In its second season, the NFL Connect app is redefining the second-screen experience for serious and casual pro football fans alike. Currently, as the most popular social second-screen app for the league, NFL Connect, allows fans and strangers to compete with each other based on real scenarios that happen during games.
So, how does it work?
Each player chooses a matchup they want to participate in (i.e. Green Bay Packers vs. Seattle Seahawks on Thursday, September 4). Every player is then given a randomly generated game board of 16 events that might happen during the game. Half of the events are player-related—such as Russell Wilson throwing a touchdown—while half of the events are game-related.
The objective of the game, much like the well-known game Bingo, is to get four events in a row as fast as you can. When that happens, the user gets a “connect” and gets points added to his or her tally. Those points then put you on a leaderboard where you are ranked against other users of the app.
Those points can turn into some pretty awesome NFL-related experiences as well. For example, last year users could cash in points for a fan experience, with players like Patrick Willis and DeAngelo Williams or trade them in for tickets to events like the Super Bowl. Last season, the fan experiences with Willis and Williams included a live video chat for fans to interact with the superstars.
Though many might see NFL Connect as a competitor with fantasy football, most people actually end up using both.
“People play this in conjunction with fantasy football,” Daren Trousdell, CEO and Founder of OneUp Sports (the parent company of NFL Connect), said. “People play our game to have a real-time fantasy experience and then check their fantasy football scoring during game breaks.”
Currently, the Connect app is available for other major pro sports, and Trousdell says expansion plans are in the works. The relatively new platform (founded just three years ago) already has more than 10 million users across its different game platforms.
For many people that are stuck watching NFL games alone or while traveling, NFL Connect is a great way to have a sense of community while watching the game. It also gives fans a chance to be competitive with one another. In addition to the game platform outlined above, there are also real-time chat rooms where fans can smack talk one another or trade informational nuggets about the game they are watching.
NFL Connect is free to download and is currently available for iOS, Android, and Windows’ Surface. When a user downloads the app, he or she will get a certain number of tokens for free to get started with the game. All additional tokens require additional purchase.
To download the app in the iTunes store, click here.
For more information about NFL Connect, click here.