Football season kicks off with the Hall of Fame Game on August 6, and we spent the entire offseason making Online Football Squares better for the people who actually run the boards. If you hosted a squares game with us last season, a lot has changed. Here is the full rundown.
You asked, we listened. Nearly every update below started as an email from a player or organizer running a real board. Keep them coming, because this is how the site gets built.
The short version
Bulk Add Players is the feature we heard requested most. If you are collecting names in a group chat or on a sheet of paper, you no longer have to claim squares one at a time on everyone's behalf. As the organizer, open your board, hit Bulk Add, and paste a list of names, one per line. Need to give someone multiple squares? Type "Sarah x3" and Sarah gets three. You can have the squares placed randomly across the board or filled in order, and the whole batch lands at once.
Pick For Me helps on the player side. Some people agonize over which square to grab, even though every square has the same chance before numbers are drawn. Now players can tap Pick For Me, choose how many squares they want, and let the site grab random open squares for them. It is the fastest way to get a hesitant group off the fence.
Max squares per player gives organizers control over board balance. If you want to make sure no one person grabs a quarter of the grid, set a limit when you create your game, or leave it unlimited. The board enforces it automatically, so you do not have to play referee.
The moment the row and column numbers get revealed is the best part of squares, and organizers now have two ways to do it. You can randomize the numbers with one tap like always, or choose Enter Manually, which is useful if your group drew numbers out of a hat in person and you just need the board to match. Either way, numbers can only be assigned once, so there are no take-backs and no disputes. If you are curious about timing the reveal, our guide on what makes a good grid covers it.
We also added friendly reminders so the reveal never gets forgotten. When your board fills up before kickoff, you will see a celebration banner letting you know it is time to assign numbers. And if the game has already started and numbers still are not assigned, the board will flag it for you clearly, because winners cannot be tracked until those numbers are locked in.
This one was overdue. When you create a game, you can now optionally add an email address, and if you ever forget your organizer password, you can request a reset link and get right back in. A couple of notes on how we built it, because we know people care about this:
If you did not get the verification email the first time, there is now a resend option built right into your organizer controls.
Groups that play together tend to keep playing together. When a game finishes, organizers will see a Rematch button that spins up a brand new board for the next game in seconds, and you can choose to carry your entire player list over, with everyone keeping their same squares or starting fresh. It is perfect for groups that run a board every week and do not want to rebuild from scratch each time. If that sounds like your crew, our weekly squares group guide is worth a read.
Plenty of boards get created before the organizer realizes we track scores automatically, and until now those games were stuck entering scores by hand. Not anymore. A manual board can be connected to a real scheduled matchup at any point before the game ends, even mid-game. Hit Link Live Scoring in your organizer controls, pick the matchup, confirm which side of your board is which team, and from that moment scores, winners, and game info all update on their own.
And if you linked the wrong game, or your group decides to follow a different matchup, boards that have not kicked off yet get a Switch Game option. Your squares, numbers, and settings all stay exactly where they are. Only the game being tracked changes.
Two upgrades are waiting for the first live game of the season:
See who is currently holding the winning square. While a game is live, the scoreboard now highlights which square would win the current period if the score held, with a subtle pulse on the board and in the winners list. Half the fun of squares is the sweating between scores, and now everyone can see exactly who is sweating.
Unclaimed squares are labeled clearly. If a winning square happens to be one nobody claimed, the scoreboard says so plainly instead of showing an empty space. No more confusion about whether the site glitched. It just means that square was up for grabs and nobody took it.
A bunch of smaller improvements shipped along the way:
Everything above is live right now. Whether you are setting up a board for the Hall of Fame Game, Week 1, or your college team's opener, it takes about a minute to create a game and share the link with your group. As always, Online Football Squares is completely free and just for fun, and the only thing on the line is bragging rights.
Have an idea for a feature you would like to see? We build this site around what organizers ask for. Several of the updates above started as a suggestion from someone just like you. Reach out anytime.
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Ryan Parker
Ryan builds and runs OnlineFootballSquares.com, and has been organizing squares games for family gatherings and office parties for years. That is exactly why the site exists. He personally answers every support email. Questions or corrections? Get in touch.