How to play
One puzzle a day, in three rounds. Each round names a statistic and asks you to find the line that splits it in half — say half of all income tax north of the line. The three answers sit in different places, and that is the point: tax does not live where population lives.
- The round's angle is fixed. The line only slides — drag anywhere on the map, or use the arrow keys (hold Shift for bigger steps) to be exact.
- Every round asks for the 50/50 line: level, to split north from south, or upright, to split west from east.
- You cannot see the split while you move the line. That is the game. Let go of the line — or press Enter — and the guess is locked in.
- One guess per round. No retries — with a smooth, continuous quantity a second guess would just be arithmetic on the first.
- You are scored on how far your line is from the correct one, not on the percentage you hit. Within 10 km is a bullseye; the score reaches zero at 250 km. 1,000 points a round, 3,000 a day.
Why distance, not percentage?
Near a city, a line one pixel further north can swing the share by several points while barely moving at all. Distance is what you actually control, so distance is what gets scored — and a line 5 km out genuinely is nearly right, even when the percentage says otherwise.
Where the numbers come from
Real published data covering the whole UK: the 2021/22 census (via the Unified UK Census from the Geographic Data Service), ONS population estimates, HMRC income and tax statistics, the 2024 general election results from the House of Commons Library, the government's Renewable Energy Planning Database, and shops and landmarks from OpenStreetMap. Each point is a local authority, a constituency or a single place; the line splits the country in two and the statistic is totalled on each side. The exact source of every round is under Sources.