River Hop Strategy: Lane Windows, Log Math and the Five-Pad Route (2026)

1. The board is a fixed 13×11 grid, so the route is fixed too

The playfield is 13 columns by 11 rows, with 26-pixel cells on a 400×286 canvas. Rows are numbered from the bottom in the code: row 0 is the start bank, rows 1–3 are the road, row 4 is the median, rows 5–9 are water, and row 10 is the far bank. That is three road lanes and five water lanes, eight moving lanes in total — the game page says five water lanes, and the build agrees; the old "four lanes of water" line in the source header is stale.

The frog starts at column 6, x = 200. The five lily pads are fixed at columns 0, 3, 6, 9 and 12, which is x = 44, 122, 200, 278 and 356. A crossing is therefore at least ten hops (row 0 to row 10), and every hop is a 0.09-second tween. The probe's wall clock read 95–100 ms per hop including its own evaluate overhead, so treat 0.09 s as the build constant and about a tenth of a second as what you feel.

Two different collision models are worth separating now, because most confusion on the water comes from mixing them up:

• Road: the frog is 18 px wide (half-width 9). A car's body is tested with a 2 px inset, so the frog is hit when its 18 px body overlaps the car's body. The safe centre band inside a gap is therefore gap − 14 px.
• Water: support is tested at the frog's centre point only, with a 3 px inset into the log. The landable band is width − 6 px. Half the frog can hang over the water and you are still standing, as long as the centre is on the log.

There are no URL parameters in this build: no ?level=, no ?seed=, no pinned board. A run is always the same board, the same lane speeds at level 1, and the same pad positions. The only thing that changes is how you play it.

2. Road lanes: three gaps, and the middle one is the gate

All three road lanes run at level 1 with these constants. "Gap time" is the empty space between two cars divided by the lane speed; "safe band" is the centre band where the frog can stand without being hit; "band time" is how long that band takes to pass a fixed point.

At first glance all three lanes are similar: cars cover only 22–25% of the lane, and the safe centre band is about two-thirds of the lane in every row. The difference is how long the safe band lasts. Row 1 gives you 1.74 seconds, row 3 gives you 3.00 seconds, and row 2 gives you 1.05 seconds. That is why the middle lane is the gate: it is not rarer to find a gap, it is the gap that closes fastest.

The 0.09-second hop matters here. During a hop the car keeps moving, so a landing at the very trailing edge of the safe band can be hit before the next hop starts. Row 2's car moves 7.7 px during one hop; at level 3 the multiplier is 1.32, so it moves 10.2 px — more than the frog's half-width of 9 px. From level 3 on, do not aim at the edge of the middle-lane gap; aim at the middle of it.

The practical order is: cross row 1 when a gap is already under you, use the median (row 4) as a free pause, then take row 2 only when the gap is wide and fresh, then row 3, which is the most forgiving. If you are waiting on the median, the clock is still running: five seconds of waiting costs ten points, exactly one row of progress.

3. Water lanes: about half of every lane is a log

The five water rows are not a single river; they are five independent conveyor belts, each with its own speed, direction, log width and gap. The landable band is width − 6 px because the support test insets 3 px at each end.

The "share" column is the important one: at any instant, only 46–53% of a water lane is a landable log. A blind hop up into the next water row is therefore close to a coin flip — and the coin is slightly against you on rows 6 and 8. The gap times (1.0–1.7 s) tell you how often a log arrives, but they do not tell you where it will be when you land; the lane is a moving phase, not a fixed platform.

Row 8 is drawn as three turtle shells, but the collision model is identical to a log: one 58 px body, 52 px landable, moving left at 40 px/s. It is the narrowest ride in the game, which makes it the least forgiving landing and the one where "aim for the middle" matters most.

The log moves during your hop, too. In 0.09 s a row-7 log travels 6.3 px, a row-6 log 4.7 px, and a row-5 log 3.1 px. At level 3 those become 8.3, 6.2 and 4.1 px. If you aim at the trailing 3 px of the landable band, the band may be gone by the time you land. Aim at the centre.

4. Riding is not the goal — leaving the log is

Once you land on a log, the frog rides with it: the build adds the lane speed (times the level multiplier) to your x every frame. That is useful for crossing, but it is also the main way to lose a life on the water. The board's water edge is checked at x < 35 and x > 365; a log that carries you past either line drowns you, even though the log itself is still on screen.

How long you have depends on the row and where you land. From the centre of the board (x = 200) to the right edge at x = 365:

Those are upper bounds from the centre; land nearer the leading edge and you have less. At level 2 every number is divided by 1.16, so row 7 becomes 2.03 s. The logs also wrap: a right-moving log that passes x = 406 reappears on the left, and if you are still standing on it when it wraps, the support test fails and you drown. The wrap is not a teleport you can ride.

The strategy that follows is simple: treat the water as five short rides, not one long one. Land on a log, hop up to the next row as soon as a log is under you, and do not wait on a log for a better view. Every extra second on a log is a second closer to the edge and a second of clock spent; the only reason to stay is that the next row has no log yet, and even then you should be looking for a horizontal hop to a better log, not a longer ride.

