Google Maps Snake: The April Fools' Game That Toured the World

For one week in 2019, the world’s most serious navigation app shipped a snake game. Google Maps snake replaced the hungry serpent with a commuter train, and the apples with passengers waiting across real city maps. It remains the most charming thing April Fools’ Day ever gave the genre.

What Google Maps snake was

Announced for April Fools’ Day 2019, the game appeared right inside the Google Maps app menu on Android and iOS. Instead of a snake you steered a little train (or shuttle, depending on the city), and instead of apples you collected passengers dotted around a stylised city map. Pick up a rider, grow a carriage longer, don’t run into yourself — snake rules, transit skin.

The city tour

The game shipped with themed boards for real cities — among them Cairo, London, San Francisco, São Paulo, Sydney and Tokyo, plus a whole-world board — each with its own landmarks drawn into the map. Riding the London board meant collecting passengers past a tiny Big Ben; Tokyo’s train snaked past torii gates. It was planned as a roughly week-long stunt in the app, though Google also made a standalone web version so it could outlive the joke.

Why it worked so well

April Fools’ gags age badly when they are only jokes. Maps snake worked because it was a complete, polished game — the joke was simply that it existed inside Maps. It also quietly proved the thesis this whole site is built on: snake’s rules are so clean that you can reskin them endlessly — train, serpent, neon line — and the game stays great.

Play the idea today

The spirit of Maps snake — wide boards, wrap-around movement, a journey rather than a box — is closest to our no-walls mode and the big board. The classic serpent-and-apple version lives on our classic board, and the rest of Google’s playful side is mapped in hidden Google games. And the timeless original is one click away — play snake online free.