What is Draw the Border?
Draw the Border is a free daily map game for anyone who likes to draw borders, built around one question: can you draw the border of a country from memory? Each round hides a country under fog on a real map; you see the coastlines and neighbours around it, but not the country. Draw the border with a finger or a mouse, press Done, and the real outline appears over your drawing with a score out of 100.
Every day you draw the border of three countries, from the easiest third of our list to the hardest third, for a best total of 300. Everyone gets the same three on the same date, so you can compare results with friends. Finish all three to keep your streak going; miss a day and Draw the Border starts your streak again from one. No account, no install: open the page and draw borders.
How to play Draw the Border
Draw the Border gives you three ways to draw borders on the same map. This page is the daily Draw the Border game. The Between mode merges two neighbours into one shape and asks you to draw the border between them, four pairs a day, with unlimited practice afterwards. Country Draw lets you pick any of the 169 countries or press Random.
To draw the border, use the pen. Lift your finger and carry on: strokes whose ends meet are joined into one outline, and a small circle marks any loose end. Draw borders of large islands as separate closed shapes. Two fingers or the hand tool move the map. Once you draw the border and press Done, the round is final: reloading shows your result, not a fresh try.
How Draw the Border scores your outline
A border drawing game should tell you how it judges you. When you draw the border of a country, Draw the Border measures three things:
- Border distance, 60%. Points along the real border and along yours are compared, and the average gap is measured in kilometres on the globe, not in pixels. It is judged against the country's size, so a miss that is fine when you draw the border of Brazil is a big one for Belgium.
- Overlap, 25%. How much of your shape covers the country, and how much spills outside it.
- Shape, 15%. Your outline is moved and scaled onto the real one, so a good shape in the wrong place still earns these points.
The coastline counts: you draw the border all the way round, not only the land frontiers. Islands under 2% of the country are optional: leaving them out never costs points, so draw the border of the main shape first and skip the specks. In the example above, a perfect outline of Spain shifted by a tenth of the country's size sits ≈ 41 km off and scores 64. Score 85 or more and Draw the Border calls you a Cartographer.
Where it is hardest to draw borders
Draw the Border ranks every daily country by geometry alone: how winding the outline is, how many pieces of land it has, and how small it is. Fame plays no part. The five hardest places to draw the border:
- Denmark. Jutland, Zealand, Funen and Lolland make 4 pieces, and the indented coast makes the outline 3.5× longer than a rubber band around it.
- Canada. Hudson Bay and the Arctic channels make the outline 4.6× longer than a rubber band around it. Newfoundland and most Arctic islands are under 2% and optional.
- Bahamas. 11 islands count, from Grand Bahama to Great Inagua. The frame is mostly sea, so if you draw the border as one blob, overlap suffers.
- Iceland. One island, but its fjords make the outline 3.6× longer than a rubber band around it.
- Philippines. 8 islands count, from Luzon to Mindanao; Cebu and Bohol are under 2% and optional.
All five sit in the hardest third of the daily list, so in the daily game you will only ever draw the border of one as the day's third country. When you draw the border of a coast like these, aim for the big bays and let the small inlets go; Country Draw shows how much detail a good score needs.
Why people draw borders too big or too small
If you draw the border of Canada too big, blame the map you learned from, not your memory. Web maps and many classroom wall maps use Mercator, a projection that stretches everything away from the equator. At 60° north, the latitude of Oslo, areas are blown up about 4 times. On a true-area map Canada is about 4 times the size of DR Congo; on Mercator the gap looks far wider.
Draw the Border does not use Mercator. Each puzzle sits on an equal-area map centred on the country, so the shape you see is the shape you are scored against. When you draw the border of a northern country, picture its northern part smaller than on a web map. Near the equator both maps agree, so Colombia or Kenya should look the way you remember them.
Tips to draw the border from memory
Before you draw the border, look at what the fog leaves visible and decide where your line has to touch it. Good anchors to draw borders against:
- Rivers. When you draw the border of Mexico, the Rio Grande gives you much of the northern edge. The Rhine separates France from Germany in the south.
- Mountains. Ridges are easy to draw borders along. The border of Argentina and Chile follows the crest of the Andes for most of its 4792 km.
- Latitude lines. The long western stretch between Canada and the United States follows the 49th parallel, which bends into a gentle arc on our map. Over the sea, Draw the Border shows a faint grid every 10°, handy for placing coasts like Chile's or Norway's.
Draw the border in two passes: the overall shape first, then the islands that count. Country Draw offers every country with no daily limit, the Between mode trains you to draw the border between neighbours, and tomorrow brings three new countries in the daily Draw the Border game. The more often you draw borders, the more the shapes stick.
Draw the Border FAQ
How is Draw the Border scored?
Each round is scored out of 100: 60% for how close your line stays to the real border in kilometres (relative to the country’s size), 25% for how much your shape overlaps the country, and 15% for the shape itself after moving and scaling it into place.
Does the coastline count as part of the border?
Yes. In Draw the Border you draw the whole outline, coastline included. Islands smaller than 2% of the country are optional: leaving them out never costs points.
When does the daily puzzle change?
At midnight in your own time zone. Everyone gets the same three countries on the same calendar date.
How do I draw borders on a phone?
One finger draws; a quick upward or downward flick scrolls the page instead. Two fingers move and zoom the map, the hand tool moves it with one finger, and the ⤢ button opens a full-screen map. Strokes whose ends meet are joined automatically.
Can I draw borders of US states or provinces?
Not yet. For now Draw the Border covers countries only.
Which borders do you use for disputed places?
We draw de facto lines from Natural Earth. Countries with disputed borders are left out of the daily puzzles; you can still practise them in Country Draw.