Playing Pocket Garden
How does the game work?
Tap bright tiles on the board to move them into your tile tray, which holds seven. Three tiles of the same kind clear. Dim tiles are covered, so clear the tiles above them first. If the tray fills up, the round is lost, though Undo can return your last tile. Clear every tile to win.
Start with First Sprout, a 12-tile tutorial. It unlocks the six-step Garden Path, where each step is a little bigger and you can earn up to three stars: three for a clear with no undos or hints, two for three or fewer. It also opens the City Square, home of the daily City Challenge, with a new board every day at 00:00 UTC (the City Square shows this time in your local time). Anyone can practice it; sign in with email to play for your city. Your city is fixed for the day after your first attempt, each account’s first verified win counts once per UTC day, and cities are ranked by how many gardeners have a verified win.
Win at least once a day to grow your streak, and watch My Garden fill with a new flower for your wins. Stuck? A Firefly hint lights up a safe next move. You get a few per game in First Sprout, the Garden Path and practice, but not when you play for your city. Used them all? You can watch a short ad for one more.
On the Garden Path, helpers join the tool bar under your tray as you go: the Garden Basket from step 2, the Spare Planter (an eighth tray slot) from step 4, and the Hummingbird (it brings the tiles that finish a set, even covered ones, and clears it) from step 5. Each comes with one free try when it unlocks. A helper works once per game, and a clear with a helper earns up to two stars. When a helper’s free tries run out, you can watch a short ad for one more, and if you lose a board, Watch an ad to keep playing can bring in a helper to rescue it. In City Challenge practice, every helper is free once per game. Ad rewards for Firefly hints and helper tries work with or without an account, up to six a day.
Do I need an account?
No. First Sprout, the Garden Path and City Challenge practice all work without one, and your progress is saved on your iPhone. You can also buy Garden VIP without an account. Sign in with email to play for your city in the daily rankings and to use Garden Baskets, including free gifts, baskets from ads and purchases. The rankings, Garden Baskets and purchases need an internet connection.
After Garden Path steps 2 and 4, the game may invite you to Save your garden by linking an email. It’s optional: tap Later to keep playing without an account.
Garden Baskets and purchases
What are Garden Baskets?
A Garden Basket gives you a little room during an online City Challenge run. It moves the oldest three tiles in your tray into the basket; tap them to return them to the tray one at a time. The basket must be empty to win.
- You can use one basket per online City Challenge attempt, once you have at least three tiles in your tray. Your result is then marked Basket assisted in the rankings.
- Restarting doesn’t refund a basket, and a basket doesn’t guarantee a win.
- In practice, you get one free basket trial per game. On the Garden Path, the basket is a helper with its own free tries. Neither uses your inventory.
- Baskets don’t expire. Free baskets are used before purchased ones.
To collect baskets, sign in with email and open Garden Supplies in the City Square:
- Free gifts: a Welcome gift once per account, and a Daily gift once per UTC day. Garden VIP adds two bonus baskets to every Daily gift.
- Rewarded ads: Watch a short ad · +1 basket, up to a daily limit (currently three). If you run out during a City Challenge run, Watch an ad for a basket also appears under your tray. With Garden VIP, you claim these baskets without an ad (VIP basket · +1, no ad), within the same daily limit.
- Purchases: basket packs, including a Starter basket pack for your first purchase.
Daily gifts and the daily ad limit reset at midnight UTC. Garden Supplies shows the reset time in your local time.
What is Garden VIP?
Garden VIP is a one-time purchase with these perks:
- No full-screen ads between levels. Without VIP, one can appear now and then after a Garden Path win from step 3 on or a City Challenge practice win, but never during play.
- No ads for rewards: an extra Firefly hint, for example, comes straight to you.
- Five Firefly hints per game instead of three.
- Every Garden Path helper free once per game.
- For accounts signed in with email: two bonus baskets with every Daily gift, and the ad basket in Garden Supplies becomes a free VIP basket, within the same daily limit.
To buy it, tap the crown button at the top right of the home screen, open Settings → Garden VIP, or tap Garden VIP in Garden Supplies, then tap Unlock VIP. It isn’t a subscription and never renews. You don’t need an account: Garden VIP belongs to your Apple ID. To get it back on another device or after reinstalling, open the same page and tap Restore purchases.
The bonus baskets need you to be signed in with email. When you are, the app links Garden VIP to your account; if the bonus baskets don’t appear, tap Restore purchases in Garden Supplies. One purchase can be linked to only one account. If it’s already linked to another account, the other perks still work on your device.
Refunds for Garden VIP are requested from Apple, like any other purchase (see How do I get a refund?). If Apple refunds or revokes it, the VIP perks end. Our privacy policy explains what we record when Garden VIP is linked to an account.
How do I restore purchases?