5. The five-pad route: cross at column 6, walk the bank

The far bank (row 10) is safe anywhere. The pad check only fires when you land within 12 px of an unfilled pad's centre; the probe confirmed that +12 px fills the pad and +13 px does not. That is a wide target: the pad is drawn with an 11 px radius, but the code accepts a 12 px offset, so you do not need a pixel-perfect landing.

Because the bank is safe, the cheapest route is not to line up a pad from the water. Cross the river at column 6 — straight up from the start — then walk along row 10 to the pad you want. Horizontal hops on the bank cannot kill you; they only cost 0.09 s each and the clock's 2 points per second.

The probe measured this directly. Starting on the bank at x = 239 (between the centre pad and the col-9 pad), it walked left and filled the col-0 pad in 8 hops with zero deaths, scoring 108 points at 29.1 seconds left. The first pad of a level is the freebie: from the start column, a straight ten-hop crossing puts you on the centre pad with no horizontal movement at all. The side pads cost 3 hops (cols 3 and 9) or 6 hops (cols 0 and 12) from the centre, all on safe ground.

So the pad order that costs the least clock is: centre first, then the nearest unfilled side pad, then the far side. It does not change the river crossing; it only changes how much of the 45-second clock is left when the pad fills, and therefore how big the time bonus is.

6. The clock is a score multiplier: 2 points per second

The crossing clock is 45 seconds, and it resets on every attempt — after a pad fills, after a death, and at the start of a new run. It does not carry over between pads. That makes it a per-crossing budget, not a per-level one.

The scoring is equally simple:

• 10 points for every new row reached in a crossing (row 0 to row 10 is 100 points; moving back down does not subtract, and the row counter resets when you respawn).
• 50 + 2 × the seconds left, rounded, when a pad fills. At 30 seconds left that is 110; at 15 seconds it is 80; at 45 seconds it would be 140, which is not reachable because the crossing itself takes time.
• 200 points for clearing a level (all five pads).

The exchange rate is the whole strategy: one second costs 2 points, one row is worth 10 points. Waiting up to five seconds for a safer gap is therefore roughly break-even in points; waiting longer than that is a net loss unless the alternative is a death. A death costs a life, and lives are much more expensive than points.

The time bar turns amber below 40% (18 seconds) and red at 18% or below (8.1 seconds). Use the colour as a decision rule: above 40%, take the safe gap; between 18% and 40%, take the first gap that is clearly wide enough; below 18%, take the first gap at all, because a death at zero seconds costs the same life as a death at thirty.

A death resets the clock to 45 as well — the probe drowned at 5 seconds left and respawned at 44.8 — so dying is also a clock reset. That sounds generous until you remember it costs one of three lives. On the last life there is no reset left, and the clock is the run.

7. Lives, levels and the +16% ramp

You get three lives for the whole run, not three per level. Clearing a level does not refill them: the probe cleared a level starting with two lives and finished with two. The level cycle is: fill five pads → +200 points, level +1, pads reset, respawn at the start bank, lanes speed up. Score, lives and level carry over.

That gives a clean survival budget. Five pads per level with three lives means you can fail at most two crossings per level; the third death ends the run. On level 1 that is generous. On level 4, with the lanes at 1.48×, it is not.

The speed multiplier is linear, not compound: 1 + 0.16 × (level − 1). Level 2 is 1.16×, level 3 is 1.32×, level 4 is 1.48×, level 5 is 1.64×. There is no cap in the build. The two lanes that feel it first are the middle road lane and the fast log rows:

The "car travel per hop" column is the one to watch. At level 1 a middle-lane car moves less than the frog's half-width during a hop; at level 3 it moves more. That is the point where a gap that looked fine at landing can close before you leave. The fix is not to hop faster — you cannot — but to aim at the middle of the gap instead of its trailing edge.

8. Score arithmetic: what a clean level is worth

A clean level — five crossings, no deaths, every pad filled — is worth:

• 500 row points (5 × 100, one hundred per crossing for reaching row 10).
• Pad bonuses of 5 × (50 + 2 × seconds left). At a 15-second crossing (30 seconds left) that is 5 × 110 = 550. At a 30-second crossing (15 seconds left) it is 5 × 80 = 400.
• 200 for the level clear.

So a clean level at a 15-second crossing is 1,250 points; at a 30-second crossing it is 1,100. The difference between a fast and a slow level is 150 points, which is less than the 200-point clear bonus and much less than a lost life. The theoretical maximum with 45 seconds left on every pad is 1,400, but that would require crossing the river in zero time; treat 1,100–1,250 as the realistic clean-level band.

Two consequences follow. First, do not farm rows by dying: a death resets the row counter, so the retry can score the same rows again, but it costs a life and the points you already earned are not multiplied. Second, speed is worth chasing only after safety: the difference between a 15-second and a 30-second crossing is 150 points per level, while a single death can end a run at level 4. Take the safe gap first; the clock bonus is the reward for being fast, not a reason to be reckless.

