Series Squares & Season Squares — Commissioner Setup Guide

Choosing your mode at creation

The create wizard is Style → Format → Details → Review. The first step picks which of the two modes you're running.

Series / Playoff Squares

Buy a square once for a set price, then you hand-set each game's prize from one shared pot. Best for a playoff run, tournament, or any short multi-game stretch.

Season Squares — weekly pot

One square for the whole season. Fresh numbers every week; each week's pot (weekly price × squares sold) splits across that week's games. Auto-loads the NFL schedule.

Setting up Series / Playoff Squares

Price per square

A one-time price that covers the whole series — buyers pay it once, not per game.

Numbers each game

Fresh numbers each game (a new random draw before every game) or the same numbers for the whole series (one draw used across every game). You can also change this game-by-game later with "Use for all games."

Games in the series

Enter the matchups and dates for the series at creation (add or remove rows as needed); you can add more games later too, either typed in by hand or pulled from the game library by sport/category.

The playoffs (NFL or MLB)

Don’t hand-type a postseason — choose the schedule template “The playoffs” and pick a shape instead. For the NFL: the Super Bowl, Championship Sunday, Championship Sunday + the Super Bowl, the Divisional round, Wild Card weekend, or the whole 13-game postseason. For MLB: the Wild Card round, a Division Series, a Championship Series, the World Series, or the whole postseason. You can do this before anyone knows who is in the bracket — the grids are built from the real schedule with real dates, matchups read TBD, and the teams and kickoff times fill themselves in as the bracket is set. The grids you sell in September are the same grids that score in January. NFL playoff games are single elimination, so every grid gets played; MLB series can end early, which is why a baseball pool also asks what to do with the money for a game that is never played.

Buy once for the whole series

On (recommended): one square is good for every game you add. Off: each game's grid is sold separately instead of sharing a single purchase.

Setting up Season Squares

Price per square, per week

What one square costs for one week; buyers pay this amount × the number of weeks in the season upfront, shown live as you set it.

Start week

Which NFL week the season begins — Week 1 for the full season, or a later week to launch a mid-season pool. The NFL schedule auto-loads from your chosen week.

Include playoffs

Adds the 4 playoff weeks (Wild Card through Super Bowl) onto the regular-season weeks, which also raises the upfront price accordingly.

Buy-once, always

Season Squares is always buy-once by design — a single square purchase covers every week of the season you configured.

Shared details (both modes)

Pool name

Defaults to something like "2026 Playoff Squares" or "2026 Season Squares" — rename it to whatever fits your group.

Limit squares per participant

Off by default (participants can buy as many squares as they want); turn on and set a max to cap it.

List publicly

Public pools can be found by anyone searching; turn this off to make the pool invite-only.

Running Series / Playoff Squares

Games, numbers and scores are on the contest's Games screen; what each game pays is set in Prizes (the Prize Builder).

Draw numbers per game

Draw (and redraw, before scores are final) each game's row/column numbers individually, or draw one game's numbers and use "Use for all games" to copy them to every other game in the series.

Prizes (the Prize Builder)

Everything a game pays is set in Prizes, for every game at once. Step 1: which periods pay (quarter, half, final…) and who can win — the exact square is on by default and can be switched off, and reverse can be added. Step 2: share the pot across the games — equal per game, more for later games (1, 2, 3…), or set each game yourself, which is how a playoff pool pays more the deeper the bracket goes. Step 3: review and publish. A pool whose prizes were set up game by game before the builder existed opens in Prizes with those exact amounts filled in, ready to change or publish.

When a prize has nobody to pay

Also in Prizes, step 2. If your series includes “if necessary” games, choose what happens to the prize of a game that is never played: add it to the last game played, hold it and share it out at the end, roll it into the next game, or keep it for your organization (the only option that pays out less than the pot — tell your players first). Below it is the rolling jackpot: if your board won’t sell out, switch it on and a prize whose winning square nobody bought carries into the same period next game ($20, then $40, then $60) until a square somebody actually bought wins it. It can never cost you more than the amounts you published.

