Play solo

How to play PinPonder

One solo game is five rounds of real photographs, with your choice of timer. A guest room is the same five places played at once by up to 20 people. Here are the rules, the timers, the scoring and the party countdown.

The shape of a game

A game is five rounds, each in a distinct starting area. Free play normally renders that area through Google Street View and Google Maps. If the monthly app allowance is exhausted, it uses the local fallback catalogue: 131 sample areas and 674 real panoramas from 27 countries across five continents. Free play prefers the areas you have played least recently and avoids reopening on the previous game's opening area when there is an alternative. Areas can come round again in a later game.

The daily challenge is the other way in, and it is always a deliberate choice: open the Solo menu and pick today’s daily. The same five-round plan is used for everyone on a given UTC day, played in Moving mode, so the street arrows and W and S work as they do in free play, with 90 seconds a round. One attempt is tracked per browser and device, saved in this browser with its own progress and XP, and it waits there until you choose the daily again; reloading the page or coming back to the game later does not reopen it on its own. There is no online account sync, and no ranked leaderboard is offered. New daily challenges from 3 October 2026 UTC use Google while the monthly allowance remains. Earlier challenges and saved attempts retain their existing imagery policy. The daily date, five starting locations, scores and timer are preserved when you resume; the daily plan is never redrawn because a provider cannot load.

In free play the timer is fixed when the game starts: 30, 60, 90 or 180 seconds for all five rounds, or no clock at all. Changing it starts a new game.

Opening the game at /play starts a fresh random free game each time, so a refresh or a later visit never drops you back into an old location. Your most recent previous game — free or daily — is kept in this browser instead: choose Resume previous game in the Solo menu and confirm, and it returns on the same location and round, with your pin, the rounds already played and the round’s original deadline, replacing the game in progress. Only one previous game is kept, so a more recent played game can replace it — and if browser storage is blocked or full, there may be nothing to resume.

Looking around

The opening view is a real photograph, taken where the camera stood. Drag to pan, or use the arrow keys, and zoom in — a sign unreadable at first is often legible two steps closer.

  • Language and letterforms. Spelling, accents, diacritics, letter shapes.
  • Number plates. Colour, layout, the country strip on the left.
  • Road markings and signage. Sign shapes, colours, fonts, language order.
  • Plants. Species that only grow in particular climates.
  • Building materials and roof shapes. Brick, render, stone, tile.
  • Poles and wires. Wooden or concrete, and how the cables run.
  • Shadows. Angle and direction give the hemisphere and time of day.

Exploring a round

Every round opens on real street imagery with movement available along the road. Look around, zoom in and walk as far as the provider's connected coverage allows before you decide where you are.

  • Walk. Follow the arrows shown on the street imagery. Google rounds use Street View's native directional movement; fallback rounds use PinPonder's forward and back arrows. Keyboard movement remains available where the active provider supports it.
  • Look around. Drag the photograph, or use the arrow keys, to turn on the spot. A new photograph opens on the direction you were already facing.
  • Zoom in. Zoom in for signs, plates and markings, and back out for the wider view.
  • Return to start. The toolbar’s reset control goes back to this round’s starting photograph, whichever photograph along the route that is, and resets the view when you are already standing there.

Movement pauses only while a round's result is on screen. A guess is always measured from the round's resolved starting position, even after you walk elsewhere.

Timers

Choose 30, 60, 90 or 180 seconds per round, or no timer at all. The choice covers every round in the game.

A running timer starts with the round's first photograph and never pauses. Reloading the page, leaving it or walking to a new viewpoint cannot add time, and a game you resume keeps its original deadline. At zero the round scores 0 points and 0 XP, the reveal shows where the photograph was taken, and you move on yourself with Next location — nothing advances on its own.

Placing your pin

The map is where your answer goes. A Google Street View round always uses Google Maps. A fallback Panoramax round uses OpenFreeMap. The game switches the panorama and map as one pair, and displays the active provider's attribution.

  1. Drag the map, and zoom in until roads and city names are readable.
  2. Tap or click to place the pin. Arrow keys move it, and you can drag it again as often as you like.
  3. Switch the distance units between kilometres and miles whenever you want; the choice is saved for later games.
  4. Confirm when you are ready. Moving the pin first costs nothing.

Scoring

A round is worth up to 5,000 points, and a game up to 25,000. A pin within about 100 metres of the source location scores the maximum; after that the score falls away with distance.

A skipped round, or one whose timer runs out, scores zero points and zero XP. The reveal shows the source location before you continue.

A score measures your pin, not the place. An ordinary street corner can be worth 5,000 points, and a spectacular view on the far side of a continent can be worth none.

The passport

Rounds you guess earn experience, and experience moves your level along, so early levels arrive quickly.

  • A guessed round earns 20 XP, plus 1 XP per 250 points, up to 40 XP.
  • Finishing a game adds 50 XP.
  • The passport also counts your current run of consecutive days on which you finished a game.

Four badges mark the milestones:

  • First Detour — first game finished.
  • Five Horizons — five games finished.
  • Close Call — a guessed round within 25 km.
  • Pinpoint — 5,000 points in one round.

The newest 100 finished games are kept, and 20 are shown.

Everything is saved in this browser for this site: the game you are playing now, your most recent previous game, any daily attempt you started, your passport and your preferences. The Solo menu exports it as JSON or clears it in one confirmed step, and Privacy and storage has the detail.

