Questions and answers
Everything people ask, in one place
Gathered from the games, the calculators and the leaderboard. Each answer also appears on the page it belongs to.
- Answers
- 60
- Pages covered
- 15
- All of it
- Free
Number check
Open Number check →- Do I need to know anything about finance to play?
- No, and that is rather the point. The game is about judgement of scale. Someone who has never read a financial statement can score well by reasoning carefully from what they do know, and someone who works in the field can score badly by assuming.
- Why is being close enough to count as "perfect" only 95%?
- Because for a judgement question, landing within five percent of a real published figure from instinct alone is genuinely very good. A stricter threshold would reward lucky precision rather than good estimation, which is the opposite of what the game is for.
- Why does the streak matter so much?
- A single good guess can be luck. Eight in a row cannot. The multiplier is capped at 2× so a streak is worth having without making the first half of a round irrelevant, and it is calculated from the streak before each answer so breaking one costs you immediately rather than retroactively.
- Are the questions the same every time?
- No. Each round is drawn from a larger bank, and recently served questions are tracked so you are not handed the same ten twice in a row. The bank is regional, so the figures you are asked about are the ones from where you are.
Stack or burn
Open Stack or burn →- Is there a right answer to every card?
- There is a defensible answer, and the card explains the reasoning behind it along with the assumption it rests on. A few cards describe situations where the better choice depends on circumstances, and in those the explanation says so rather than pretending the matter is settled.
- Why do I lose a life as well as the money?
- Because without a limit the sensible strategy would be to guess fast on everything and rely on averages. Three lives make each card worth a moment of thought, which is the behaviour the game is trying to practise.
- Are the amounts realistic?
- They are set in your own currency at amounts that are plausible for that region, rather than converted from dollars. A wallet impact is meant to feel like a decision you could actually face, because a figure that feels foreign is easy to reason about carelessly.
- Can I see the cards again afterwards?
- Yes. Anything you want to come back to can be saved from the explanation, with a private note of your own, and saved cards gather on one page. Signing in is only needed to keep them beyond the current device.
Scam or legit
Open Scam or legit →- Are these based on real scams?
- They are modelled on documented patterns — the techniques, the framing and the requests are drawn from fraud that has actually been reported. Names, numbers and addresses are invented, and nothing in the deck links anywhere real.
- I got a legitimate message wrong. Does that matter?
- It matters quite a lot, and it is the half of the test people overlook. Treating real alerts as fraud has its own cost: missed security warnings, ignored fraud checks, and eventually a habit of dismissing everything. The explanation will show what marked that message as genuine.
- Why is there a time limit?
- Because real messages arrive while you are busy, and the whole design of a scam is to catch you in the few seconds before you think. The limit is set to allow a proper read, not to rush you — it is there to stop the round becoming a forensic exercise nobody performs in real life.
- What should I do if I think I have been scammed?
- Contact your bank immediately through a number you look up yourself, not one from the message, and report it to your country’s fraud authority. Speed matters more than anything else: some transfers can be stopped or recalled within a short window. Nothing on this site can do that for you.
Money quiz
Open Money quiz →- Is this financial advice?
- No. It is general education about how rules and products work, and it cannot know your circumstances, your income, your tax position or your goals. For a decision that matters, the right next step is a qualified adviser in your own country.
- How current are the rules?
- Questions are written against published rules with the source cited, and reviewed when limits and thresholds change. Tax rules do change, often annually, so for anything with a deadline or a limit attached it is always worth confirming the current figure with the relevant authority.
- What if my country is not covered?
- You will be served the shared pool of questions, which sticks to principles that hold across borders rather than country-specific rules. It never mixes one country’s specifics into another’s round.
- Why multiple choice rather than open answers?
- Because the wrong options are the teaching. Each one is a real misconception, and seeing it next to the correct answer — with an explanation of why it is attractive — does more than being asked to produce the right answer from nothing.
Jargon
Open Jargon →- Are the terms country-specific?
- Some are, and those are regionalised. A 401(k) is American, an ISA is British, an EMI and a PPF account are Indian. The shared terms — compounding, liquidity, diversification, yield — mean the same thing everywhere and appear for everyone.
- Fifteen seconds feels short.
- It is set to read four definitions and choose, which is about as long as most people take before second-guessing. If you know the term it is ample; if you do not, the extra time would usually go on doubt rather than on reasoning.
- Why do I keep seeing terms I already know?
- Recently served terms are tracked so a round is not a repeat of the last one, but the bank is finite and familiar terms will recur. They are also not wasted: the distractors change, and a term you know in isolation is not always one you can pick out of four close definitions.
- Where do the definitions come from?
- They are written in plain language against published and regulatory definitions, with sources listed on the sources page. Where a term has a precise legal meaning that differs from its everyday use, the definition says so, because that gap is usually where the confusion starts.
Loan and EMI
Open Loan and EMI →- Why is my lender quoting a different monthly payment?
- Three usual reasons. The quote may include fees financed into the loan, so the amount borrowed is larger than the figure you entered. The lender may compound daily rather than monthly. Or the advertised rate may be a representative APR that only some applicants receive. Comparing the total payable rather than the monthly payment makes those differences visible.
