Your players open one link on the phone already in their hand, claim their squares, and follow the live board while the game is being played.
Pick the NFL or college football game your group is watching, set your price per square and the prizes, and you have a board in a few minutes without installing anything yourself.
Players tap it, claim the squares they want, and enter a name and email. There's no app store to visit and no sign-up to get through first — their spot on the board is set up for them as they claim, so there's no password for anyone to invent or forget.
Scores update on their own, the grid marks the square on track to take the quarter being played, and the winner gets worked out for every scoring period.
100 squares available
Playing as: You. Choose your squares!
Built on three core principles: Easy, Fun, and Fast. If this is the first board you've run on a phone rather than a printed sheet, our full guide to hosting a football squares pool covers everything from pricing the squares to paying people out.
Nothing for anyone to install
Play Squares runs in the browser your players already have open, so nobody visits an app store, waits on a download, or frees up storage before they can claim a square.
Mobile-first, not just mobile-friendly
Almost everyone will only ever see your board on a phone during the game, so the grid, the claim flow, and the prize list were designed on that screen first rather than squeezed down from a desktop layout.
Scores and winners handled for you
We pull the live score for the NFL and NCAA football and work out the winning square at the end of every quarter, so nobody has to follow the game with a pen and a printed grid.
See who's winning while it's still being played
The grid highlights the square that takes the quarter if the score holds where it is, so your players can check for themselves instead of texting you about it every ten minutes.
One link fills the whole board
Send the same link to a group chat, a work channel, or an email list, and watch the open squares disappear as people claim the ones they want.
The money goes straight to you
Players pay you directly through one-click Venmo, Cash App, PayPal, or Zelle links on the board, and you keep one record of who has settled up.
Set the prizes however your group plays
Pay out the four quarters, add the reverse score rule, or write your own custom prize, and the board keeps track of every one of them for you.
The same board across every season
Run an NFL board one weekend and a college football board the next, then carry the same pass into NCAA basketball, the NBA, and baseball.
| Our App | PDFs/Sheets | Other Sites | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Automatic winner detection | Sometimes | ||
| Real-time updates | No/Manual | Sometimes | |
| Mobile-optimized | Yes/Limited | Varies | |
| Setup time | <5 minutes | 10-15+ minutes | 5-10 minutes |
| Fun animations | Rarely | ||
| Flexible payment options | Sometimes | ||
| Multiple games on 1 board | Rarely | ||
| Board Creation Limits | Unlimited | Per board | Per board |
| Cost | One Game Pass - $12.99 | Free | Free to $25/board |
Real feedback from people running Play Squares boards.
“After years of using pen and paper, this was such a welcome upgrade. It was easy to set up and share for our Super Bowl party.”
“As a host, this saves so much time and eliminates manual errors. The interface is easy for players, and I'll use this for every event I host.”
“Even my older uncle had no issues picking squares. I felt confident sharing it with everyone, and it was completely worth the price.”
For almost every pool, no, and the download is the part worth thinking hardest about. A squares board only works when the whole group is on it, so anything standing between your players and their squares costs you a filled board. A link opens on every phone in the room, and an install only opens on the phones whose owners got around to it.
The two native squares apps sitting at the top of the app stores tell the story better than we could. The iOS app named simply Squares holds 2.4 stars from 9 ratings and won't install at all below iOS 18.6, which quietly rules out anyone whose phone is a few years old. The other, 10x10 Sports Squares, does better at 3.3 stars, though that's still only 36 ratings across more than a decade on the store. Ask twenty party guests to download either one and you'll spend the first quarter helping three of them find it.
| Option | What your players have to do |
|---|---|
| A native iOS or Android app | Find it in the store, install it, and run an operating system new enough to open it |
| A pool site that calls itself an app | Open a link, though several of them still ask every player to register first |
| Play Squares in the browser | Tap your link and claim their squares straight away, with no install and no sign-up to get through first |
Losing the install only helps if what opens on the phone is any good, and plenty of squares tools are a desktop grid shrunk until it technically fits. Play Squares is built mobile-first: a 10x10 grid you can read without pinching, squares big enough to claim with a thumb while the game is on, and the live winner marker and payment links sitting where you can reach them one-handed from the couch.
There's a real case for one, and it's worth saying out loud. If the same small group plays constantly and won't mind keeping an icon on the home screen, a native app gives them a shortcut and a push notification that a browser tab can't match. Play Squares doesn't send game notifications today, so if a buzz on the phone the moment the numbers are drawn matters most to you, that's an honest reason to look elsewhere.
A Super Bowl squares app and a football squares app are doing identical work on different weekends, so there's no second tool to find in February. Set the game, share the link, and the quarters pay out the way they did in October, which also means the group already knows how to use it by the time the big one comes around. Our Super Bowl squares page covers the version written for a party crowd.
The rules are the same whichever way you run it, and the arguments almost always come from something nobody agreed on beforehand. Our rules guide covers overtime, ties, and repeat winners, and the payouts guide walks through splitting the prize pool.
The host pass is the only money that ever comes to us, and your players never pay anything to claim a square. What they put into the prize pool goes straight to you through your own payment links, because we never hold prize money or pay out winners ourselves.
Best for single-event hosts.
Best for hosting multiple pools over a short period, such as playoffs, tournaments, or busy game stretches.
Best for frequent or season-long hosts.
30-Day Satisfaction Guarantee
If you're not satisfied, we'll refund you. No questions asked.