Start with Terraria - it is the same loop with a sword in it
If you want the closest thing to Stardew Valley that a group can play together, Terraria is the pick. It is a 2D world you dig into, build in and slowly improve, it supports up to eight players, and it runs on everything including phones. The feeling is the same - you log in, you potter, the world is a bit better than it was - with combat and boss fights where Stardew has festivals and fishing.
If you want the building and the open-ended nothing-in-particular rather than the progression, Minecraft is the better answer and the one that scales to the biggest group. If what you liked was specifically the calm, with no threat at all, PowerWash Simulator 2 is a stranger recommendation that lands remarkably well.
First, the reason most people end up searching this
A lot of people arrive here not because they finished Stardew Valley but because they tried to play it with a friend and hit a wall. Stardew Valley's multiplayer is same-platform only. A Switch farm cannot take a PC friend. A PlayStation farm cannot take an Xbox one. You can both own the game outright and still not be able to play it together, which is a genuinely frustrating thing to discover after paying twice.
If that is why you are here, the thing you need is not a Stardew-like at all - it is a cosy co-op game that crossplays. On the list below, Minecraft, PowerWash Simulator 2, Moving Out 2, Overcooked! All You Can Eat and Human: Fall Flat all support cross-platform play. Terraria is partial - it crossplays across most platforms when everyone is on the same version, which is worth checking before the group buys. The crossplay status is flagged on every pick.
What actually makes a game "like Stardew Valley"
It is worth being precise, because the obvious reading - farming - is the least important part. Four things do the work.
Nobody can lose, and nobody is competing. There is no scoreboard and no way to fail the evening. That is what makes it playable with a partner, a parent or a friend who does not play games, and it is the single biggest reason people want more of it.
The world persists between sessions. Progress is cumulative rather than per-match. You are not starting over each time you log in, which means a half-hour session is still worth having - the thing that makes it survive real schedules.
You can both do your own thing in the same space. One of you mines, one of you decorates, and neither is waiting on the other. Games that force the group to move as a unit feel completely different even when the subject matter matches.
It is slow on purpose. There is no timer pushing you. This is where the party co-op games on this list genuinely diverge - Overcooked and Moving Out are frantic by design - and why they are ranked below the sandboxes despite being excellent.
Judge the picks below against those four, not against whether they have crops. Two of them have no farming whatsoever and are still closer in feel than most farming games would be.
Before you buy for a group
Check the player cap against your actual group. Terraria and Minecraft take eight. Human: Fall Flat takes eight. Overcooked, Moving Out 2 and PowerWash Simulator 2 are built around two to four. A cosy game that splits your group is not cosy.
Decide whether you need a host online.In most of these, somebody's world is the world, so progress sits with that person's save. If your group plays at wildly different times, that matters more than any feature - and our different time zones guide covers how to handle it.
Only one of you may need to pay. Several of these support a single purchase covering two players through Steam Remote Play Together, which is worth knowing before you buy two copies - see our one copy, two players guide.
