Frequently asked questions
Answers about playing Hidden Front: cost, accounts, inviting friends, phones, languages, disconnections, ranking seasons, fairness, safety and the project itself.
Playing
Is Hidden Front free? Yes. There is nothing to buy and no premium tier. The current version does not show advertisements either; if that changes, the privacy policy will say so first.
Do I need an account? No. Open the game and play. You are given a nickname automatically, and you can change it in the lobby or in settings. A Google account is needed only for ranked games and the leaderboard.
How do I play against a friend? Choose online play, open a room and share the invite link. Your friend opens the link and sits down in the room; no account needed on either side. The link is the room, so if either of you reloads the page you return to the same game.
How do I find an opponent right now? Press quick match. It joins the first open public room or opens one for you. If nobody arrives within about half a minute, the game offers a computer opponent instead.
Can I play alone? Yes. Play against the computer at easy, medium or hard. The computer plays by the same rules and with the same hidden information as a person.
Does it work on a phone? Yes. Hidden Front is a web page, so it runs in the browser on phones, tablets and desktops without installing anything. Pieces can be tapped or dragged.
Which languages are supported? English, Korean, Simplified Chinese, Traditional Chinese, Japanese, Spanish and Portuguese. The language switch is in settings, and the learning pages exist in every language.
During a game
What if my connection drops? You have 60 seconds to come back. Reload the page or open the same link and you return to your seat. Your move clock keeps running while you are away, and after 60 seconds the game is lost.
Why is there a 30-second clock? Online games are played with strangers, and without a clock one player can hold the other hostage. Thirty seconds is enough to think about a move in Junqi and short enough that a game stays under an hour. Your third timeout in a game forfeits it.
Can I take back a move? Not in online games. In lessons and puzzles you can undo freely.
Can we chat? There is no text chat. You can send emotes or point at the board with a shared cursor.
Can I see the game afterwards? Yes. When a game ends you can replay it move by move with both sides revealed.
Can I take notes on enemy pieces? Yes. Tap an enemy piece and write what you think it is. The notes are only on your screen and disappear when the game ends.
Ranking
How does ranking work? Sign in with Google and choose a ranked quick match. Each ranked game adjusts both players' ratings using the Glicko-2 system. You appear on the leaderboard after three ranked games.
What is a season? Ratings reset at the start of every quarter: 1 January, 1 April, 1 July and 1 October, at 00:00 UTC. The last quarter of 2026 is a preseason; season one begins on 1 January 2027. Past seasons' tables stay visible.
Why does ranking need a Google account? A rating has to belong to someone, and a Google sign-in is the least intrusive way to make sure the same person keeps the same rating. We request only the minimal sign-in scope: no email address, name or photo.
Fairness and safety
Can my opponent see my pieces? No. During an online game, the server sends masked enemy pieces without their ranks. Combat shows the outcome while the ranks stay hidden. Both sides are revealed when the game ends for replay.
Someone behaved badly. What can I do? From the game menu, you can submit a report and block the opponent. While using this device, blocked players are excluded from quick matches and public rooms, and their emotes are hidden. The block record is stored on this device only.
What does Hidden Front store about me? As little as possible. Settings and learning progress stay in your browser. The server keeps what a game needs while it is running and deletes it a week after the last move. The privacy policy lists every item.
The project
Who makes Hidden Front? A small independent team: one developer and one designer. The about page has the story.
Is it open source? The source code is maintained privately and is not publicly available.
Are the rules the "real" rules? Junqi has regional variations. Hidden Front follows the most common competitive conventions and documents every choice on the rules page and in the history article.
How do I report a bug or suggest something? Open the main menu and choose Send feedback. You can report bugs, ask about rules, suggest translation fixes or share ideas without signing in.