Football Kick tips: how to score more, from the game’s own rules

The most useful Football Kick tips come from the rules in the free game’s code. Power is mostly your finger’s speed in the last 60 milliseconds before it lifts. On a phone the ball flies to the spot on the goal under your finger when you let go, and a swipe that bows to one side bends it. The game aims every kick as if the air were still, so the wind is yours to allow for. And the corners pay: a goal at least 2.35 m from the middle and 1.5 m up is top bins, 50 points on top of the goal’s 100.

We make Football Kick at 9io. It’s a one-finger football game for iPhone and iPad, made for iPhone Duo, with no ads or in-app purchases, and its App Store listing is called Football Kick Live: Soccer. These tips are for version 1.0, from its listing and its engine, KickKit, as submitted on 29 October 2026. To try the swipe first, the free browser game at footballkicks.9io.ai runs the same engine in Just Kick, Penalties and Streak for five minutes of play a day. This guide covers the swipe, curl, wind and bonuses, then each mode, and ends with a checklist.

How Football Kick reads a swipe

KickKit reads each swipe for where the ball should go, how hard and how much it bends. Then it solves for the launch that puts the ball there in still air, spin included. Screen distances are in points (pt), the unit iOS lays screens out in, and power runs from 0 to 1.

In KickKit’s tests a 200 pt swipe over half a second comes out under 0.25 power, and the same swipe in 0.07 s above 0.85. From the penalty spot, power 0 sends the ball off at about 14 m/s and power 1 at 33.5 m/s. Hard shots above 0.62 power get topspin and dip, and soft ones under 0.4 aimed above 1.1 m float on backspin, both still arriving at your aim.

On iPhone Duo folded like a laptop, half the gap between the ball and the fold aims about 1.5 m up, the bottom of the top-bins zone, and three quarters about 2.3 m, just under the bar. A fifth aims about 0.6 m, the top of the bottom-corner zone. Length is measured along the path from where the swipe first comes within reach of the ball. A run-up therefore adds height, and so does a bow, about a tenth more at full bend, so start every swipe the same way.

How to curve the ball in Football Kick

Bow the swipe the way the ball should set off. Bow it out to the right and the ball starts right of your target, then curls back to the left and, in calm air, arrives where you aimed. The curler bonus, 40 points, needs at least 45% of full bend, a bow of about 11%, and the ball crossing the line at least 0.55 m to the side of its launch line. That 0.55 m includes the wind’s drift, so a crosswind blowing the way you curl helps.

Swerve builds up through the flight, so distance helps. By our arithmetic from the engine’s spin and drag constants, a bow just past the 45% mark is plenty from a free kick 20 m out. From the penalty spot, with only 11 m to swerve, that bow carries the ball 0.55 m only on the softest strikes, and a full-power penalty needs close to full bend.

For walls, our post on how to bend a free kick has the swipe and the physics: start the ball outside the end of the wall and let it curl back. Curl also catches out four of the six keepers. Theo, Gus, Rafa and Viktor predict the flight as if the ball had no spin, and only Kenji and Idris read it.

How the wind moves the ball, and how to allow for it

The solver aims each kick for still air, and KickKit makes the wind count 1.8 times what it would on a real ball. Drift grows with time in the air. A full-power penalty covers the 11 m in about a third of a second, the softest one takes more than twice as long, and so does a 25 m shot struck as hard as that penalty. As one of the game’s level tips puts it, “Hit it harder and the wind has less time to move it.”

The wind badge is live. Its arrow points where the wind is blowing and turns gold above 12 km/h and red above 25 km/h. A kick’s wind keeps changing while you line up. Its speed moves by up to 9% either way in a breeze and by a third or more in gusts, and gusty settings swing its direction too, by up to 25° in most and 60° in the wildest. Strike in a lull. The wind bonus, a point per km/h when the kick’s average wind is 15 km/h or more, goes by that average, so a lull doesn’t cost you it.

Keepers rated under 0.55, which in the World Tour means Theo, Gus and Rafa, also read the flight as if the air were still, so a shot the wind is carrying keeps drifting away from where they expect it. At the Storm Cup, the only wet ground, keepers spill shots they would hold in the dry and low balls skid on.

