Guide

Glossary of sports prediction terms

If you're new to predictions, some words come up all the time. Here's a short, clear glossary so you understand them all at a glance.

Game terms

Pool / sweepstake: the game of predicting results with friends. Creating a group is setting up your pool.
Prediction: the score you forecast for a match (for example, 2–1).
Exact score: getting the result spot on (you predicted 2–1 and it finished 2–1). Worth the most points.
Correct result: getting the winner right (or the draw), even without the exact score (you predicted 2–1 and it finished 3–1).
Global prediction: your pick for the tournament's champion and runner-up. Worth bonus points and has a deadline.
Auto-fill: a feature that completes your pending predictions with a statistics-based forecast, so you never leave a match unpredicted.
Goal difference: goals scored minus goals conceded in a result. In the knockouts, getting the exact difference right earns a bonus point.

Group stage: the first phase, where teams are split into groups and play everyone in their group.
Knockouts (single elimination): the phase where the loser is out. It includes the Round of 32, round of 16, quarter-finals, semi-final and final.
Round of 32: the first knockout round of the 2026 World Cup, with the 32 qualified teams.
Extra time: 30 extra minutes played if a knockout match is level after 90.
Penalties: the shootout that decides the winner if it's still level after extra time. It decides who advances, but doesn't change the match score.
Third-place match: the game between the two losing semifinalists, which decides who finishes third in the tournament.
Venue: the stadium and city where each match is played.

Leaderboard: your group's ranking, sorted by points.
Goal-difference bonus: an extra point in the knockouts if you get the result and the exact goal difference right.
Locked prediction: when a match starts, your prediction closes and can no longer be changed.
Score at 90': in groups that don't count extra time, your prediction is scored on the result at minute 90 (plus stoppage time), not the extra-time result.
Tiebreaker: when two people have the same points, the leaderboard orders them by exact scores and, if still level, by correct results.

If you want to see how many points each correct call awards in each phase, it's all detailed in the rules.

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