Walk. Claim. Hold your ground.
Turf turns your neighbourhood into a game board. Here's how it works, how to win, and how to stay safe while you do it.
🗺️ How to play
- Go outside with the app open. The world is split into hexagonal tiles about 150 m across.
- Stay inside an unclaimed tile for 30 seconds. Walking around inside it counts. Watch the ring at the bottom of the screen fill up.
- Claim it, but only if you want to. You decide how claiming works (tap your name → Safety & privacy): Auto-claim, Ask me (you tap "Claim" each time), or Off (explore without claiming anything).
- The tile is yours. It turns your colour and shows your name to everyone. It's shielded for 24 hours.
- Come back on other days to make it stronger. Neglected tiles fade.
- Explore! Every new tile, new part of town and daily quest earns XP. XP can never be taken away.
🏰 Tile strength
Stronger tiles look more solid on the map and take much longer to steal. The best defence is walking your turf regularly, not rushing to it when someone attacks.
⚔️ Challenges
You can't just walk into someone's tile and take it. You have to challenge for it.
- Stand in their tile and tap ⚔️ Challenge.
- Hold the tile: 1 minute per ★ of strength (1 to 5 minutes). The ring turns red. If you leave the tile or lose signal for more than a minute, the challenge is abandoned.
- The owner gets a warning. If they get to the tile in time, they defend it, the challenge fails, and they earn XP.
- Win, and the tile is yours at ★ level 1, shielded for 24 hours. Every battle shows in both players' profiles.
Never rush, run across roads or take risks to defend a tile. Losing one is fine: your XP and achievements stay, and revenge is cheaper. More challenge types (such as quiz questions) are coming.
🏰 Landmarks
Over 40,000 castles, palaces, museums, zoos, monuments, historic sites and parks are on the map. Stand in a landmark's tile for 20 seconds to discover it. Each one counts once, for your collection.
A landmark's tile is also worth extra territory points (up to +6), so expect competition for them. The 🎯 screen shows undiscovered landmarks near you. Landmark data comes from Overture Maps. If one is in the wrong place, closed or on private land, tap it and press Report. Respect opening hours, tickets and private property: discovering a landmark never requires going inside.
⭐ XP, levels & quests
Territory can be lost. XP, your level, streak and achievements can't. The best way to earn is to go somewhere new.
Daily quests: three new ones every day (tap 🎯). One is always about exploring somewhere new. Achievements: 12 badges, from First Flag to Cartographer (1,000 tiles discovered). Leaderboards: territory (near you and global) and This week, which counts XP earned since Monday, so anyone can top it.
🏆 Scoring
Your score is the total points of the tiles you currently own. If someone takes a tile, its points go to them. The leaderboard has two tabs: Near you (your city area) and Global. Tap any player to see their whole turf.
🧭 The maps
Territory shows who owns what. Each player's land has its own colour and border, and yours glows. A dotted green edge marks a bonus green tile.
Explored covers everything you haven't visited in fog. Every tile you walk through clears it for good. Tap any tile to see who owns it, what it's worth and whether you've been there.
The Layers button switches the base map (OpenStreetMap or satellite) and turns the hex grid, green spaces and water on or off.
🤝 Fair play
- Claim on foot, by wheelchair, by bike or on a run. Human-powered movement only.
- One account per person.
- Choose a name that's fine for everyone to see.
- No GPS spoofing, location-faking apps or emulators.
- No claiming from a car, bus, train or scooter.
- No sharing accounts or farming tiles with extra accounts.
- No harassing, following or confronting other players over territory. It's a game.
Breaking these rules can lead to claims being removed or accounts being suspended.
🦺 Safety first
- Look up. You don't need to watch the screen. Hold your phone at your side, and a vibration tells you when a tile is claimed. (Keep the screen on: a locked phone pauses the timer.)
- Stay on public land. Use public paths, parks and pavements. Respect closing times and signs.
- Tell someone where you're going, especially for long routes or after dark.
- Dress for the weather, carry water and keep your phone charged.
- Under 16? Play with a parent or guardian.
- Never use the app while crossing a road, cycling in traffic or driving.
- Never trespass, climb fences or walls, or enter railways, building sites or private gardens.
- Never go into water or onto ice, mudflats or riverbanks to reach a tile. Water is on the map for scenery, not for claiming.
- No tile is worth risking yourself. If a place feels unsafe, leave.
🔒 Privacy
Your claims are public. Every player can see the tiles you own and when you claimed them. Over time that shows the areas where you spend time. You're in control of what you claim:
- Home privacy zone. Tap your name → Safety & privacy and set a zone around your home (about 150–600 m). You can never claim inside it, and any tiles you already own there are released straight away. Only you can see the zone, shown in red on your map.
- Ask me / Off. Switch claiming to "Ask me" to decide tile by tile, or "Off" to just explore. Nothing gets claimed without you choosing it.
- Think about your workplace, your school and other places you visit regularly too, not only your home.
- Your username is public. Don't use your full real name.
- Other players never see your exact GPS position, only which tiles you own.
- Only your own account can see your Explored map (the tiles you've visited).