How to Play Super Bowl Squares

Super Bowl squares are a historically popular way to bet on Super Bowl props with friends and potentially win some money. You can also find them at online sportsbooks. While they may look complex to newcomers, Super Bowl squares boast a relatively simple scoring system.

How Do I Read Super Bowl Squares?

If you’re looking to fill out your squares for this year’s Super Bowl, the standard grid is 10×10. Each row and column are assigned a number between zero and nine, so each number appears once in a row and once in a column.

Each axis of the grid represents one of the participating teams; the x-axis represents the NFC champion, while the y-axis represents the AFC champion or vice versa. Players participate in the game by selecting one or more of the 100 cells on the grid. Then, the numbers are randomly assigned.

Filling out the Grid

After every cell in the grid is assigned to a player, the next step is assigning the numbers to the axes. It’s an easy enough process to do manually, but many online setups provide randomly generated number sequences to reduce conspicuous number placement.

The numbers correlate to points scored in a quarter by each team, so players might be more inclined to pick numbers like 0, 3, and 7 – the value of the most common scoring plays in football.

How Do You Win?

Generally, winners in Super Bowl squares are determined at the end of each quarter, based on the score of each team at each interval. For example, if the score at the end of the first quarter was Bengals 7, Rams 3, the winning cell would be the one assigned to the Bengals seven and the Rams three.

Once scores reach double-digit numbers, the last digit of a team’s point total is the number referenced for the square. If the score at the end of the third quarter was Bengals 24, Rams 21, the winning cell would be the one assigned to the Bengals four and the Rams one.

Square formats and payouts vary depending on house rules. The standard scoring is that each player with a winning cell for the first three quarters receives 20 percent of the pot, while the player with the correct cell for the final score receives the remaining 40 percent.

If you want to play squares at an online sportsbook, you are in luck. Caesars offers odds on different scores that correlate with the highest and lowest probability squares.

Super Bowl Squares Variations

The rules listed above are basic and widely used. However, there are variations you can use in different pools that favor advanced scoring methods.

Some squares allow for multiple winners in each quarter. This includes players who own cells adjacent to the winning cell, cells in the same row or column as the winning cell, and so on.

Some variations also differentiate grids for each quarter. This allows for different winners if the score changes or lands on the same numbers during the game. Other variations reward the owner of the cell that has the correct pair of numbers assigned to the wrong teams.