play in.  As others have mentioned, my oldest (10) likes to make movies with his sets.  He is currently saving all his money to complete the African animals playset.  My youngest (6) is able to build and play with Playmobil on his own, while he needs lots of help with the Legos.  Playmobil holds together well to allow for more play.  We are fortunate to live near the Playmobil Fun Park, so we have had the opportunity to play with lots of the sets to decide which we would like to have at home, and they always offer a nice discount in December.  I am very thankful for my dear friend who introduced me to Playmobil a few years ago.  I think I enjoy it as much as my boys!

We also have both Lego and Playmobil, and we have both girl and boy sets.  My kids happily play together.  However, I NEVER allow both Lego and Playmobil to be out and played with at the same time.  Its either one or the other or I lose my mind.

We have both sets and one commenter above made an important distinction:  Legos allow for more creative building play, but Playmobil is better for action figure type play.  We have all kinds of Playmobil: from cowboys to Civil War soldiers to Noah’s ark, Roman soldiers, Vikings, pirates, knights and castles, and police and fire sets.  My almost-12yo loves these and relives historical events through these sets.  Last year when we studied Lewis and Clark he converted the Viking and pirate ships into long boats, found “guys” to resemble Lewis and Clark and their dog and reenacted their expedition.  When we studied the American Revolution and Civil War eras, he did the same thing. His 6yo brother joins in and learns from him about history.  This year, he’s studying ancient Egypt and the 2011 new sets in Playmobil are from this time period.  I think that Playmobil stays more true to history than Lego, which seems to add a modern edge to everything (witness their Egyptian line).  The other comment made above is that Playmobil characters and objects don’t fall apart like Lego things, which eases the frustrations of kids younger than 8.  I’m the mother of 4 boys but if I ever have a granddaughter, I will definitely get one of the Playmobil doll’s houses for her!

Our son loved complicated legos at the age of 3 (surprised us!), and has been a lego creationist ever since.  He has a 4x6 foot lego table (a $50 white table from IKEA), and all of the sets are in marked bins around it.  I would take the title off the box, and maybe a picture and tape it to the clear bin.  It’s the “lego lab”.  He’s the kind of kid who puts a set together and then, when he’s good and ready, takes it apart to build something else.  He knows where to find different pieces and has made some really complicated cars and planes.  When he was little (he’s 13 now) it was all about re-making fun sets his own way.  We took pictures of each cool idea and put them in a little photo album so he could remember them once they were taken apart, and that’s fun to look at!  Legos have been a huge part of his life, and now we have a future engineer on our hands.  He still enjoys making things, but now he’s a bit busy with school!!  Playmobile is great for imaginative play, but legos are great for creating things…2 very different types of wonderful toys!!

both, but we try to limit the little plastic toys to only those 2, so no K’NEX, no plastic action figures, etc

Both! keep them in the flat under the bed boxes for easy access, clean up and rummaging.

even my 4 year old daughter builds unique sculptures from the standard size legos and my 6 year old recently built a sculpture of me - including my 9 month prego belly! I cherish their lego creations more than drawings sometimes!

I want to make my own Advent wreath and am looking for a circular wooden frame that I can use.  Any ideas.  Or any ideas how to do this.  Thanks

We are huge Playmobil fans.  This might be the first Christmas that I won’t have the joy of spending Christmas afternoon putting together a large Playmobil set.  sniff.  I really do love it and I love Playmobil.  But this Christmas will be more of a Lego Christmas for 8yo and 11yo boys.

We have lots of legos from friends and family as gifts…from tag/yard sales…from hand me down toys.  I got a HUGE lego table off of craigslist a few yrs back.  they love it.  we got a set of playmobile 2 yrs ago for Christmas for one of my boys (we have 4) and it was a hit but the pieces got lost within about 2 weeks.  Little by little, they were lsot and I just dont’ see it worth the $.  Too much $.

Our family belongs in the “neither” group.  More plastic, choking hazzard, get sucked up by vacuum & hurt the feet in the middle of the night.  Always was plain wooden blocks for us.

We tried both, but playmobil didn’t work here. I think because my son doesn’t ‘role-play’. He likes to build and to drive with the cars he builds, he never uses the lego puppets. He had a playmobil airplane, he knew how to fly with it but that was all. Luckily we were able to sell it. I used to love both playmobil and lego when I was a kid, my mom kept the lego! My mother in law threw it out, my husband had loads…

Of course i’d prefer playmobil. Playmobil features more learning concepts with their toys. Children learn more and have more fun because playmobil toys are entertaining.

I’d rather choose Playmobil toys because it offers different variants of toys. It is very safe for kids as well as their toys were age appropriate like Playmobil 1.2.3 for 3 years old below. They have the realistic approach compare to Lego.

I also choose playmobil, it is more safe to play and it also have learning features, adorable characters compared to lego, the disadvantage of lego is the small parts needed to make a building, person, places etc. It can harm kids when they accidentally swallow the small parts.

I found this page while trying to find a comparison between Playmobil and the old vintage Fisher Price Play Family sets. I have several of the FP sets from my own childhood and my daughter enjoys them, but Playmobil is so much more detailed… I’m just curious which one kids might play with more if given the choice. Does anyone have any of those old FP sets?

I must say that both toy companies were really great for creating an entertaining and developmental set of toys. But I rather choose playmobil between the two because it allows the kids to imagine and role play using the pieces of the set. It brings kids into different dimension and places base on the set up they choose to buy.