Open the City Square, tap Garden Supplies, then tap Restore purchases. The app checks the App Store for any basket order that hasn’t reached your garden yet and delivers it.
Baskets are consumable: once delivered, they belong to your Pocket Garden account. Restore doesn’t bring back baskets you’ve already used, and it can’t move baskets to a different account, so make sure you’re signed in with the email you used when you bought them.
Garden VIP belongs to your Apple ID rather than your Pocket Garden account. To restore it, tap Restore purchases on the Garden VIP page, with or without an account (see What is Garden VIP?).
I bought baskets but they didn’t arrive
- Check that you’re signed in with the same email address you used to buy them (Settings → Account & sign-in). Baskets go to the account that made the purchase.
- Make sure you’re online, then open Garden Supplies and give it a moment to sync.
- Tap Restore purchases.
- If you see Awaiting purchase approval (for example with Ask to Buy), the baskets arrive once the purchase is approved. Tap Check approval status to see where it stands, and please don’t buy again while you wait.
- If you see Confirming your earlier purchase, tap Retry original purchase delivery. You won’t be charged again.
Still missing? Email us with the Support reference shown with the order in Garden Supplies (if there is one), the order ID from Apple’s receipt email, and roughly when you bought.
How do I get a refund?
Payments are handled by Apple, so refunds are requested from Apple at reportaproblem.apple.com. We can’t issue refunds ourselves. If Apple refunds a purchase, any baskets from it that you haven’t used are removed from your account. If Apple refunds Garden VIP, its perks end.
Garden Supplies also has an optional setting, Share basket use for refund reviews, which is off by default. If you turn it on, we tell Apple how many baskets from a purchase you’ve used when you ask for a refund. Our privacy policy explains exactly what’s shared.
Your account
How do I sign in with email?
- Open Settings (the sliders button at the top right of the home screen) and tap Account & sign-in.
- Under Sign in with email (or Save your garden with email if you’re using a guest account), enter your email address and tap Send code.
- Enter the six-digit code from the email and tap Verify email.
Codes expire after 10 minutes and allow up to five tries. You can ask for a new code after about a minute.
Didn’t get the email? Its subject is “Your Pocket Garden verification code”. Check your spam or junk folder (and folders like Promotions), make sure your address is spelled correctly, then try again. We’ll never ask you for your code, so don’t share it with anyone.
Already playing without an account? The first time you sign in to an account on your iPhone, it keeps the garden you’ve grown there: Garden Path progress and stars, My Garden flowers, your streak and helper tries.
Using a guest account? Linking a new email turns it into a full account. If your email already has an account, tap Sign in to existing account and keep guest garden, sign in, then tap Merge saved guest garden. The guest’s Garden Path progress, stars, flowers, streak and helper tries on this iPhone are added to your account, keeping the best of both, so nothing is lost.
How do I delete my account?
Open Settings → Account & sign-in → Delete account, then confirm Delete account permanently.
- Your email address, sign-in details, synced progress and City Challenge results are deleted, and you no longer appear in the rankings.
- Unused baskets are lost and can’t be restored, even with a new account.
- Garden VIP stays with your Apple ID, so its in-game perks keep working, and you can link it to a new account.
- Deleting doesn’t cancel a purchase that’s waiting for approval or request a refund, so sort out pending purchases first.
- Progress saved on your iPhone stays there. Delete the app if you want to remove it too.
- We keep limited purchase, Garden VIP and basket records, without your email address, for refunds and accounting.
Can’t open the app? Email contact@lynxce.cn from the address on your account and we’ll delete it for you. The privacy policy explains what’s deleted and what’s kept.
Getting help
How do I report a problem?
Email contact@lynxce.cn and include:
- your iPhone model and iOS version (iOS Settings → General → About);
- the app version, shown at the bottom of the game’s Settings (for example, 1.0 (1));
- when it happened (date, time and time zone) and what you were doing;
- screenshots or a screen recording, if you can;
- for account or purchase questions, your account ID (shown under Account in Account & sign-in) and any Support reference from Garden Supplies.
Please never send us your sign-in code or payment details.
How do I report an ad?
If you see an ad that’s inappropriate or not suitable for your age, please tell us:
- In the game, open Settings → Help & privacy → Report an ad. It opens an email to contact@lynxce.cn with your app version filled in. If there’s no email app on your iPhone, it opens this page instead.
- Or email contact@lynxce.cn directly.
Tell us what the ad showed and roughly when you saw it, and include a screenshot if you can. We review every report and use Google’s controls to block ads that break the rules. If the ad shows Google’s ad choices icon, you can also tap it to give Google feedback about the ad.
Privacy
Read how we collect, use and protect your information in the Pocket Garden privacy policy. In the game, open Settings → Help & privacy → Privacy policy.
Still need help?
Email contact@lynxce.cn and we’ll get back to you as soon as we can.
Lynxce Technologies Pty Ltd, Australia