For Players
Join, find, scan, and climb the leaderboard.
1 What is ZAZTEK Munzee?
A live QR-code treasure hunt for families and events — a ZAZTEK International product.
An organizer hides small printed QR "munzee" cards around a venue. Players use their phones to scan them; each scan "captures" that munzee and scores points. A live map shows the hunt and a live leaderboard tracks the race. Most points when the game closes wins. No app store needed — it runs in the browser and can be installed to your home screen.
2 Play in 60 seconds Players
- Open the game link (or scan the "Scan to play" QR your organizer shows).
- Type your name.
- Tap your team — or, if you scanned a team's own QR/link, you're already on that team; or tap "I have a join code".
- Tap Join the hunt.
- Tap Scan, allow the camera, point at a munzee QR — it captures automatically. 🎉
3 Install it on your phone Players
📱 Android (Chrome)
- Open the link in Chrome.
- ⋮ menu → Add to Home screen / Install app.
🍎 iPhone / iPad (Safari)
- Open the link in Safari.
- Share (□↑) → Add to Home Screen → Add.
Permissions: tap Allow when asked for the camera (to scan) and location (to see yourself on the map and unlock nearby munzees). The site is secure https, which both features require.
4 Joining a game Players
- Team QR / link — scanning your team's QR (or opening its
?team=CODElink) drops you straight onto that team; just enter your name. - Pick a team — enter your name and tap a team colour.
- Join code — tap "I have a join code" and type the short code your organizer gave you.
- Solo mode — if the organizer chose Solo, there are no teams; your "My Team" tab is renamed to your name.
Sign in with ZAZTEK (optional). If you're logged into zaztekinternational.com in the same browser, the join screen shows "Signed in as [you]" and fills your name in — your play links to your account. Not signed in? Tap Sign in with ZAZTEK, or just play as guest. Either way works — no dead ends.
One phone = one player. Your place is saved on that phone, so you can close and reopen without losing your score.
5 The five screens Players
| Tab | What it's for |
|---|---|
| 📷 Scan | Camera to capture munzee QRs; also a type-the-code box if a camera won't open. |
| 🗺️ Map | Live map that follows you, with a direction arrow to the nearest munzee (see §8). |
| 🏆 Ranks | Live leaderboard and current MVP. |
| 👥 My Team / your name | Your score, rank, found/left counts, team-mates, and the hint button. |
| 💠 Types | Legend of munzee types and their points. |
6 Capturing a munzee Players
- Find a hidden munzee QR card.
- Tap Scan and point the camera at it — hold steady until it reads.
- A reveal pops up with the type and points; ZAZ may cheer. 🎯
- Your score updates and the spot lights up on the map.
- Once per team. If a team-mate already scanned it, you'll be told — go find another. (In Solo, each player can claim every munzee.)
- No camera? Use the type-the-code box and enter the code printed under the QR.
Two ways to grab — the organizer picks. Scan the QR card (default), or in a Tap-on-map game there are no cards: walk within range of a munzee and tap it on your Map — it glows green and shows "tap!" when you're close enough. Some games allow both.
7 Munzee types & points Players
| Type | Points | What it does |
|---|---|---|
| 🟢 Common | 10 | Steady points — grab lots. |
| 🔵 Rare | 25 | Worth chasing. |
| 🟣 Legendary | 50 | Jackpots that swing the lead. |
| 🎁 Mystery | 5–75 | Random reward rolled the instant you scan — always grab one. |
| ❄️ Jinx | 0 | A trap: 0 points and freezes your team ~60 s (organizer can change). |
9 How munzees "reveal" (unlock) Players
★ You don't see all munzees at once
To keep it fair and exciting, your team starts with only a few munzees on the map — the ones nearest your team's starting point. More unlock as you play, two ways:
- Proximity — when any team-mate walks within ~100 m of a hidden munzee, it opens for the whole team (you'll see "✨ new munzee nearby!").
- Progress — when your team has captured all the munzees currently shown, the next nearest batch opens automatically, so you're never stuck.
Everyone on a team sees the same munzees. Reveals are shared across the team, not per phone.
Needs location, outdoors. Proximity reveal uses GPS, so allow location and play outdoors for best results. If you decline location, munzees still open by progress, and you can always scan any card you physically find.
10 ZAZ — your in-game assistant Players
- Hint — nudges you toward a munzee your team hasn't found.
