Fathoms main menu on iPhone
f a t h o m s

Spell words to control the crush.

Five columns. Letters fall like sediment. Spell your way back to the surface — before the depth spells it for you.

ETYMOLOGY

fath·om

/ˈfaðəm/


noun · nautical
A unit of length equal to six feet, or 1.83 metres, used to measure the depth of water.
verb · transitive
To penetrate with the understanding; to come to the bottom of; to comprehend.
origin
Old English fæthm — "outstretched arms, embrace."
A brass sounding weight and coiled hemp rope on aged oak planks

HOW IT PLAYS

ONE

Tap letters. Spell words.

Five columns fill the screen, each stacked with letters. Tap the letters you want — in any column, in any order — to build a word. When you like what you see, submit it.

The game verifies against a word list for your language. If the word is real, the tiles shatter, those letters vanish, and new ones fall in from above. Longer words score exponentially more, and rare letters are worth far more than common ones.

You do not need to be fast. You need to be patient. The best players are the ones who wait, read the whole board, and find six- and seven-letter words nobody else saw.

Victorian navigator's study: iPhone on oak desk beside open leather book, quill and brass inkwell

TWO

Your first tap matters.

Every word submission causes pressure. A new block of letters drops into the board — but not where you would expect. It lands in the column you tapped first, plus its two neighbours to a lesser degree.

This means every word is also a decision about where to take the damage. Tap in the middle and you pay on three columns at once. Tap on the edge and you only pay on two. Longer words (five letters or more) reduce the pressure on your primary column, because you are doing the work.

Ghost tiles appear before you commit, previewing exactly where the hit will land. Your strategy is written in where you start, not where you finish.

Victorian navigator's study: iPhone beside brass scales in balance, lead sounding weight and plumb bob

THREE

Don't hit the red line.

A red line runs across the top of the board. If any column reaches it, the game ends. This is your only constraint, and it is absolute.

The way to push it back is a cascade. Clear every tile in a column and the neighbouring columns each lose a tile too. If a neighbour empties, it cascades further. Cascades are the only way to reduce pressure across the board, and chaining them is how your score climbs fast.

Play long enough and the levels escalate. Every ten words you rise a Level, the puzzle accelerates, and the red line becomes a heartbeat you are trying not to hear.

Victorian navigator's study: iPhone beside brass pressure gauge with needle near red, amber oil lamp and warning-knotted rope

THEMES

Wooden

Warm grain. The default descent.

Wooden theme hero

02 / 07

Glass

Cold clarity. Fragile pressure.

Glass theme hero

03 / 07

Cyberpunk

Neon mist. Pink and violet depths.

Cyberpunk theme hero

04 / 07

Electric

Pure black. Purple current.

Electric theme hero

05 / 07

Steampunk

Brass. Clockwork. Patina.

Steampunk theme hero

06 / 07

Stone

Heavy slate. Torchlight. Carved walls.

Stone theme hero

07 / 07

Water

Bioluminescent abyss. Drift and sink.

Water theme hero

SCORING

The maths of descent.

Every letter has a value. Common letters score low; rare ones score high. Longer words multiply the total. Consecutive words build a combo. And every ten words, the depth increases, raising the stakes on everything. Fathoms rewards vocabulary, but it rewards strategy more.

Letter values

Each letter has a Scrabble-style point value. Common letters like E and A score 1. Rare letters like Q and Z score 10.

Length multiplier

Longer words multiply your score. A five-letter word gets 1.5x. Six letters: 2x. Seven: 3x. Eight or more: 4x.

Combo chain

Submit words back to back and each scores higher. The combo resets if you hesitate too long.

Depth levels

Every ten words, the depth increases. Pressure grows. But so does the multiplier on every point you earn.

DAILY

Seven days. Seven descents.

0 SCORE
0 DAY STREAK
LONGEST WORD

At midnight, local time, a new puzzle appears. Everyone on Earth playing Fathoms on that day is playing the same board, in their language. No accounts, no friends list, no email digests — the game simply shows you the day's puzzle when you open it, and your streak either holds or resets. The streak is the only score we keep across sessions.

Miss a day and the counter goes back to one. The deep does not forgive. But it does not remember either. The moment you are back on the board the descent begins again, and the streak is yours to rebuild.

LOCALISATION

Play in your language.

Fathoms is built for English, French, German, Spanish, and Italian. Each language plays differently because each language is different.

English English
Français Français
Deutsch Deutsch
Español Español
Italiano Italiano

Common questions.

Does Fathoms need the internet?

No. Everything runs on your iPhone. Daily puzzles are generated from the date itself, so they work offline. Everyone playing on the same day gets the same board, no download required.

What happens at midnight?

A new Daily puzzle at local midnight, synchronised to your device clock. Everyone on the same day plays the same board. Miss a day and your streak restarts.

Is there GameCenter support?

Yes. Optional. Sign in to appear on leaderboards and sync streaks across your devices. We never see your GameCenter identity — Apple handles that.

What languages are supported?

English, French, German, Spanish and Italian.

What's the untextured mode?

A clean setting for players who find the material textures distracting. All 7 themes still change the colour palette; only the tile textures go flat.

Is Fathoms accessible?

Yes. Colour-blind mode, reduced motion support, and dynamic type for menus. The game grid uses high-contrast letters regardless of theme.

AVAILABLE NOW

Fathoms, for iPhone.

A word puzzle measured in fathoms. Built for iPhone. Playable offline. Available in five languages, at midnight local, every day.