How to play Pocket Plot

Pocket Plot is a merge game on a little allotment. You plant seeds on a small grid, put two of the same thing together to grow the next stage, and fill your plot journal with flowers, trees and prize vegetables. It is still an idle game at heart: everything you grow gives off seeds every second, and the plot keeps growing while you are away.

The basics

• Plant. The two big buttons plant a flower seed or a vegetable seed in the first empty square. The first costs 10 seeds; each one you buy costs a little more.
• Merge. Two of the same thing, at the same stage, grow into one of the next stage. Tap one, then the other, or drag one onto the other. You can also tap an empty square to move something there, or drag one thing onto a different one to swap them.
• Grow. Everything gives off seeds every second, and each stage gives off two and a half times as much as the stage before. So merging always pays, and it frees a square too.
• Discover. There are 12 stages of flower and 12 of vegetable. Each new one goes into your plot journal, which you keep for good.

Flowers or vegetables?

Both. Flowers give off the most seeds. Vegetables give off a quarter as many, but each one enriches the soil: it adds a boost to everything on the plot, and the boosts add up. A vegetable’s boost doubles with every stage, so merging two vegetables keeps the boost and adds more seeds.

A plot of only flowers grows slowly. In our tests, plots with a third or more vegetables grew much faster than flowers alone, but there is no single right mix. Try a few and watch the seeds-per-second figure.

Your first few minutes

1. Merge the two seeds you start with into a sprout, then keep planting and merging.
2. Buy the seed basket early (60 seeds). It plants a free seed every 10 seconds when there is room, and faster with each level.
3. Rich soil doubles everything. Each level costs more, and each is worth it.
4. After 25 merges, Tidy hands adds a Merge all button that merges every pair on the plot at once.
5. Once something reaches stage 6, Better seeds makes new seeds start as sprouts, so every seed is worth two.

Keeping room on the plot

The plot is small on purpose: 4 squares across and 5 down, plus a sixth row once you buy An extra row. Merging frees a square every time, so the main skill is keeping pairs moving. Merge low stages first, and keep a space or two free so new seeds have somewhere to go.

If the plot ever fills up with nothing that matches, select the smallest thing and press Pull up to clear its square. It is never a dead end. Something at stage 5 or above asks before it goes.

When to start a new plot

Once something reaches stage 9 and you have made at least 100,000 seeds on the plot, you can start a new one. You dig everything into compost: your seeds, plants and upgrades reset, but you keep your compost and your journal. Compost is the square root of this plot’s seeds divided by 100,000, rounded down, so 100,000 seeds brings 1 barrow, 400,000 brings 2 and 10 million brings 10. Each barrow makes everything give off 10% more seeds, for good.

A good time is when the plot has slowed down and a new plot would bring a good handful of compost. For more, see what is prestige?

While you are away

Your plot gives off seeds for up to 12 hours while you are away, at the full rate. If you own the seed basket, it fills empty squares too (planting only, never merging), so there is something to tidy when you come back. See idle games that work offline.

Keep your plot safe

Pocket Plot saves automatically in your browser every 30 seconds and when you leave. Use the Save page to copy a backup now and then, or to move your plot to another device.

The numbers

These tables come straight from the game's own data, so they always match what you see in the game.

Every stage

What one of each gives off every second, before upgrades and compost. Each vegetable also adds the soil boost shown to everything on the plot; boosts add up.

Prices

Each new plant you buy costs a little more than the last, wherever you buy it. Free ones (from a basket or the tide) don't count, and prices start again with everyplot.

Bought so far	The next costs
0	10 seeds
10	80 seeds
50	2.16K seeds
100	13.31K seeds
250	175K seeds
500	1.32M seeds
1,000	10.30M seeds

Upgrades

Start a new plot

A new plot unlocks at: anything at stage 9, with at least 100,000seeds made on this plot. You get the square root of this plot's seeds divided by 100,000, rounded down, in barrows of compost. Each one adds 10% to everything, for good.

Achievements

• Two become one: Merge for the first time.
• In bud: Grow something to stage 5.
• Something to eat: Plant a vegetable.
• Busy hands: Merge 100 times.
• Full flower: Grow something to stage 8.
• Keeping notes: Fill 12 pages of the plot journal.
• Fresh ground: Start a new plot.
• Green fingers: Merge 1,000 times.
• Taller than you: Grow something to stage 10.
• The great tree: Grow a great blossom tree.
• Prize of the show: Grow a giant marrow.
• The whole journal: Discover every stage of both chains.
• Old hand: Start five new plots.
• Seed bank: Make a billion seeds in total.