- Is it better to overpay or to take a shorter term?
- Mathematically they are close to the same thing: both cut the time interest is charged for. A shorter term is a commitment and usually gets a slightly better rate; overpaying is flexible but easy to stop. If your income is steady, the shorter term enforces the saving. If it is not, overpay when you can and keep the lower required payment as a safety net.
- Does paying extra reduce my monthly payment?
- Usually not by default. Most lenders apply an overpayment to the balance and keep the payment the same, which shortens the term. Some will instead recalculate the payment over the original term, which lowers the monthly amount but saves far less interest. It is worth asking which one your lender does, because they are very different outcomes.
- Why does so much of the early payment go to interest?
- Because interest is charged on the balance outstanding, and at the start the balance is at its largest. There is nothing unusual or unfair happening — it falls directly out of the formula. It is simply the reason that overpaying in year two is worth much more than overpaying in year eighteen.
Credit card
Open Credit card →- Why does my balance barely move when I pay the minimum?
- Because most of the minimum is covering that month’s interest. On a 36% card, 3% of the balance is consumed before a single unit comes off the debt. A minimum set at 5% of the balance leaves only about 2% doing any work, and that 2% shrinks every month as the balance does.
- Should I clear the card or keep saving?
- Compare the rates honestly. A card at 20–36% is costing you far more than almost any savings account or steady investment is likely to earn, and the card’s cost is certain while the return is not. The usual exception is an emergency buffer: clearing the card and then borrowing again on it the next time something breaks leaves you no better off.
- Does a balance transfer actually help?
- It can, but only if two things are true: the transfer fee is smaller than the interest it avoids, and you clear the balance before the promotional rate ends. A transfer that resets at a high rate with most of the balance intact simply moves the problem and adds a fee. Work out the monthly payment that clears it inside the promotional window before you take one.
- Is paying weekly better than monthly?
- Slightly, on cards that charge interest on the daily balance, because the balance spends less time at its higher level. The effect is real but small. The size of the payment matters far more than its frequency.
Debt payoff planner
Open Debt payoff planner →- Which should I actually choose?
- If the interest difference between the two is small — and on most real sets of debts it is — choose the one you will stick to. A snowball you finish beats an avalanche you abandon in month four. If one debt is at a punitive rate and dwarfs the others in cost, the avalanche advantage grows and is worth taking.
- What if I cannot cover all the minimums?
- Then this is not the right tool yet, and the plan will say so rather than pretend. Missing minimums adds fees and damages credit faster than interest does. Talk to the lenders before missing a payment — reduced-payment arrangements and hardship plans exist, and they are far better entered deliberately than discovered after a default.
- Should I pay off a 0% debt early?
- Only in the run-up to the promotional rate ending. Until then it is costing nothing, so every spare unit does more good against a debt that is charging you. What matters is the date the rate changes: work backwards from it so the balance is gone before it arrives.
- Does clearing debts in this order affect my credit?
- Broadly, lowering balances helps and closing accounts can hurt, because it reduces your available credit and can shorten your credit history. Clearing a card does not mean you must close it. The ordering here is chosen for cost and momentum, not for a credit score.
Savings goal
Open Savings goal →- What return should I assume?
- Use something you would be comfortable defending if it turned out to be wrong. For money you will need within three years, the honest answer is close to the prevailing savings rate. For longer horizons people commonly use a figure in the mid single digits after inflation, but that is a long-run average and not a promise about your particular five years.
- Does this account for inflation?
- Not directly. The target is in today’s money, so if the goal is a real purchase ten years out, the thing itself will cost more by then. The inflation calculator will tell you what the target should be to keep the same buying power, and that figure is the one to bring back here.
- What if I cannot afford the monthly amount?
- Three levers, and only three: push the deadline out, lower the target, or accept more risk in the hope of a higher return. The first two are under your control and the third is not, which is usually the order worth trying them in.
- Why does the required amount fall so much when I add a year?
- Because you gain twelve more contributions and every existing one gets twelve more months to grow. Both terms of the equation improve at once, which is why deadlines are the most powerful input on the page.
Investment
Open Investment →- Is 10% a reasonable assumption?
- It is roughly the long-run nominal average of large developed equity markets before inflation, and it is not a figure to plan a specific decade around. After inflation the long-run number is closer to 6–7%, and any individual twenty-year stretch can land well either side of it. Try a lower figure and see whether the plan still works — if it only works at 10%, it is fragile.
- Why does the calculator show a savings comparison?
- Because the gap between the two is the only honest way to see what the assumed return is actually claiming. If the difference looks implausibly large, that is a signal to question the return you entered rather than to celebrate.
- Lump sum now or spread over time?
- Mathematically, investing a lump sum sooner wins more often than not, simply because the money spends longer compounding. Spreading it out reduces the chance of putting everything in immediately before a fall, which is a real psychological benefit even where it costs a little expected return. Both are defensible; doing neither because you cannot decide is not.
- What happens if I stop contributing halfway?
