How to Play PaintingGuessr

Game Rules

Every game session in PaintingGuessr consists of five rounds. In each round, a painting is displayed on screen along with its title and artist name. Your task is to make two guesses before time runs out:

1. Place a pin on the map — Click or tap the interactive world map to indicate where you believe the painting was created. You can zoom in and pan around to place your marker as precisely as possible. The map covers the entire globe, from Japanese ukiyo-e studios to Parisian ateliers.
2. Pick a year on the timeline — Use the year slider to select the date you think the painting was completed. The slider covers a range from 1300 to 2000, spanning the late medieval period all the way through modern art.
3. Submit your answer — Once you are satisfied with both your location pin and your year selection, hit the submit button. The correct answer is revealed immediately: you will see the actual location highlighted on the map, a line showing the distance between your guess and the truth, and the correct year compared to yours.

After all five rounds are complete, your total score is tallied and you receive a rating based on your performance. You can then share your results or jump straight into another game.

How Scoring Works

Each round awards up to 10,000 points — 5,000 for location accuracy and 5,000 for year accuracy. Your five-round total can therefore reach a maximum of 50,000 points in Normal and Hard modes, or 25,000 points in Easy mode (which scores year only).

Location Scoring (0 – 5,000 points)

Location points are calculated using a cubic decay formula based on the great-circle distance between your pin and the actual location. The maximum scoring radius is 20,000 km — roughly half the circumference of the Earth. If your pin lands within that radius you earn some points; beyond it you receive zero. Additionally, if your guess falls within 1,500 km of the correct location you earn a +500 point proximity bonus, rewarding close guesses even when they are not perfect.

Year Scoring (0 – 5,000 points)

Year scoring uses a two-phase decay curve. Many paintings have an accepted date range (for example, 1503–1519 for the Mona Lisa). If your guess falls within that date range, you receive a perfect 5,000 points. Outside the range, a quadratic decay applies for the first 100 years of error, dropping more gently at first and accelerating as you drift further. Beyond 100 years off, a steeper quartic decay kicks in, making scores fall rapidly toward zero.

Example Scores

The cubic location decay means that even a moderately close guess earns a respectable score, but pinpoint accuracy is handsomely rewarded. For years, the quadratic-to-quartic transition at the 100-year mark means you still earn meaningful points for getting within the right century, but wildly off guesses score almost nothing.

Daily Challenge

Every day, PaintingGuessr features a Daily Challenge — a curated set of five paintings that is identical for every player around the world. The challenge resets at midnight UTC, giving everyone the same 24-hour window to submit their guesses.

Once you complete the Daily Challenge, your results are shareable. You can copy a spoiler-free results card to your clipboard and paste it into group chats, social media, or messaging apps. The card shows your score and rating without revealing the specific paintings, so your friends can still play unspoiled.

Comparing daily scores with friends is one of the most popular ways to enjoy PaintingGuessr. Because everyone sees the same paintings, you get a genuine apples-to-apples comparison of art history knowledge — no luck of the draw involved.

Tips for Beginners

You do not need to be an art history professor to score well in PaintingGuessr. A handful of visual cues can dramatically improve your guesses. Here are some strategies that experienced players rely on:

• Study the color palette. Warm, earthy tones with rich golds and deep reds are hallmarks of the Italian Renaissance. Cooler palettes with silvery grays, muted greens, and overcast skies tend to point toward Northern European painters — think the Dutch Golden Age or Flemish masters. Bright, saturated colors with visible brushstrokes usually indicate Impressionism or Post-Impressionism, placing the work firmly in the late 19th century.
• Look for architectural clues in the background. Classical columns and arches suggest Italy or Greece. Half-timbered buildings point toward Germany or the Low Countries. Onion domes hint at Russia or Eastern Europe. Even a window frame or doorway can reveal a region if you look closely.
• Pay attention to clothing styles. Fashion changed dramatically across centuries. Ruffs and elaborate collars place a painting squarely in the 16th or 17th century. Powdered wigs and pastel silks scream 18th-century France. Simple tunics and biblical drapery often indicate an earlier medieval or early Renaissance period.
• Examine the brushwork. Smooth, almost invisible brushstrokes are characteristic of earlier paintings where artists sought a polished, photographic finish. Visible, textured brushwork is a strong signal of Impressionist or later movements, narrowing the date to roughly 1860 onward. Thick impasto — paint applied so heavily it stands out from the canvas — usually points to Post-Impressionism or Expressionism.
• Consider the subject matter. Religious scenes depicting saints, the Madonna, or biblical narratives are overwhelmingly Italian or Spanish in origin, particularly from the Renaissance and Baroque periods. Landscapes and seascapes are a strong indicator of Dutch or English artists. Still-life paintings with flowers, fruit, and table settings flourished in the 17th-century Netherlands. Portraits of wealthy merchants and burghers also suggest the Low Countries.
• Check the medium. Oil on canvas became the dominant medium after roughly 1500, replacing tempera on wood panels. If a painting looks like it is on a wooden panel with a slightly different texture, it is likely from the 14th or 15th century. Watercolor paintings were especially popular in 18th- and 19th-century England, so a delicate watercolor landscape almost certainly has British origins.
• When in doubt, guess central Europe. If nothing about the painting gives you a clear geographic signal, placing your pin somewhere in central Western Europe (France, Germany, the Netherlands) gives you the best statistical chance of a reasonable score, simply because a large proportion of the database comes from that region. For the year, the mid-1600s is a solid default — it sits near the median of most public-domain painting collections.

Difficulty Modes

PaintingGuessr offers three difficulty modes so players of all skill levels can enjoy the game:

• Easy — You only need to guess the year. The location component is removed entirely, so each round awards up to 5,000 points for a maximum possible score of 25,000. This mode is perfect for beginners who want to focus on learning art history timelines without the added pressure of geography.
• Normal — The standard experience. You guess both the location and the year for each painting, earning up to 10,000 points per round and a maximum of 50,000. The painting is displayed clearly along with its title and artist name.
• Hard — For true art history enthusiasts. The painting is blurred and only the title is shown — the artist name is hidden. You must rely on the title alone, any vague shapes you can make out through the blur, and your deep knowledge of art history to determine the location and year. Scoring works the same as Normal mode with a maximum of 50,000, but achieving a high score here is a genuine accomplishment.

Ratings

After completing a game, you are assigned a rating title based on your total score. These tiers give you a quick sense of how well you performed and a goal to aim for in your next session. The five rating tiers are:

• Finger Painter (below 15,000 points) — You are just getting started. Do not worry — even the greatest curators began as finger painters. Focus on learning the visual cues described above and your score will climb quickly.
• Museum Tourist (15,000+ points) — You have a solid grasp of the basics. You can generally place paintings in the correct region and century. Keep refining your eye for detail and you will level up soon.
• Art Student (25,000+ points) — Your knowledge of art history is genuinely impressive. You can distinguish between artistic movements, identify regional styles, and narrow down dates with reasonable accuracy.
• Gallery Curator (35,000+ points) — You could run a gallery. Your ability to pinpoint locations and dates suggests a deep familiarity with the major artists, movements, and historical contexts of Western and world art.
• Art Historian (45,000+ points) — The highest honor. Scoring above 45,000 means you placed nearly every pin within a few hundred kilometers and nailed the dates within a decade or two. You have an encyclopedic knowledge of art history that few can match.