9. Common mistakes and a one-second checklist

The mistakes that show up most often on this board:

1. Hopping blind into water. Only 46–53% of a water lane is landable at any instant. Look for the log's centre before you press up, not after.
2. Riding a log to the edge. From the centre of row 7 you have 2.36 seconds before the right edge; at level 2, 2.03. Hop off while the log is still under you, not when the board edge is close.
3. Using sideways hops in traffic or water to line up a pad. The bank is the only place where horizontal movement is free. Cross at column 6 and walk on row 10.
4. Waiting for a perfect gap. One second is 2 points and one row is 10, so five seconds of waiting is about one row. Waiting ten seconds to avoid a moderately tight gap is a bad trade unless the alternative is a death.
5. Expecting a level clear to refill lives. It does not. Three lives are for the whole run; the level clear only adds 200 points and speeds the lanes up.
6. Pressing Restart when you meant to continue. Restart begins a new run and resets score, level and lives. The R key does the same. If you only want a fresh attempt at the current level, keep playing; the game respawns you after a death or a pad.
7. Trying to land exactly on a pad from the water. The pad tolerance is ±12 px and the bank is safe; land anywhere on row 10 and walk.
8. Forgetting that the log moves during the hop. Aim at the centre of the landable band; the log travels 3–6 px during the 0.09-second hop.
9. Swiping too short on a phone. A swipe shorter than 14 px is treated as a tap, which starts a run if you are idle rather than hopping. Use deliberate swipes or the on-screen pad.

The one-second checklist before each hop:

• Is the next row's landing band under me now, not where it was a moment ago?
• If it is a road, is the gap wide enough to hop out again, not just to land?
• If it is water, is the log's centre at least 3 px inside its edge?
• Am I within 12 px of an unfilled pad, or should I land on the bank and walk?
• Is the clock above 8 seconds, and do I have a life to spend if this goes wrong?

FAQ

How do you play River Hop?

Hop one cell at a time with the arrow keys or W A S D, or swipe and use the on-screen pad on a touch device. Cross three road lanes, then five water lanes on logs and turtle rafts, and fill all five lily pads on the far bank. You have three lives and a 45-second clock per attempt. The game page has the full controls and rules; this page is about the decisions inside them.

Is River Hop a Frogger game?

River Hop is a Playnesta-original grid river-crossing game, not a Frogger port and not affiliated with Konami. Frogger is a Konami product mark and Crossy Road is a Hipster Whale product mark; both names are used here only to describe the genre. The mechanic — hop across traffic and ride logs — is a public idea that predates any single game, and every line of this build is written for Playnesta.

How many lives do you get?

Three lives for the whole run, not three per level. A level clear does not refill them: the probe cleared a level with two lives and came out with two. Five pads per level and three lives means you can fail at most two crossings per level; the third death ends the run.

How do you score points?

Ten points for every new row reached in a crossing, 50 plus twice the seconds left when a pad fills, and 200 for clearing a level. A clean level at a 15-second crossing is worth about 1,250 points; at a 30-second crossing, about 1,100. The best score is kept in this browser, and Restart resets the run's score.

Why do I keep drowning on the logs?

Because support is tested at the frog's centre point, with a 3 px inset into the log, and only 46–53% of a water lane is a landable log at any instant. A blind hop is close to a coin flip. The log also moves 3–6 px during the 0.09-second hop, so aiming at the trailing edge is how a landing that looked safe turns into a splash. Aim at the centre, and leave before the log reaches the board edge.

Do logs carry you off the board?

Yes. The water edge is checked at x < 35 and x > 365; a log that carries you past either line drowns you. From the centre of row 7 you have 2.36 seconds before the right edge at level 1, and 2.03 seconds at level 2. Logs also wrap: a right-moving log that passes x = 406 reappears on the left, and if you are still on it when it wraps, the support test fails.

What happens when you fill all five lily pads?

The fifth pad pays its time bonus, the level clear adds 200 points, the level counter goes up by one, the five pads reset, and you respawn at the start bank with the same lives and score. All eight lanes then run 16% faster than the previous level, linearly: level 2 is 1.16×, level 3 is 1.32×, level 4 is 1.48×.

Does River Hop get faster?

Yes, on every level clear, and the ramp is linear rather than compound. The middle road lane's gap time goes from 1.21 seconds at level 1 to 1.04 at level 2, 0.92 at level 3 and 0.82 at level 4. The fast log row (row 7) goes from 1.00 to 0.86, 0.76 and 0.68 seconds. There is no cap in the build.

Can you play River Hop on a phone?

Yes. On a touch device the game shows a four-button pad, and you can also swipe the board; a swipe shorter than 14 px is treated as a tap, so make the gesture deliberate. The pad only appears on touch devices, and the buttons are at least 26 px tall. The desktop layout hides the pad and uses the keyboard.

What is the best strategy for River Hop?

Cross at column 6, land anywhere on the safe far bank, and walk to the pad; do not use sideways hops in traffic or water. Take the middle road lane only when its gap is fresh and wide, because it is the fastest-closing gate. Treat the water as five short rides: land near the centre of a log, hop up as soon as the next row has a log under you, and never ride to the edge. Then spend the clock deliberately: one second is 2 points, one row is 10, and a life is worth more than either.