Cluster and square maxxing
There are three main ways to compete in tile hunting, no matter which platform you use.
The first is the most straightforward: collect as many tiles as possible, regardless of whether they’re connected or form a specific shape. The strategy is simple but not easy, ride as many unique routes as you can. If you always start from home, you’ll quickly run out of nearby tiles. To keep growing your count, you’ll need to go on longer rides, weekend trips, or cycling vacations.
The second approach comes naturally from the shape of the tiles themselves: build the largest possible square from your collection. This works best if you start most rides from home, using it as the centre of your square and expanding outward in all directions. It’s a satisfying, structured way to hunt, but geography can be a problem. Oceans, lakes, or borders can cut off your progress.
Since many top cycling nations are near the coast, building a perfect square isn’t always practical. That’s why a third option has become the most popular: creating the largest cluster of connected tiles. Only tiles that share all four sides (north, east, south, west) with other claimed tiles count. This method combines the best of both worlds. You can expand from a home base and work around obstacles like water or borders.
Route planning tactics and tips
Route planning is a huge part of the tile hunting game. As you run out of the tiles closest to your home, you will find yourself spending a lot of time with a map. Here are three of my favourite tactics for route planning:
Tree method (hub-and-spoke): Pick a central “hub” (like a junction or main road) to follow and plan “spokes” out to unvisited tiles, returning to the hub each time. This lets you efficiently cover many adjacent tiles in one ride while progressing in a selected direction.
Two tows at once: Try to unlock tiles in rows of at least two, staying along the shared edge of adjacent rows. Well-chosen side roads let you collect two parallel rows in a single ride. This works best in areas with dense road networks.
Row sweeping: Treat a block of tiles like a grid, then sweep back-and-forth along rows (or columns) to systematically cover every tile in that area. This minimizes backtracking and is great for urban tile hunting.
The Squadrats browser extension is a lifesaver for all three of these. I use it with Mapy.com, where the grid overlay shows which tiles I already have and which are missing. As I plan the route, it highlights the tiles that will be collected, so I can be sure I haven’t missed any. And it works directly in Strava, Komoot, Garmin, any many other platforms.
Overcoming “impossible” tiles
It’s only a matter of time until you come across a tiles that are really hard to get to. Maybe there’s a mountain, or a really dense patch of forest, a mine, a military base, or simply private land not accessible to public. For the standard 1,5 km x 1,5 km tiles, I haven’t hit many roadblocks yet. But for the smaller ones 200m x 200m (Squadratinho), I’m already stuck in two spots.
A zoo enclosure (home to Przewalski’s horses) blocks two Squadratinho tiles for me. Unless I become a zookeeper, they may be impossible to reach forever. The second one is a train depot. There is still a chance to get this one but it’s a bit tricky. The way I look at it, if I can see a Street View of a given road, I’m going to give it a try. If a Mapy/Google car could drive there, I assume I can too, without trespassing. But I’m not climbing fences or entering private land on purpose.
For some tiles, you will realize that there simply aren’t any legal ways to get int. For those, you have three options:
- Use special events for public (open days, guided tours) to access the restricted areas.
- Contact property owners directly, sometimes they’ll let you through if you ask.
- Accept your fate and plan routes around the impossible tiles.
Bike, run, hike: the multisport advantage
When you get properly into tile hunting, you start thinking about the gear to use to most efficiently hunt for tiles. In my area, a gravel bike is the gold standard. It’s versatile enough off-road, yet fast enough for long distances on the asphalt. But since I don’t own one, I use a road bike for distance and a trail bike for forests. But it’s always good to have a reason to buy another bike.
The nice thing is that you can do any outdoor sport to hunt tiles. I found that running is great for those smaller tiles (like Squadratinhos) during the cycling off-season. If you live in a mountainous terrain, hiking is mandatory to reach difficult tiles. And open water swimming might be the final frontier for hardcore tile hunters.
Tile hunting is about strategy and creativity. But there also needs to be balance. I will talk about the motivations and philosophy of tile hunting in the next article.