- Ask ZAZ — type any question about the hunt; ZAZ also cheers big captures.
Tap the ✨ ZAZ button, or find Hint on your team tab.
11 Scoring, leaderboard & results Players
- Your team's score is the sum of points of everything it captured; ties break by number found.
- MVP is the individual with the highest personal score.
- When the organizer closes the game, scores freeze and certificates can be printed (per team, or per player in Solo).
12 Player troubleshooting Players
| Problem | Fix |
|---|---|
| Camera won't open | Allow camera; use Safari on iPhone. Or use the type-the-code box. |
| I'm not on the map / no arrow | Tap 📍 Center on me and allow location. |
| No new munzees appear | Walk toward the arrow (within ~100 m unlocks nearby ones), or finish the ones shown to unlock the next batch. |
| "Already has this one" | A team-mate got it — find another. |
| "Jinxed! Frozen" | Wait out the countdown, then keep hunting. |
13 Winning strategy Players
Team play
- Split up — each munzee scores once per team, so cover different zones. Spreading out also unlocks more munzees faster (proximity).
- Call out finds and clusters so nobody doubles back.
- Bank commons early for a steady lead, then chase rares/legendaries.
Route & the arrow
- Follow the direction arrow to the nearest target; loop rather than zig-zag.
- Move toward areas you haven't cleared to trigger proximity reveals.
Value, Mystery & Jinx
- Think points-per-minute — a Legendary (50) nearby beats scattered commons.
- Always grab Mystery (5–75, no downside).
- Jinx freezes the team — only one member should test an unknown card; if frozen, walk toward your next target so you're ready when it lifts. Late game while leading, avoid unknown cards.
Solo
- Efficiency wins: tightest loop, grab every Mystery, be cautious with Jinx (no team-mate scanning in parallel).
Avoid
- Herding one card · jackpot tunnel-vision · backtracking · reckless late-game Jinx risk · forgetting the last scan before closing.
For the Day Manager
Run the event without full admin access — lighter login, just the day-of controls.
14 What a Manager does Manager
★ The Manager console — /munzee/manager.php
A separate, lighter login (its own PIN) so someone can run the day and take load off the admin. A Manager can:
- Open / close the game and watch the live board.
- See and distribute teams & players — add, move, delete, paste a roster to split randomly, shuffle.
- Set each team's starting point on a map (or auto-spread teams).
- Configure reveal — trigger (proximity / progress / both / off), start count (1/3/5), range.
- Print join QRs & links (scan-to-play and per-team).
- Switch Teams ⇄ Solo.
A Manager cannot add/edit/delete munzees, change core setup, or reset data — those stay with the admin.
Giving a customer their own access. To let someone run their own event, share the manager.php link and a Manager PIN (set
MUNZEE_MANAGER_PIN in .env). They get every day-of control but never the admin console, munzee editing, member lists, data reset, or your website members. They see only the event they're running.15 Logging in Manager
- Go to yoursite.com/munzee/manager.php.
- Enter the Manager PIN (default 2200; the admin can set
MUNZEE_MANAGER_PINin.env). This login is separate from the admin console.
16 Teams & start points Manager
- Open Teams & starts. Pick a team, then tap the map where they should begin — a pin drops and saves instantly.
- Or use Auto-spread to place all active teams evenly in a ring around the map centre — so every team starts at a different point.
- Toggle teams on/off or add a team here too.
Why it matters: a team's first munzees are the ones nearest its start point, so different starts give teams different opening jewels.
17 Reveal settings Manager
On Day settings, choose how munzees open up:
| Setting | Options |
|---|---|
| Trigger | Both (proximity + progress) · Proximity only · Progress only · Off (show all) |
| Start count | 1, 3, or 5 munzees shown at the start |
| Proximity range | metres to unlock a nearby munzee (default 100) |
18 Players & roster Manager
- Add one player, or paste a list of names to shuffle evenly across teams.
- Move anyone between teams, delete, or 🔀 Shuffle all.
- Each added player gets a join code to enter in the app.
19 Join links & QRs Manager
- The Join QRs tab shows a big "Scan to play" QR (opens the game for anyone) and a per-team QR + link that drops players straight onto that team.
- Tap Print to hand each team its own QR, or share the links in a group chat.
20 Running the day Manager
- Confirm teams, start points and reveal settings.
- Share the join QR/links; let players join and install.
