# Square Town vs Tocka: favicon wall or penny-war pixel canvas? > Square Town vs Tocka, as of August 2026: $1 favicon squares with double-price evictions versus a 1000×1000 painted canvas where each takeover adds 1¢. Source: https://square.pov.town/vs/tocka Tocka (tocka.rocks) is a live 1000×1000 pixel canvas where you spend credits to paint pixels, and anyone can take a pixel over by paying more — each takeover raises that pixel's price by 1¢. Square Town (square.pov.town) is a live favicon wall where every square is $1, holds one website's icon, and can be evicted for double. The difference: Tocka is a penny-war over painted pixels; Square Town is a dollar-war over websites. ## Square Town vs Tocka at a glance | | Tocka | Square Town | |---|---|---| | Price | Credits; $1 of credit free to start; each takeover raises that pixel's price by 1¢ (as of August 2026) | $1 per square, one-time; Throne starts at $100 | | What you place | A painted pixel (colour) on a 1000×1000 canvas | Your website's favicon, fetched from the URL you paste | | How you pick a spot | Click any pixel, including one someone else owns | Click any empty cell in the unlocked area, or evict an occupied one | | Ownership model | Hold the pixel until someone pays more | Hold the square until someone pays double what you paid | | Can you lose your spot? | Yes — for the current price plus 1¢ | Yes — for double your price; the evictor's price doubles again | | Game mechanics | Takeovers, rising per-pixel price, leaderboard | Evictions, the Throne (4×4 centre, doubling), 90-day kiss decay, ring unlocks at 70 % fill, Hall of Clowns | | Live? | Yes — live updates for everyone | Yes — WebSockets push every buy, eviction, kiss and unlock; 30-second polling fallback | | 3D? | No | Yes — tilt into a three.js scene where tower height = clicks | | Analytics | Leaderboard | Views, clicks and kisses on every deed; $5 unlocks per-day charts | | Accounts | Credit balance (account details not noted in our August 2026 check) | None — a secret deed URL is the only proof of ownership | | Payment | Credits (payment method not noted in our August 2026 check) | Stripe (card) | | Audience | People who like painting and defending pixels | Indie developers, small sites, anyone with a URL and $1 | | Launched | 2026 | August 2026 | | Status as of Aug 2026 | Active | Active, central 16×16 live at launch, grows to 1024×1024 | ## What Tocka does well **The takeover price is tiny, so the war is constant.** A pixel that has changed hands ten times costs ten cents more than it did at the start. That is a very low barrier to fighting back, which keeps the canvas churning and the live view worth watching. Square Town's evictions double, so most squares change hands once or twice, not fifty times. **Free credit to start.** As of August 2026 Tocka gives you $1 of credit for nothing. You can paint before you pay. Square Town has no free tier — the first square is $1, full stop. **A million cells and pixel art.** 1000×1000 painted pixels means groups can draw things: flags, logos, mascots, rude words. Square Town gives you a single 1×1 cell showing a favicon you didn't draw. If you want to *make* something on a shared canvas, Tocka is the better toy. **A live canvas.** Tocka is one of the few paid walls in the [2026 landscape](/blog/pixel-walls-ranked-2026) that pushes changes to everyone in real time. Square Town does the same, so this is a draw, but it is rare enough to call out. ## What Square Town does differently **The unit is a website, not a colour.** Every square on [square.pov.town](/) is a favicon fetched from a URL. That means every square points somewhere: click it and you go to the site. Tocka pixels are colours; there is no outbound link per pixel, so a Tocka pixel is not a way to be found — it is a way to be seen inside Tocka. **Evictions double, they don't add a penny.** Taking a square costs 2× what the current owner paid, and the next taker pays 2× yours. A square bought at $1 costs $2 to steal, then $4, then $8. That makes evictions rare and expensive on purpose; the price of a contested spot tells you what it's worth. Tocka's +1¢ makes takeovers cheap and frequent. Both are legitimate designs; they produce very different walls. See [the economics of eviction](/blog/economics-of-eviction). **A centre worth fighting for.** Square Town's Throne is the 4×4 dead centre, one owner, intro price $100, doubling on every eviction. Tocka has no throne — the centre of the canvas is just more pixels. **Decay you can prevent for free.** An icon nobody has kissed for 90 days fades to grayscale. Anyone can kiss any icon, free, by clicking it. Tocka pixels don't fade; they just get painted over. **Scarcity that grows.** Only the central 16×16 of Square Town is live at launch. Each time the live area is 70 % full it grows by 8 cells in every direction, up to 1024×1024. Tocka opens all 1,000,000 pixels from day one. **Analytics per square.** Every Square Town deed shows views, clicks and kisses; $5 unlocks per-day charts. Tocka's leaderboard tells you who has the most pixels, not who clicked yours. ## Who should pick Tocka - You want to paint, not advertise. Tocka is a canvas; Square Town is a wall of icons. - You enjoy a low-stakes fight. A penny per takeover means you can defend a pixel a hundred times for a dollar. - You want to try before you pay. The free $1 credit does that. - You are part of a group that wants to hold a shape together (a logo, a flag). One favicon can't do that. ## Who should pick Square Town - You have a URL and want it on a map that people click. Square Town fetches the favicon; you place it; every click goes to your site. - You want to know if it worked. Views, clicks and kisses per square, with $5 per-day analytics if you care. - You want a spot that is hard to take. Doubling evictions protect a $1 square better than a 1¢ increment protects a pixel. - You'd rather pay once and not run a credit balance. See [pricing](/pricing). - You like the game around the wall — Throne, kisses, ring unlocks, the Hall of Clowns — more than the painting. [How it works](/how-it-works) covers all of it in a few hundred words. ## Can you use both? Yes, and they don't overlap much. Tocka is where you draw and defend; Square Town is where you park a favicon and get clicked. A pixel-art community could hold territory on Tocka and put its site's icon on Square Town for a dollar. Neither site cares. Square Town has no accounts, so "using both" costs you a deed URL to bookmark and nothing else. If you are choosing between all the pay-to-hold walls rather than just these two, [pixel advertising alternatives](/alternatives/pixel-advertising) ranks the field. ## FAQ ### Is Tocka a Million Dollar Homepage clone? Not really. The Million Dollar Homepage sold fixed 10×10 blocks once and never changed. Tocka is a live 1000×1000 canvas where any pixel can be taken over by paying its current price plus 1¢, so it never finishes. See [Square Town vs the Million Dollar Homepage](/vs/million-dollar-homepage) for the original. ### How much does it cost to take a Tocka pixel? As of August 2026, each takeover raises that pixel's price by 1¢, so a fresh pixel is nearly free and a hotly contested one costs a few cents more than the last owner paid. Tocka gives you $1 of credit to start. ### How much does it cost to evict someone on Square Town? Double what the current owner paid. A $1 square costs $2 to evict; the next evictor pays $4. The Throne starts at $100 and doubles the same way. ### Does Tocka show my website? Tocka pixels are colours on a canvas, not links or favicons. Square Town is built around the URL: paste it, the favicon is fetched, and clicks on your square go to your site. ### Are both sites live for everyone? Yes. Both push changes to every open browser. On Square Town that is a WebSocket feed of every buy, eviction, kiss and unlock, with 30-second polling as a fallback. ### Which is cheaper? Tocka: it starts free and each takeover adds a cent. Square Town is $1 per square with no free tier, but a square never costs more than $1 unless you are evicting someone. ### Can I lose my spot on Square Town? Yes, if someone pays double what you paid. Also, if nobody kisses your icon for 90 days it fades to grayscale — you still own it, it just looks unloved until someone kisses it.