Peg Pop is a free online peg shooter: a cannon at the top of the board, a field of round pegs below it, and orange targets you have to clear before you run out of balls. You choose the launch angle and nothing else — from the moment the ball leaves the barrel it belongs to the physics, ricocheting from peg to peg and off the side walls until it drops out of the bottom. Pegs you hit light up but stay solid for the rest of that shot, so a ball deep in a cluster keeps rattling around inside it, and the score multiplier climbs every four pegs the same ball touches. That is the whole reason to aim at a crowd instead of at the nearest orange. Each board also carries one green peg that detonates when it lights, clearing everything within a wide radius of it, and a bucket sliding along the bottom edge that hands the ball back if you drop it in. Five boards — Open Field, The Arch, Twin Towers, The Funnel, The Curtain — each with a par that a reference bot measured against this exact simulation rather than a number anyone guessed. No download, no account.
How to play Peg Pop
- Move your finger, the mouse or the arrow keys to swing the cannon at the top of the board. Tap, click or press space to fire.
- The dotted guide shows the path up to the first peg you would touch, and no further — where the ball goes after that is the game.
- The ball falls under gravity, bounces off every peg it touches and off the two side walls, and the shot ends when it drops out of the bottom.
- Orange pegs are the targets. Clear all of them and the board is done, however many blue pegs are left standing.
- Blue pegs are worth 10 points, orange 100, and the green peg 250.
- Pegs you hit light up but stay solid until the ball drains, so one ball can rattle through the same cluster several times.
- The multiplier climbs one step for every four pegs a single ball lights, up to five times, and resets when the next ball is loaded.
- Each board holds one green peg. When it lights it detonates, clearing every peg within a wide radius of it — orange ones included.
- A bucket slides back and forth along the bottom edge. Drop the ball into it and you get that ball straight back.
- The readout shows the balls in hand and the orange pegs still standing. Run out of balls with orange left and the board is over.
- Three stars is clearing the board in par, two is within two shots of par, one is clearing it at all.
Tips
- Aim at a crowd, not at the nearest orange peg. Four pegs on one ball doubles everything the rest of that ball touches, and eight triples it.
- The green peg is usually worth a whole shot on its own. Look at what sits inside a wide circle around it before you decide it is not the target.
- Extreme angles ride the side wall down. That is the only way into the outer columns on The Funnel, and it is also how you reach a bucket that is parked at the far edge.
- A peg you light stays in the way for the rest of that shot, which is what keeps a ball inside a tower. Firing into the same cluster twice is not a wasted second shot.
- Watch the bucket before you fire, not after. It takes a few seconds to cross, so a shot aimed to drain on the left is a free ball if the bucket is heading that way.
- On The Curtain the mesh is passable — the staggered rows leave gaps a ball fits through, and finding the gap is the level.
- Par is a measured number, not a target you are expected to beat first try. It is what a bot needs when it can try every angle, so matching it takes a board you already know.
- If a shot is going nowhere, the guide dots are still worth reading. They tell you which peg the current angle actually reaches, which is rarely the one it looks like.
FAQ
Is Peg Pop free to play?
Yes. It runs in the browser with no download, no sign-up and nothing to buy. All five boards are included and unlock as you clear them.
How do you win a board?
Clear every orange peg. Blue pegs are only points — you can finish a board with most of them still standing, and often will. The board ends the moment the last orange peg is removed, and it ends the other way if you run out of balls with one still up.
Can I steer the ball once it is fired?
No. The launch angle is the only input, and after that the shot is pure physics: gravity, a bounce off each peg, a bounce off each wall. That is why the dotted guide stops at the first peg — showing the whole path would remove the only interesting part of the shot.
What does the green peg do?
It detonates. When a green peg lights, every peg within a wide radius of it lights too, orange ones included, and all of them are cleared when the ball drains. There is exactly one per board, and hitting it is often worth more than any direct shot at an orange peg.
Why do the pegs I hit stay on the board?
Because a shot would be far less interesting if they vanished. Lit pegs stay solid until the ball drops out of the bottom, so a ball inside a cluster keeps bouncing off pegs it has already scored — that is what produces the long ricochets, and the multiplier is what pays for them.
What is the bucket at the bottom for?
It returns the ball. The bucket slides left and right along the bottom edge, and any ball that lands in it comes straight back to the cannon, so a shot that ends badly can still cost you nothing. Watching where the bucket is heading before you fire is the cheapest extra ball in the game.
How is the par for each board decided?
It is measured, not chosen. A reference bot plays each board against the same simulation you do: it tries sixty-one launch angles, takes the one that clears the most orange pegs, and repeats until the board is done. Its shot count is the par, and the test suite re-derives it — so if the physics ever changes, the build fails instead of a board quietly becoming unfair.
Are the boards random?
No. All five are fixed layouts, so replaying one is genuinely replaying it: the same pegs in the same places, and the only thing that changes is where you aim. The simulation runs on a fixed time step too, so the same angle on the same board gives the same shot every time, on any screen.
Does it work on a phone?
Yes. Drag anywhere on the board to swing the cannon and lift your finger to fire, with the whole board scaled to fit the frame in portrait. On a keyboard the left and right arrows aim and space fires, so the game does not need a pointer at all.