- Open game, keep the Live board visible.
- Give a "two minutes" warning, then Close game.
★ War Room — live team map Manager Admin
The whole hunt on one screen
Open 🗺️ War Room ↗ from the admin or Manager console. It shows a live map of all munzees (fading as they're taken), the standings, and a recent-captures feed, auto-refreshing every few seconds.
- Live team dots — tap 📍 Live tracking (top-right) to see each team's members move on the map, coloured by team, with their name and how long ago they were seen. It's off by default.
- Players are told. While tracking is on, players see a notice that their team's position is visible to the organizer. Turning it off clears stored positions.
- Organizer-only. The War Room needs the admin or Manager PIN — players and the public can't open it.
Needs outdoor GPS. Team dots require players to allow location and be outdoors; a player whose position is older than 5 minutes drops off the map until they move again.
For the Admin
Setup and full control — the parts a manager can't touch.
★ Running more than one hunt Admin Manager
Several hunts, at the same time, on one install
One Munzee install can run any number of hunts side by side. Two schools on the same Saturday, a morning family hunt and an evening corporate one, a real event and a rehearsal — each has its own teams, its own munzees, its own leaderboard and its own settings. Nothing crosses between them. A team in one hunt cannot see, scan, or score another hunt's munzees, and each hunt's board shows only its own teams.
- Make one: organiser console → the hunt picker at the top → Start a new hunt.
Give it a name. It gets a short code (like
SPRING) that appears in links. - Switch between them: same picker. Everything on the page — munzees, teams, settings, the board — follows the hunt you have chosen. The console shows which one you are on at all times; check it before you change anything.
- Hand one to a manager: send them
manager.php?g=CODE. That link puts them in that hunt and keeps them there. If they openmanager.phpwith no code and more than one hunt is running, they are asked which one rather than dropped into a guess. - Players: a team join link and a printed QR card already say which hunt they belong
to, so players never pick. Someone arriving at the bare address needs
/munzee/?g=CODE.
Check the hunt name before anything destructive. Reset game data,
Start a new hunt and Generate new codes act on the hunt you are currently on, and only
that one — the others carry on untouched. That is the protection; reading the name at the top of
the page is what makes it work for you.
Saved games still work, and now travel between hunts. A hunt you put
in the cupboard can be loaded back into any hunt, which is how you run the same course again next
year without setting it up twice. The list marks anything taken from a different hunt. Loading
replaces what is in the hunt you are on and archives it first; it never touches the others.
QR codes and join codes are unique across the whole server, not just
within a hunt. That is deliberate: a card scanned by someone with no session at all has nothing but
the code to say which hunt it belongs to. The console takes care of this — it is only worth
knowing if you are ever tempted to reuse a printed set of cards in two hunts at once. Don't; print a
fresh set.
21 One-time setup Admin
- Upload the /munzee/ folder into
public_html/(so it's at yoursite.com/munzee/). - In phpMyAdmin import schema.sql once, then the upgrades in order: upgrade3, upgrade4, upgrade5 (teams/solo, join codes, progressive reveal and team starts), then upgrade6, upgrade8, upgrade9, and finally upgrade10-multigame.sql, which is what lets the install run several hunts at once. Each one is safe to run twice, and upgrade10 keeps everything already on the server as your first hunt — same teams, same codes, same scores, same links.
- Set PINs in
public_html/munzee/.env:MUNZEE_PIN(admin) andMUNZEE_MANAGER_PIN(manager). The login screens confirm whether each PIN is read from.env. - Open /munzee/ once and refresh so the latest app version loads.
22 Placing munzees on the map (GPS) Admin
Why the admin has maps. The Area map (GPS) pins each munzee to a real-world location — this powers the guiding arrow, proximity reveal, the War Room, and Tap-to-grab. The Deploy map instead places munzees on an uploaded floor-plan image (by percentage) for indoor venues where GPS is unreliable, so players see a picture map. Use Area map for outdoor GPS play; Deploy map for indoor image-based play.
Required for reveal & tap. Proximity reveal and Tap-to-grab need each munzee to have a GPS location (Area map). Without GPS, the game falls back to showing the first few munzees by number, and Tap-to-grab won't work.
