Questions, answered

Is Linkster free?

Yes. Every game is free to play, as often as you like, and it's supported by advertising.

Do I need an account?

No. You can play everything as a guest. A free account (just a username and password, no email) saves your results, keeps your Daily Drive streak going across devices, tracks your stats and achievements, and puts you on the leaderboards.

How does scoring work?

• Daily Drive and Target: the fewer moves the better, measured against par. Hints and misses are counted too and break ties.
• Chain Links: golf scoring. Every move, wrong guess and hint is a stroke (so is letting the shot clock run out), and your score is how far over or under par you finish the round.
• Classic: your score is the length of the chain you build before three strikes (or one, in sudden death).
• Hurry-Up: the number of pairs you link in sixty seconds.

How is par worked out?

For the Daily Drive and Target, par is the shortest route between the two players through well-known players, using colleges in the NFL, colleges and draft classes in the NBA, and teams in MLB. Any link counts when you play, so a shared number or team can beat par. In Chain Links, par is the hole's "book route" plus one stroke: the book route is a birdie, and anything shorter is an eagle or better.

Where does the player data come from?

From openly licensed sources: nflverse for the NFL (2000 to today), hoopR / sportsdataverse for the NBA (2002 to today), and the Lahman Baseball Database for MLB. The data credits page lists every source, its license, and what we changed.

Why didn't a link I know count?

Jersey numbers and teams only count for seasons inside the range you're playing, so a number a player wore before that range won't link him. Colleges count whenever he was there. A few gaps come from the data itself: baseball has no jersey numbers, and its college records stop in 2014.

If you think we've got a player wrong, tell us at team@playlinkster.com and we'll look.

When does the Daily Drive change?

At midnight US Eastern time, every day. Everyone gets the same puzzle. Your first finish of the day is the one that's ranked; replays are just for fun. Finish on back-to-back days to build a streak.

Does a wrong answer cost me anything?

It depends on the game. In Classic a false link is a strike; in Chain Links it's a stroke; in the Daily Drive and Target it's counted as a miss; in Hurry-Up it only costs time. Typos and names we don't recognize never count against you: you get a "did you mean" instead.

How do I delete my account?

Sign in, open Account and use "Delete my account". It removes your account, results, rounds, achievements and stats right away. If you only want a clean slate, you can reset your stats on the settings page instead.

What do you do with my information?

Very little. An account is a username, a hashed password and your game results; we don't ask for your email and we don't sell data. Where ads are shown, advertising partners such as Google may use cookies to choose them. The privacy policy has the details, including how to opt out of personalized ads.

Is Linkster connected to the NFL, NBA or MLB?

Linkster is an independent fan project. It is not affiliated with, endorsed by or sponsored by the NFL, NBA, MLB, their teams, players or players' associations, or any data provider. League, team and player names are used only to describe real careers.

How do I report a bug or suggest something?

Email us at team@playlinkster.com. We read everything, especially reports of wrong answers.