Scores & finalize

A game linked to the schedule scores itself: the live feed writes each period as it happens and the boxes are read-only, because anything typed over them would be replaced on the next sync. A game you typed in by hand is yours to score — enter each period as it happens ("Save scores"), then lock it in as official with "Save & finalize", which computes and displays that period's winning square. To take a linked game back, use "Unlink from schedule" in its ••• menu: the teams, start time, payouts and numbers all stay and only the scoring returns to you. Finalizing stops the feed, so any period still unscored is named as a warning first — it will not block you, because a game can end early.

Pot & you keep

The top of the Games screen shows the full sellable pot, your cut, and what you keep at sellout, with a link to Prizes.

Release another seriesPro

Sell another full 100-square set once the current one fills, either manually or automatically once a chosen percent of squares are sold.

Running Season Squares

On the contest's "Weeks, numbers & winners" screen.

Draw week numbers

One set of numbers per week, shared by every game that week — draw week-by-week, or draw every remaining week at once with "Draw numbers for all weeks."

Auto-drawPro

Turn on and each game's numbers draw themselves ahead of kickoff — you pick the lead time — so you never have to remember. Two options sit under it, and the first one matters most: "Keep selling" holds the draw back while squares are still open, because people stop buying the moment the numbers are showing. It is NOT a wait-until-sold-out trap — a grid that never fills still gets its numbers at the fallback time you choose (one hour before kickoff by default), so a half-sold board is never left blank at game time. The second, "draw every game as soon as the grid sells out", settles the whole season's numbers the moment the last square goes. Both live on the Games screen, not the grid's Settings tab.

Undraw week numbers

On the Games screen (not the grid's Settings tab — that is the single-game Squares layout). Undoes a week's draw — useful if a week drew earlier than you wanted, or auto-draw ran before you were ready. Games that have already started or been scored are left alone, and you're told how many. Squares bought after the draw go back to playing those games.

Enter final scores

Games linked to the NFL schedule score themselves as results come in — there is nothing to type. Enter the final score yourself for any game you added by hand, or for one you have unlinked from the schedule.

Settle the week

Splits that week's pot evenly across however many of that week's games have final scores, and assigns each game's winning square — available once numbers are drawn and at least one score is entered.

Mark winners paid

Each settled game shows its winning square and prize; mark it paid once you've sent the money.

Entry price, pot & organizer cut

How the pot is built

Series/Playoff: pot = squares sold × the one-time series price. Season: each week's pot = squares sold × the weekly price, calculated fresh every week.

Organizer cutPro

Every entry-fee pool supports a cut on the Settings tab — a percentage of the pool, a flat total, or a flat amount per entry. The prize pot shown to you and to buyers is always net of it. It is a Pro Commissioner and Organization feature.

Payments

Buyers pay you directly through the app's in-app payment step when they claim a square — money never routes through ChooseASquare.

Grid settings (Settings tab, per set)

Applies to each 100-square set individually — a series with multiple sets configures each on its own.

Reveal numbers

Choose when drawn numbers become visible to participants: at lock, at game time, once all squares are claimed or paid, on a schedule, manually, or immediately.

Unsold squares at lock

Assign any unsold squares to the club (recommended, so every number is covered) or leave them blank (a winning number on a blank square pays no one).

Lock timing

Locks automatically at game time by default; set an earlier lock time if you want selling to close sooner.

Display

Toggle showing the 1–100 square numbers and participant names on the public grid, and the live game view below.

Live game view

While a game on the board is under way, its grid shows the score, marks the square the score is sitting on right now, and lists underneath what each person would need to win from here. On football it also shades each square with its chance of being the next to win; other sports get the score and the live square with no percentages. It is per set, and it applies to whichever game of the series you are looking at. New pools have it on; pools that were already being played when it shipped have it off, so nothing changed mid-season.

Swap the axes (per game)

On the Games screen, each game’s Numbers tab. Puts that game’s away team across the top and home team down the side, to match a printed sheet or the TV graphic. It is per game because the home and away teams change from game to game. Only the picture changes: every square keeps its owner and who wins is unchanged. The board, the PDF and the big screen all follow it.

FAQ