Playing with friends in a guest room

Guest rooms are the casual multiplayer side of PinPonder, at /multiplayer. Nobody needs an account: one player creates a room, and everybody else joins with a nickname and the six-character code — or by following the invite link. A room holds up to 20 players.

Pick a friendly nickname: one word with 2–24 letters or numbers, without spaces or symbols. Inappropriate names are refused. Each name can be used by only one person in a lobby, including different capitalisation or common look-alike spellings.

While the lobby is open, the code is all anyone needs to walk in. Once the match has started, the room is closed to new arrivals: only players who are already in it can reconnect, using a private token saved in their own browser.

  • The countdown is shared. A full three minutes begins when the second player joins, and the host can start sooner once at least two players are in the room. Both paths open the same ten-second countdown for everyone, and joining closes while it runs; if the room falls below two eligible players the clock waits and starts a complete three minutes again for the next pair.
  • Same five places, same order. Every player receives identical areas and an identical starting photograph. Moving is the only play mode, so the street arrows and W and S work exactly as they do in a solo game.
  • 90 seconds a round, after a shared load. Before each round the photograph and the map load behind a cover, and the clock is not running yet: the 90 seconds begin once everybody is ready. If your photograph or map is still loading when the room’s loading limit runs out, you wait for the next round and score zero for that one. Once the round is running, look, walk, decide and confirm your pin inside the 90 seconds. A confirmed guess is final — you cannot move it, and you cannot submit a second one.
  • Waiting is visible, not blank. After you confirm, the scene stays on screen while the rest of the room finishes, so nothing disappears on you.
  • The reveal is shared. A round is revealed as soon as everyone has guessed or the 90 seconds run out. The location, every round score and the standings stay up for 10 seconds, then the next round begins automatically.
  • The finish is a ceremony. After round five the winner is celebrated first, with the full leaderboard and the round-by-round breakdown straight after. Equal top scores share the win. From the leaderboard, Play again together moves everyone still in the room into a fresh lobby automatically: the same players and the same private identity, a new room code, and the scores reset.

Rooms are run by the project’s own server so that every player sees the same countdown and the same reveal. Deadlines are absolute and server-held: closing a tab, refreshing or reconnecting cannot add time, and no browser can write a score or extend a round. A player who drops out keeps their place and can rejoin the room while the match runs; a round they miss scores zero.

This is casual play, not a ranked mode. Guest rooms do not award solo XP, do not touch your solo passport or daily records, and no score from them is an official record. There is no chat: names, codes and pins are all a room ever carries. Finished rooms are removed after one hour.

When something goes wrong

Reloads, blocked storage, lost progress

Does reloading the page lose my game?

Reloading the page, or coming back to /play later, starts a fresh random free game. Your most recent previous game — free or daily — is kept in this browser instead, and Resume previous game in the Solo menu brings it back after a confirmation: the same location and round, your pin, the rounds already played and its original deadline, replacing the game in progress. Only one previous game is kept, so a more recent played game can replace it, and the daily challenge likewise starts or resumes only when you choose it in the Solo menu.

What if my browser blocks site storage?

The game still plays; what stops working is everything that has to be remembered: the passport, badges and units — and the previous game, so Resume previous game may have no game to bring back. If storage is only full rather than blocked, Clear all solo progress in the Solo menu frees the space the game is allowed to use.

What happens if I lose connection in a room?

Your place is kept and the clocks keep running: a disconnect pauses nothing and removes nobody. The game reconnects when your connection returns. After closing the tab, reopen Multiplayer in the same browser profile and choose Rejoin game under Your saved rooms. Opening the original invite link also restores your saved session. You return to the current phase with your confirmed guess and scores intact. A round you miss scores zero, and the match carries on without you until you are back.

Once the match has started, the room is closed to new players: only people already in it can reconnect. Recovery works while the room still exists and its saved session is available in this browser (up to five rooms, for up to 24 hours). Clearing site data, using another browser or device, or explicitly leaving the room prevents recovery. When browser storage is blocked, follow the warning shown in the game; closing a private browsing session may also clear its data.

Can progress be recovered elsewhere?

Nothing is uploaded, so there is no account to recover. Export progress (JSON) in the Solo menu gives you a personal copy to keep, but there is no import, so a different browser, device or web address starts empty.

What is here now

  • free solo play at /play, five rounds per game;
  • an optional timer of 30, 60, 90 or 180 seconds per round, fixed for the whole game;
  • guest rooms at /multiplayer for two to 20 players, with a three-minute lobby countdown or a host start once two have joined, a shared ten-second countdown, and 90 seconds a round once photographs and maps are ready;
  • Google Street View and Google Maps while the conservative monthly app allowance remains, with a local fallback of 131 areas and 674 panoramas from 27 countries across five continents;
  • progress, badges and settings saved in this browser, and nowhere else.

Google rounds show real Google Street View imagery with Google's required attribution. Fallback photographs are real camera images from Panoramax contributors, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0 and credited through a Photo credits control. The gameplay pictures on this site are captures of the real game. Branding illustration is decorative: never a clue and never geographic evidence.

Reduced-motion preferences are honoured, sound is off, and nothing autoplays.

Five rounds are waiting

A new place. A fresh set of clues. Your next guess.

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