Frequently asked questions

Yes. The daily puzzles and all game features are free to play.

GeoTalez has four daily geography games: Connections, Missing Link, Population Target, and True Scale. Each has one official daily challenge made up of three rounds.

Which country shares a border with both countries? Enter a country that shares a land border with each clue country. The clue countries may also border one another. After the round ends, explore the map to review the answer, your guesses, and the clues.

Unlimited mode offers additional play where available. Its challenges are separate from the four official daily results.

The daily set changes at 00:00 UTC. Everyone receives the same scheduled challenge for a date.

Yes. Every game works without an account and saves progress in this browser. Signing in is optional and adds cross-device history.

Connections lets you retry ignitions and undo or restart while arranging the board. Missing Link allows unlimited unique guesses. In Population Target, you can remove a pick for a 10-point penalty and replace it before viewing the challenge result. In True Scale, you can move the slider freely until you press Check; a submitted estimate is final. Practice and archive games are separate from official daily scores.

Connections has three rounds in its daily challenge. Each round starts at 100. Each swap above the shortest verified solution costs 5 points, a failed check costs 8 points, and each hint costs 10 points. A round score cannot go below zero. Revealing the shortest solution makes that round score zero. Your Connections score is the rounded average of the three round scores.

Each of the three rounds starts at 100 points. Each different wrong country costs 15 points. The first-letter hint can be used once per round and costs 10 points. A skipped round scores zero. Your Missing Link daily score is the rounded average of its three round scores.

The daily challenge has three rounds. In each round, choose exactly three different countries. The round scores up to 100 points based on absolute distance from its target population, then loses 10 points for each pick you remove. The score cannot fall below zero. Going over the target is allowed; an over-target total scores the same as a total the same distance below it. Your daily score averages the three round scores.

Two country silhouettes appear together. One stays fixed while you resize the other with a slider. Press Check to lock an estimate for that round and reveal the answer. The daily challenge has three comparisons, and your score averages the three round scores.

It compares country land area. The adjustable country keeps its outline proportions and its displayed area changes with your estimate. It does not use population or compare width alone.

Each round earns points based on the logarithmic distance from the actual area ratio. An estimate twice too large loses the same points as one half as large. The daily score averages all three round scores out of 100.

True Scale uses Natural Earth Admin 0 Countries 1:10m version 5.1.1 for its country silhouettes. The locked 19 October launch puzzle retains the 1:50m country dataset. Land polygons are projected with a spherical equal-area projection for the silhouettes and area ratios. Maritime areas are excluded and Natural Earth de facto boundaries are used. Metropolitan France includes Corsica and excludes its overseas regions; Spain uses the Iberian mainland and Balearics, Portugal the mainland, Norway continental Norway, Italy includes Sicily and Sardinia, and the United States includes its contiguous land, Alaska, and Hawaii.

The game uses a frozen 2024 World Bank population snapshot. Scores use the full published population counts; the interface rounds values to the nearest 0.1 million.

Yes. All four games save official progress in this browser so you can resume after a refresh. True Scale also saves the current slider estimate and submitted round guesses.

An exhaustive shortest-path solver checks arrangements of the nine tiles and finds the smallest number of swaps that lets ignition reach every country. Each published puzzle is validated against that result.

Yes. Open Past puzzles to replay published dates. Archive runs are practice and do not change your official daily score, streak, or statistics.

Your streak grows on consecutive UTC dates when you complete at least one official game available that day. A perfect day means completing every game published for that date. Practice and archive games do not count.

The server calculates scores from each official daily challenge and accepts one result per guest or account, game and UTC date. Each game score is out of 100. Overall daily scores average all four completed game scores and are out of 100; a day appears in the overall ranking after all four games are complete. Seven-day, 30-day, and all-time overall scores average completed daily scores. Ties share a rank. Public puzzles mean anonymous rankings cannot be perfectly cheat-proof.

When you first submit a daily result or open the leaderboard, GeoTalez creates a random nickname and stores a signed, HttpOnly browser cookie. It is not a verified human identity. Clearing site data, private browsing, or another device may create a different guest.

Yes. On the leaderboard page, turn off “Show my guest results” to remove the nickname and scores from public lists. Reset deletes that guest’s ranked results and gives this browser a new nickname. Anonymous community completion totals remain unchanged.

Yes, if you choose to sign in. Verified guest results can be linked to your account without creating duplicate game/date results. Imported local history stays private and does not become ranked.

Guest results are included under a random nickname by default, with a hide control on the leaderboard page. Signed-in account results follow the visibility setting in your profile. Public lists show only a nickname or chosen player name, score, and result count, never an email or account ID.