Background Nowadays, the youth are more engaging with their more advanced smartphones having high-quality graphics and gaming features. However, existing literature depicts that adolescents suffer from several forms of psychological problems including mental health, depression, loneliness, insomnia and low self-control due to mobile game addiction. Therefore, this study aims to find the prevalence and motivating factors for mobile game addiction among university students of Bangladesh. Methods A cross-sectional survey was carried out to collect the required information from 1125 students of three universities in Bangladesh. Descriptive statistics, χ2 test and ordinal regression model are employed to meet the objective of this study. Results The findings reveal that male students are more likely to show addictive behaviours than their counterparts in the context of mobile game addiction. The results depict that loneliness, duration of using smartphones and playing mobile games, and source of entertainment are the main cause of mobile addiction. Also, more than half of the respondents (54.3%) are severely addicted to mobile games who were influenced by friends and YouTube gamers to play games. Moreover, students are suffering from several physical problems such as headaches, eye discomfort, blurry vision and ear discomfort. Conclusion Considering the findings of this paper, the authors suggest that the authorities should consider this immediately and arrange a positive entertainment environment to prevent students from mobile games. Furthermore, it is necessary to encourage students to participate in sports or other extracurricular activities that may be helpful to lessen mobile game addiction among students in Bangladesh.