For accurate pins, walk to each hidden card and tap "📍 Use my location for selected" while standing beside it — the tool shows the GPS accuracy (± metres); if it's high, stand still and tap again for a tighter fix. Clicking the map by eye is less precise. The tool now confirms every save ("✓ Saved N/total"); if you ever see a red "Save failed", open
admin.php, log in again, and retry.- Use Hints & spots to add a hint and a location note per munzee (ZAZ uses these).
- The Answer key tab lists every code and type — your checklist while hiding cards.
23 Printing & placing QR cards Admin
- Open print-cards.php for a printable sheet of all munzee QR cards (label + code).
- Print, cut, and (for outdoors) laminate. Keep the printed code visible for the type-in fallback.
- Hide each card, ticking it off the Answer key; set its GPS on the Area map.
24 Settings & data Admin
- Admin controls everything the manager does plus munzee editing/deleting, core settings, and data reset.
- Munzees persist until an admin deletes them. Reset game data clears players, scores and reveal state but keeps munzees and teams — perfect for re-running.
- Open the Manager console any time via 🎮 Manager ↗ in the admin tab bar.
- Capture mode & map: in Settings (admin) or Day settings (Manager) choose 📷 Scan QR, 📍 Tap-on-map, or Both, set the tap range in metres, and toggle Show munzees on the player map on/off. Tap-on-map needs GPS-placed munzees and the map ON.
Build teams from members — private & opt-in. The admin Players tab has "Add from website members", but it's off by default: the owner turns it on with
MUNZEE_MEMBER_PICKER=1 in .env. Even then it lists only members who opted in (they tick "let organizers add me to future games" when they sign into the game) — never your full member list, and only in the admin console (managers/customers never see it). Pick, choose a team, add; anyone already in the game is greyed out.★ Test the whole game before you play Admin
A 10-minute dry run that catches every dead end
- Place munzees: admin → Area map → for each card tap "📍 Use my location" (or click the map). Confirm the counter climbs and you see "✓ Saved". Tap "Save this view as players' start".
- Make teams: admin or Manager → add 2 test teams.
- Set starts: Manager → Teams & starts → tap the map for each team (or Auto-spread).
- Reveal: Manager → Day settings → Trigger = Both, Start count = 3, range 100 m. Open game.
- Join: Manager → Join QRs → scan the "Scan to play" QR on a phone; enter a name; pick a team. Confirm the gold "LIVE HUNT" banner and teams show.
- Map: open the Map tab; allow location; confirm the blue dot centres on you and the red arrow points to the nearest munzee with a distance.
- Scan: scan a printed card; confirm the reward pops up and your score rises.
- Reveal check: walk within 100 m of a hidden munzee → "✨ new munzee nearby"; or clear the shown ones → next batch opens.
- Leaderboard: confirm the Ranks tab updates; try a second phone/team.
- Finish: Manager → Close game → open Results → print a certificate. Then admin → Reset game data to clear the test (munzees stay).
25 Admin troubleshooting Admin
| Problem | Fix |
|---|---|
| Login takes any PIN / won't stay logged in / actions "do nothing" | Stale cached page. Open /munzee/, DevTools → Application → Service Workers → Unregister and clear Cache Storage, then reload. Admin/manager pages must never be cached. |
| Login shows "PIN source: default" | Add MUNZEE_PIN / MUNZEE_MANAGER_PIN as lines in public_html/munzee/.env. |
| Red "Action failed…" banner | Run upgrade3/4/5.sql in phpMyAdmin — a needed column/table is missing. |
| Munzees don't reveal by proximity | Give munzees GPS (Area map), set team start points (Manager → Teams & starts), and make sure reveal isn't set to Off. Players must allow location, outdoors. |
| Old test scores appear | Settings → Reset game data. |
26 Glossary & FAQ
Glossary
- Munzee — a hidden QR card players scan to score.
- Reveal / unlock — a munzee becoming visible to a team (by proximity or progress).
- Start point — where a team begins; its first munzees are nearest here.
- Join code / team link — drops a player onto a specific team.
- Jinx — 0 points + a short team freeze. Mystery — random 5–75.
- MVP — highest individual score.
FAQ
Do we need internet? Yes, to score and reveal; the app opens on flaky Wi-Fi and syncs when connected.
Does everyone on a team see the same munzees? Yes — reveals are shared per team.
Can the same card be scanned by different teams? Yes; within a team it counts once.
Manager vs Admin? Manager runs the day (teams, starts, reveal, players, QRs, open/close). Admin also creates/edits/deletes munzees and resets data.