Picture Reveal

Updated by Darryl Waterhouse on 3 November 2026 7 min read

Put a guess-the-picture game on your website. Choose a round of pictures from your Media and say what each one is. Every picture starts hidden - pixelated, blurred, zoomed right in, or under tiles - and each wrong guess shows a little more. Guess it early for more points, and top the leaderboard. Picture Reveal is a Pro Tool, and can be gifted to a site.

What it does

A round of pictures: up to 30 pictures from Media in a game, each with its answer. Upload new ones straight from the picture chooser.
Answers that forgive: capitals, accents and punctuation never matter, nor does a leading "the", "a" or "an". Add other answers that also count (a nickname, the name in another language), and choose whether small typing slips are forgiven.
Four ways to hide a picture: Pixelated (a few big blocks that get smaller), Blurred (a soft blur that sharpens), Zoomed in (a close-up that pulls back - you choose where it looks) or Tiles uncovering (covered squares that come off a few at a time, in a different order for every player).
Stages: 2 to 8 (5 unless you change it). A wrong guess, or Reveal more, moves to the next stage. A wrong guess at the last stage ends the picture.
Points: all of them for a picture guessed at the first stage, down in equal steps to a share at the last. With 100 points and 5 stages: 100, 80, 60, 40, 20. Most points wins; the faster time breaks a tie.
A stage preview in the editor shows every stage of the chosen picture, with what each is worth - drawn exactly as players get it.
No peeking: the pictures never reach a player's browser before they have guessed them or given up. Your website draws each stage itself and sends only that, without the picture's file name or any of its details (camera, place, date). Even the last stage holds less than the whole picture.
Timing kept by the server: the time runs while a picture is on show and stops between pictures. A time limit for each picture is optional.
Leaderboards of the top scores for today, this week, this month and all time, best go per name.
Optional shuffled order, opening and closing times, and a limit on goes per name.
Personal best, a picture-by-picture recap on the finished screen, and a Share button (it never gives a picture away).
Works on phones and with the keyboard alone.

Getting started

Switch Picture Reveal on in Tools.
Open Tools > Games > Picture Reveal and choose New game.
Give it a title and press Add a picture…. Pick a picture from Media, or drop a new one in to upload it. Type its answer. Add as many pictures as you like (up to 30).
Choose the reveal style, stages and points. The strip on the right shows every stage of the chosen picture.
Press Save and test and play it yourself (see below).
Set the status to Open and save.
Put it on any page:

[picture-reveal id="gig-night" /]

Good pictures for this game have one clear subject that people can name. Choose pictures you are allowed to use on your website.

Every setting

The game

Title - shown above the game and on the leaderboard.
Short name - used in the shortcode (id="..."). Made from the title when you leave it empty.
Status - Draft (not shown anywhere), Open (can be played; every picture needs an answer and must be in Media) or Closed (shows its leaderboard, cannot be played). Test works whatever the status.
Introduction - shown on the start screen.
Opens and Closes - optional dates and times. Before it opens, visitors see "This game opens soon"; after it closes, "This game has closed".

Pictures

Add a picture… - any PNG, JPEG, WebP, GIF or AVIF picture in Media.
The answer - what the picture is.
Also accept - other answers that count as right, with commas between.
Drag the handle to change the order, or right-click a picture (or use its ⋮) to move it, show its stages, replace it or take it out of the game. Taking a picture out of a game never deletes it from Media.

How players see it

Reveal style - Pixelated, Blurred, Zoomed in or Tiles uncovering.
Stages - 2 to 8.
Points - what a picture guessed at the first stage is worth (10 to 1000).
Focus point (Zoomed in only) - click the chosen picture where the close-up should look. Each picture has its own.

Rules and leaderboard

Spelling - Exact spelling, Forgive one slip (the default) or Forgive up to two slips. A slip is a letter missed, added, swapped or wrong. Answers under 4 letters always have to be exact; two slips are only forgiven on answers of 8 letters or more.
Order - in the order listed, or shuffled for each player.
Seconds for each picture - 0 for no limit. Running out of time ends that picture with no points.
Goes each (per name) - 0 for as many as they like.
Leaderboard size - how many names it shows (3 to 100).
Leaderboard opens on - the period the leaderboard shows first. Players can still switch.
Show a leaderboard - on unless you switch it off. A go with nothing guessed is not on it.
Animations - on unless you switch it off: each stage settles in and the whole picture fades up. Visitors who asked their device (or the site's Reduce motion switch) for less motion never see them.

Settings for new games

The cog at the top of Picture Reveal opens its settings: the reveal style, stages, points, spelling, seconds for each picture, leaderboard size and leaderboard that a new game starts with. Each game keeps its own settings once made, so changing these never changes a game you have already made.

How a game plays

The player types a name and presses Start.
The first picture appears at stage 1. They type a guess and press Enter (or Guess).
Wrong: the guess is crossed out under the picture, and the next stage shows a little more. Reveal more moves on without guessing. Give up ends the picture.
Right (or given up, or wrong at the last stage): the whole picture appears with its answer and the points earned. Next picture carries on.
After the last picture: the score, the time, the place on the leaderboard, a personal best, and every picture's answer and points.

The same guess twice costs nothing. Keyboard: the guess box has focus while a picture is on show; Tab reaches Reveal more and Give up; when a picture ends, Enter moves on.

Testing a game

Press Test (in the list, the editor or the banner). You play the saved version exactly as players will, even a draft or a closed game. A test go is never on the leaderboard and never counted; the finished screen says where it would have come.

Plays and the leaderboard

Plays shows every go (newest first) with the pictures guessed, the points and the time, plus the leaderboard. Hide takes a play off the leaderboard without deleting it (a rude name, a known cheat); Show puts it back. The cross deletes a play. Reset the leaderboard… deletes every play of the game.

Shortcodes

The game, with its leaderboard below it:

[picture-reveal id="gig-night" /]

The game without its leaderboard, or the leaderboard alone:

[picture-reveal id="gig-night" board="hide" /]
[picture-reveal id="gig-night" board="only" /]

The leaderboard on its own, anywhere:

[picture-reveal-leaderboard id="gig-night" period="week" limit="5" title="This week's best" /]

period is today, week, month or all (left out: the game's own Leaderboard opens on), limit is how many names (up to the game's leaderboard size), title the heading.

Export and import

Export needs the Manage permission, as the file holds the answers. Export (a game's ⋮, or the editor's banner) downloads one game as a file; Export all downloads every game. Import… adds the games in a file. Imported games arrive as drafts, with a short name of their own and no plays.

The file carries each picture's Media address (for example /media/decks.jpg), its answer, other answers and focus point - not the picture itself. To move a game to another site, put the same pictures in that site's Media first (same file names). A picture the other site does not have is named in a warning after the import; upload it or replace it before opening the game. The stages are drawn afresh from the pictures on the new site.

Notifications

Picture Reveal top scores - someone has gone top of a game's leaderboard (all time).
Picture Reveal picture missing - a player tried to start an open game with a picture that is no longer in Media. You are told once per game and picture.

The sidebar shows how many plays finished today, or - first - how many open games have a picture missing from Media.

Good to know

Moving or renaming a picture in Media breaks the game that uses it: players cannot start it until you choose the picture again.
Changing a game's pictures, answers, style, stages, points, spelling, order or time limit while someone is playing ends their go ("This game was changed while you played"). Changing the title, dates or leaderboard settings does not. A finished go always keeps the pictures and answers it was played with.
Picture Reveal is a Pro Tool. It can also be gifted to a site, for good or for a number of days.