Squirm.io tips and tricks: how to win and become the biggest worm

Cut in front, never chase from behind

You cannot kill a worm by catching up to it. A kill only happens when their head hits your body, so the entire attack in Squirm.io is getting across the front of someone and making them run into you.

Aim at the empty space ahead of their head, not at the worm itself. If you aim at where they are, you arrive where they were.

Coil around smaller worms to trap them

Your own body is not a hazard to you, so you can spiral tightly around a smaller worm and shrink the circle until they have nowhere to turn that is not your body.

Start the coil wide and close it steadily. A worm that notices the circle early can still turn out through the gap, so keep your head moving to wherever that gap is.

Never boost without an exit

Boosting costs length every second you hold it, more the bigger you are, and drops that length behind you as food anyone can eat. Boosting in a straight line away from a chase is the most expensive thing you can do — you get smaller and you feed your pursuer.

Boost to complete a cut you can already see, or to reach a death cloud before someone else. Never boost just because you are frightened.

Farm death clouds, not loose food

Loose food is worth 5, 6 or 9 a piece. A dead worm gives back 85% of its length as food worth up to 35 a piece, and it all lands in one place.

When a big worm dies anywhere near you, go immediately. Thirty seconds in a fresh death cloud beats several minutes of grazing.

Spend a Magnet charge on a death cloud

The Magnet pulls food in from 2.5 times as far away for 20 seconds, and drags it to your mouth however fast you are moving. On loose food it is nice. In a fresh death cloud it hoovers up pieces other worms were still steering towards.

If you are carrying a Magnet charge, that is the moment to spend it: a big worm has just died nearby and three others are heading for the same food.

Stack Feast with a big meal

Feast makes every piece of food worth 2 times as much for 15 seconds. Picked up on open ground, most of that time is spent swimming. Used as you reach a death cloud or a thick clump of food, it can double what you eat in one pass.

It is weaker for whoever is winning — 1.5 times for the top 3 — so it is a catch-up tool as much as a lead-extender.

Use Nimble and Sprint to fight, not to flee

Nimble lets you turn 1.5 times as fast, which makes a cut across a bigger worm's nose far harder to escape. Sprint makes you 1.8 times as fast and makes boosting free while it lasts.

Both are at their best when you already have a target. Sprint in particular turns an expensive boost into a free one, so a Sprint is the time to boost across someone's path.

Use the Telescope to pick your fights

The Telescope lets you see 40% further for 20 seconds. That is time to spot a death cloud before anyone else does, see which way a big worm is heading, and notice the worm coming to cut you off.

Use the arena edge as a weapon

The red boundary kills on contact and does not bounce. That makes it a wall you can pin people against: run alongside a worm and steer gradually outward, and their only escape is through your body.

The same trick works on you, so keep a mental note of which way the middle of the arena is whenever you are fighting near the edge.

Turn wide when you're big

Turn rate is the only penalty size carries in Squirm.io — speed stays the same however long you are. A long worm turns noticeably slower than a short one.

Start your turns earlier than feels right. Most deaths at large sizes are a turn begun half a second too late, not a clever play by someone else.

Head-on: only go in bigger

When two heads meet, the bigger worm wins. If the two of you are within about a tenth of each other's size, both die.

So a head-on is only ever worth taking against a clearly smaller worm, and even then a cut is safer. Against anything close to your size, break off early.

Punish boosting worms

A boosting worm is committed. It is travelling about 2.4 times its normal speed, and even though boosting lets it turn a little faster, it sweeps a much wider circle and sheds length behind it.

If someone boosts past you, do not follow — turn into the space they are heading for. They are far less able to avoid you than they were a second ago, and their trail is free food either way.

Grab the gold on the way

Gold Nuggets are kept even when you die, so a detour for one is never wasted. A big one is worth 5 of the small ones. When a big worm dies it spills fresh Nuggets along its body, so the death clouds you are already chasing are where the gold is too.

Nuggets buy power-up upgrades in the Burrow, and every upgrade level makes that power-up last a second longer, for good.

Play the leaderboard, not the kill

Length is the score on every leaderboard. Defeating worms earns XP and counts towards achievements, but it only makes you longer through the food it drops.

A quiet worm that farms clouds and never picks a fight will out-rank an aggressive one that dies every two minutes. Fight when it is free; otherwise eat.