Wplace

Wplace
Area of Tokyo in Wplace on August 12
OwnerWplace
Created byMurilo Matsubara[1]
URLwplace.live
RegistrationAccount required to edit canvas
Launched21 July 2025 (2025-07-21)
Current statusActive

Wplace is a collaborative pixel art website developed by Murilo Matsubara and launched on 21 July 2025, where users can edit the canvas by changing the color of a single pixel on a world map. The website is based on r/place, a collaborative project that was hosted on Reddit.[2]

Overview

Individual users can edit the world map on an online canvas through changing any of four trillion square pixels available.[3] Users begin with a limited pool of 30 pixels that they can place, and regain one spent pixel every 30 seconds as the maximum pool size expands the more the user draws.[4] The site also features a leaderboard that shows which country and region host the most pixels. By August 7, the first country in the leaderboard was Brazil, hosting over 500 million pixels.[5] Such rules result in frequent wars between users, where every author tries to finish their own picture, sometimes destroying previous or neighbouring images.[4]

Users accumulate "droplets" by leveling up and placing pixels – a special currency that can be spent on increasing the pool of pixels, getting more current pixels, changing their profile picture or adding a flag of a chosen country to their profile. If user draws in the country where they have a corresponding flag, they recover 10% of all pixels spent.[citation needed]

The website attracted over a million users in four days, gaining popularity on platforms like TikTok, Reddit and Twitter, especially among residents of countries like Germany and Brazil. Due to the very high amount of concurrent users, the website has experienced many technical issues, that blocked leaderboards and prevented new users from registering, despite allowing already existing users to edit the canvas.[3]

Reception

Pop culture

Users actively draw images from famous video games, anime, cartoons, memes and elements of Internet culture in total.[6] Elements from video game franchises like Genshin Impact, Hollow Knight, Honkai: Star Rail, Kirby, Overwatch, Persona, Sonic the Hedgehog, Mario, Undertale, Deltarune, Stardew Valley, and are frequently featured on the website.[7][8][9][10] One of the most featured franchises on the website is Deltarune,[9] with some sources saying the franchise overrun the site by the amount of artwork related to it present on the website.[9][11]

Media activism

Wplace was also used as an attempt of fans to communicate with corporations, such as through creating art in the location of the company's offices.[12] Video game publisher EA was one prominent example of this, as several fans of the series Dragon Age used Wplace to protest disallowing its developer BioWare from creating remastered versions of their games.[6][13][14]

Political activism

Pro-transgender artwork has been documented on the site, particularly in prominent locations in the UK.[15] Notably users started to feature transgender flags near the house of J.K Rowling due to her previous statements regarding the trans community.[16][17] Due to the large number of trans flags on the map, the community of the website begun making memes about their prevalence.[15]

On the canvas, in the Gaza Strip and its surroundings, since the release of the website, numerous pixel art works including Palestinian flags, anti war slogans and other works of art were featured as a sign of protest to the Gaza war.[18][19][20] In North America, users showed their dissent against Alligator Alcatraz in Florida and remembrance art on the site of the Jalisco extermination camp, located in Jalisco, Mexico.[18] In South America, various users from Colombia and Peru practiced activism in support of their respective country's claim on the contested Santa Rosa island.[21]

References

  1. ^ Profile of Murilo Matsubara on LinkedIn
  2. ^ "Brazil Turns Itself Into A Metal Gear Shrine On Wplace". www.msn.com. Retrieved 18 August 2025.
  3. ^ a b Weatherbed, Jess (11 August 2025). "This collaborative doodling website is like Google Maps plus MS Paint". The Verge. Archived from the original on 11 August 2025. Retrieved 12 August 2025.
  4. ^ a b Nadim, Mynul Islam (12 August 2025). "wplace Craze Sweeps Internet: Inside the Global Pixel Canvas Phenomenon". Bangla news. Retrieved 13 August 2025.
  5. ^ Hernandez, Patricia (7 August 2025). "Gamers are taking over wplace, Google Maps for mass collaboration pixel art". Polygon. Archived from the original on 11 August 2025. Retrieved 12 August 2025.
  6. ^ a b Valentine, Rebekah (11 August 2025). "Game Fans (And Trolls) Are Racing To Claim Pixels in Wplace". IGN. Retrieved 12 August 2025.
  7. ^ Williams, Leah J. (12 August 2025). "Wplace is a new online map where gamers are 'painting the world'". Screenhub. Retrieved 12 August 2025.
  8. ^ Lewis, Catherine (8 August 2025). "Deltarune's beloved Spamton is everywhere and Persona 3 fans are turning Japan's real-life Port Island into a JRPG mural in this viral web app that's seeing pixel artists literally take over the world". GamesRadar+. Retrieved 13 August 2025.
  9. ^ a b c Robertson, Joshua (9 August 2025). "Wplace Is A Live Interactive World Map You Can Draw On, And It's Already Been Overrun By Deltarune Fans". TheGamer. Retrieved 13 August 2025.
  10. ^ "Everywhere I go on Wplace, I see his face - Genshin Impact's Wanderer, Persona 5's Joker, and Deltarune's Tenna to be exact". Pocket Tactics. 14 August 2025.
  11. ^ "Deltarune Fans Have Already Overrun Live Interactive Map Wplace". www.msn.com. The Gamer. Retrieved 17 August 2025.
  12. ^ Makar, Connor (11 August 2025). "Hytale Fans paint #SaveHytale art over Riot Games' Office on Wplace, protesting its cancellation". Eurogamer.net. Retrieved 12 August 2025.
  13. ^ Bardhan, Ashley (11 August 2025). "Enraged Dragon Age fans are punishing EA for rejecting BioWare's remaster pitch by covering pixel art map Wplace in adorable threats". GamesRadar+. Retrieved 17 August 2025.
  14. ^ Bevan, Rhiannon (10 August 2025). "After Finding Out About The Rejected Dragon Age Remasters, Fans Are Taking to Wplace To Send A Message To EA". TheGamer. Retrieved 17 August 2025.
  15. ^ a b Hansford, Amelia (11 August 2025). "People are using pixel-painting game Wplace to call out transphobia in the UK". PinkNews. Retrieved 17 August 2025.
  16. ^ "A timeline of JK Rowling's anti-trans shift". The Week. 17 September 2024. Retrieved 18 August 2025.
  17. ^ Villegas, Por Tamara Ramírez (14 August 2025). "W/Place, fenómeno de internet que convirtió el mundo en un lienzo". La Crónica de Hoy México (in Spanish). Retrieved 18 August 2025.
  18. ^ a b Gómez, Juan (17 August 2025). "Wplace: pixelart colaborativo y protesta social". Fábrica de Periodismo (in Spanish). Retrieved 18 August 2025.
  19. ^ "Una semana en Wplace: el mundo reinventado en píxeles". Diario ABC (in Spanish). 12 August 2025. Retrieved 18 August 2025.
  20. ^ "Saltillo se une al mural digital global de Wplace con arte pixelado". vanguardia.com.mx (in Mexican Spanish). 16 August 2025. Retrieved 18 August 2025.
  21. ^ Nolasco, Por Edwin Montesinos (9 August 2025). "Wplace en Perú: El fenómeno viral donde miles de peruanos pintan el mapa del mundo con píxeles". infobae (in European Spanish). Retrieved 18 August 2025.
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