A new puzzle every day at your local midnight.
How to Play Transfer Fee
Transfer Fee is a game about money and memory. Five famous transfers a day, each shown with the player, the year and both clubs. You move a slider to say what you think the deal cost — and the closer you land, the more you score. Five rounds, five hundred points, no guessing games about whether you were *nearly* right.
How the scoring works
Each round is worth up to 100 points, and the formula is deliberately transparent: your points are 100 minus your percentage error. Guess 80 million on a 100 million transfer and you are 20% out, so you score 80. Guess 50 on the same deal and you score 50. Because the error is proportional rather than absolute, being 5 million off on a 10 million transfer costs you far more than being 5 million off on a 100 million one — which is exactly right, since knowing a small deal precisely is the harder skill.
How to guess well
- Anchor on the year, not on today's market. A 40 million transfer in 2009 was a superstar; in 2023 it is a squad player. The slider does not adjust for inflation and neither should your instinct.
- Use the selling club as a price signal. The same player costs more leaving a club that did not want to sell.
- Round numbers are rarer than you think. Real fees are messy — 63, 47, 86 — so a perfectly round guess is usually a lazy one.
- Do not over-correct after a bad round. Each round is independent; a wild swing to compensate just costs you a second bad score.
Where the fees come from
We use the most widely reported base fee in millions of euros, and this matters more than it sounds: reported fees vary between sources because some include add-ons, performance bonuses, sell-on clauses and agent fees, and some do not. Bonuses and add-ons are excluded here — the figure is the base fee, and where sources disagree we go with the number most commonly cited. That is why a deal you remember as "120 million" may score against a lower number: you are probably remembering the headline figure with every conceivable bonus attached.
What the game is really testing
It looks like a trivia game about numbers and it is really a game about eras. Anyone can learn the ten biggest transfers of all time; the players who score well are the ones who can feel the difference between the 2013 market and the 2018 one. If you find yourself consistently guessing too high, you are almost certainly reading old transfers through modern prices — the most common way to lose points here.
Sharing and the daily reset
Five transfers are drawn from the pool based on the date, so everyone playing on the same day sees the same five and a total out of 500 is directly comparable. The share button copies your score without revealing the transfers. A fresh set arrives at midnight in your own time zone.
Frequently Asked Questions
How do you play Transfer Fee?
Five famous transfers per day: the player, the year and both clubs are shown. Use the slider to guess the transfer fee in million euros — the closer you get, the more points you earn, with an exact hit worth 100.
How is the score calculated?
Your points equal 100 minus your percentage error. Guess 80M for a 100M transfer and you're 20% off, so you score 80. Five rounds add up to a maximum of 500 points.
Where do the fees come from?
We use the most widely reported base fees in million euros, excluding bonuses and add-ons. Sources can differ slightly; we go with the figure most commonly cited.
Are the transfers the same every day?
No — five transfers are drawn from the pool based on the date, and everyone sees the same five on the same day. A fresh set arrives the next day.