- Less than you might fear, and more than is comfortable. The existing balance keeps compounding, so the pot still grows — but you lose both the later contributions and all the growth those contributions would have produced. Run it with the shorter contribution period and the same total years to see the two effects separately.
Inflation
Open Inflation →- What rate should I use?
- For a general projection, the central bank’s target or the recent average for your country is a reasonable default — commonly around 2% in developed economies and higher in fast-growing ones. For a specific goal, use the rate for that category if you know it: education and healthcare have run well above general inflation in many countries for decades.
- Does this account for salary growth?
- No. It answers what happens to a fixed amount. If your income rises with inflation, your buying power holds roughly steady — which is exactly why a raise that matches inflation is not really a raise, and why one below it is a pay cut arriving politely.
- Is deflation better?
- Not generally. Falling prices sound good for a shopper and are bad for an economy: people delay purchases because waiting is rewarded, that delay reduces demand, and the debt everyone already owes gets harder to repay in real terms. Low and predictable beats either extreme, which is why most central banks target a small positive number rather than zero.
- How does this change how I should invest?
- It sets the bar. A return below inflation is a loss in the only terms that matter. When you compare an investment to a savings account, compare both against inflation first — that comparison frequently reverses which one looks safe.
Borrowing power
Open Borrowing power →- Where does 28/36 come from, and is it still used?
- It is a long-standing conventional guideline rather than a law, and lenders routinely approve above it. Government-backed programmes in the United States commonly run 31/43 and stretch further with compensating factors, while Indian lenders often work from 40–50% of net rather than gross income. That is exactly why the ratios on this page are inputs you can change rather than fixed constants.
- Should I borrow the maximum?
- The maximum is a ceiling derived from ratios, not a recommendation. It assumes your income holds, the rate behaves and nothing expensive goes wrong. Borrowing at the ceiling leaves no room for any of those, and the ratios make no allowance for how you would like to live.
- Gross or net income?
- The 28/36 convention uses gross — income before tax. Some markets and many sensible household budgets work from net instead, which gives a noticeably smaller and often more realistic answer. Whichever you enter, make sure the ratio you pair it with was written for the same thing.
- Why did clearing a small debt help so much?
- Because the total-debt cap subtracts existing payments directly. Removing a monthly commitment hands that full amount back to the available payment, which is then multiplied up by the loan formula into a much larger figure. It stops helping the moment the housing ratio becomes the binding limit.
Retirement
Open Retirement →- Does the 4% rule work outside the United States?
- Less well than it is usually quoted. It was derived from US market history, which was unusually strong over the period studied. Research using broader international data generally supports a lower safe rate. If you are planning outside the US, treating 4% as an upper bound rather than a default is the more defensible reading.
- Should state or employer pensions be included?
- Only through the income figure. Work out the total you want to live on, subtract anything guaranteed from other sources, and bring the remainder here. The pot only has to cover the gap, which often makes the target far less daunting than the headline number suggests.
- What if I retire early?
- A longer retirement needs a lower withdrawal rate, because the money has to survive more years and more bad stretches. The 4% finding was tested over thirty years. For a forty- or fifty-year horizon, the comparable safe figure is meaningfully lower, and flexibility in spending becomes more valuable than any particular starting percentage.
- Why does the projection ignore sequence of returns?
- Because modelling it properly needs either historical sequences or a simulation across thousands of paths, and either would produce a range of outcomes rather than a single line. Showing one line is clearer, as long as it is labelled for what it is: the average path, not the worst case. The flexible withdrawal range is the page’s nod to that risk.
All games
Open All games →- Do I need an account to play?
- No. Every game is fully playable without one, and always will be. An account keeps your scores between devices, lets you save questions with your own notes, and puts your best rounds on the leaderboard.
- How long does a round take?
- Two to three minutes for most of the games. Stack or burn runs twenty cards and takes a little longer; jargon and the quiz are ten to twelve questions with a fifteen-second limit each.
- Is this gambling?
- No. There is no money involved, nothing to stake, nothing to buy and no prize. The wallet in stack or burn is a score, in the same way that points are a score.
- Are the games suitable for teaching?
- They are used that way. Each round ends with sourced explanations rather than just a score, there is no account requirement, and nothing is paywalled — so a class can play a round and then discuss the reasoning without anyone signing up for anything.
Leaderboard
Open Leaderboard →- I just played a great round. Where is it?
- Waiting for the next rebuild, which runs hourly. If you were signed in when you played, your best score appears under the table straight away even before it ranks.
- Why do my anonymous rounds not count?
- Because a table needs somebody to rank, and an anonymous round has no account attached. Signing in attaches the rounds already played on that device to your new account, so earlier play is not lost — it is claimed.
- Can I be removed from the leaderboard?
- Yes. Deleting your account removes your entries from the table and unlinks your rounds, and there is a delete option on the account page that does it immediately rather than by request.
- Why is the board quiet on some games?
- Because only signed-in rounds rank, and the site is young. A game with few entries is genuinely winnable with one good round, which is rather the point of ranking by best round rather than by total.
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