Lighthouse Atlas

About Lighthouse Atlas

Seven competitions use real, individually reviewed photographs of lighthouses. Name a tower, choose the country it stands in, pin it on a zoomable world map, enter its height in metres or the year its light was first lit, or match ten photographs and names.

The library holds 1,885 lighthouses across ten regions: the United States and Canada, Latin America and the Caribbean, Britain and Ireland, France and the Low Countries, Germany, Poland and the Baltic, the Nordic countries, Spain and Portugal, the Mediterranean and Black Sea, Asia and Africa, and Australia and New Zealand. Play famous lighthouses, one region or all of them. Heights and first-lit years are confirmed by two different sources.

How to play

Goal

Recognize the lighthouses of the world from photographs, and learn their names, countries, places on the map, tower heights and the years they were first lit.

How it ends

Finish ten questions or ten pairs, exhaust the sprint clock, or make one sprint mistake.

Record

Best score, highest map, height or year reserve, or fastest matching finish, with time and the player’s name.

1. Recognition Sprint: choose the pictured lighthouse from eight names. You have 90 continuously running seconds; one wrong answer ends the run. Most correct answers wins, with time of the last correct answer breaking ties.
2. Name Search: identify ten photographs. Type part of a name or another name, ignoring case and accents, and choose the exact lighthouse from the filtered list.
3. Country: a photograph with the lighthouse’s name; choose the country it stands in today from eight; the other seven are the countries with a lighthouse nearest to it. Lighthouses whose names give away the country or town stay out of this competition. A wrong answer scores nothing but the run continues. Most correct answers wins, then the faster total time.
4. Map Pin: tap the world map where the lighthouse stands, zooming in as close as you like, then confirm. You start with 1,000 reserve. A pin within 25 km costs nothing; beyond that each started 20 km costs one point, at most 100. Highest reserve wins, with time breaking ties.
5. Tower Height: enter the tower’s height in whole metres, base to top. A guess inside the sourced range costs zero; outside it, the loss grows with how many times too tall or too short you were: half or double costs 18 points, at most 100. Highest reserve wins, with time breaking ties.
6. First Lit: enter the year the light was first lit. Any year inside the sourced range costs zero; outside it, each year off costs one reserve point, at most 100. Highest reserve wins, with time breaking ties.
7. Matching: select or drag a photograph onto its name. Match all ten pairs. Each wrong pair adds three seconds; fastest adjusted finish wins.

Controls

Tips

• Read the coast Granite headlands, palm-lined harbours and flat dune shores narrow the region before the tower's paint does.
• Zoom before you pin A pin inside 25 km is free; zooming to the right headland saves more than a fast answer.
• Height is the tower, not the light Count from the ground to the top of the structure; a short tower on a high cliff is still short.

Good to know

Every photograph retains its creator, chosen licence, original title and source links. Creator credits appear beside the photograph; Full photo credit opens the complete attribution and sources. Opening full credits during a ranked question, leaving the tab or restoring an unfinished run makes that attempt practice. Heights and first-lit years are reviewed ranges, not exact figures.

Questions