What triggers top bins, chips and the other bonuses

A goal is worth 100 points. The App Store listing names six bonuses and the code adds four more. The corner bonuses and the chip go by where the centre of the ball crosses the line, measured from the middle of a regulation goal, 7.32 m between the posts and 2.44 m under the bar.¹

A run of goals multiplies the lot, by 1.25 for the second in a row, 1.5 for the third, 1.75 for the fourth and 2 from the fifth, until anything but a goal resets it. KickKit’s scoring test puts a 31 m/s top-corner goal in a 20 km/h wind, third in a row, at (100 + 50 + 30 + 20) × 1.5, or 300 points. Top bins is also the bigger target. Measured to the inside of the frame, each top-bins zone is 1.31 m wide and 0.94 m tall, and a bottom corner 1.06 m by 0.6 m. A ball that clips the bar in a top corner and goes in takes top bins and the woodwork, 100 points of bonus.

Where these numbers come from

Thresholds, ratings and ranges are from KickKit and the app’s code as submitted for 1.0. The power figures, the Duo swipe lengths, the zone sizes, the run totals and the swerve from the spot are our arithmetic from that code. We haven’t measured how often players earn each bonus.

Just Kick, the World Tour and Quick Play from Rookie to Legend

Just Kick in 1.0 is endless penalties at the Training Ground, with no wind and a sleepy Theo Lund in goal, rated 0.08. Its helping hand accepts swipes up to 70 pt from the ball’s edge. It keeps each kick 1.15 to 3.2 m from the middle on the side you leaned and 0.25 to 2.1 m up, at 0.45 power or more, and leaves the bend alone. That rules out chips and keeps the kick clear of the frame, but top bins, bottom corners, curlers and rockets are all there to practise. The browser’s Just Kick has since gained levels, going up one every five goals as keepers arrive and the help fades.

The World Tour has 30 levels, each with an objective. Meeting it earns the first star and opens the next level, and a level stops once the objective is out of reach. The second and third stars need points, so come back for bonuses later. The level card shows the kicks, the wind range and the keeper’s scouting line.

Quick Play is ten kicks of one type. Free kicks are from 18 to 25 m against a wall of three or four, long range from 23 to 30 m, and Mixed is 40% penalties, 26% free kicks, 22% angled shots from 12 to 17 m and 12% long range. Your best score is kept for each pairing of difficulty and kick type.

Over ten kicks the run counts most. Ten plain goals in a row make 1,750, and one miss at the fifth or sixth kick leaves 1,300, so in mid-round take the shot you trust. On Legend the wind never drops below 15 km/h, so every goal earns the wind bonus.

Keepers react to the ball and never see your swipe, and firm shots into the corners beat all six most of the time. Kenji and Idris remember your last eight kicks, so change corners against them. Our post on Football Kick’s goalkeeper AI has the rest.

Football Kick Streak: how the keeper and the wind climb

Streak ends at your first miss. The keeper’s rating starts at 0.12 and rises 0.04 a goal, so Theo faces your first two kicks, Gus takes over from 2 goals, Rafa from 6, Viktor from 10, Kenji from 14 and Idris from 18, at full strength from 22. The ground moves on every five goals, from the Training Ground to the World Final at 25, which puts goals 15 to 19 on the Storm Cup’s wet grass. The first kick is calm, and then the wind’s top speed rises 2.2 km/h a goal, to 36 km/h.

The first three kicks are penalties, so bank them. After that the kicks come from the Mixed list, and from 6 goals one in five has a ring in a top corner. Take it, since a goal through its middle is worth 300 before the multiplier. Leave the woodwork alone, because a ball off the post can come out, and change corners every kick once Kenji arrives. The browser’s Streak climbs the same ladder from the penalty spot.

The Daily Kick repeats exactly, so scout it first

The Daily Kick is five kicks on one ground, new at midnight UTC and the same for everyone. Each kick comes from the Mixed list, with a keeper rated 0.35 to 0.85, which means Rafa, Viktor or Kenji on most kicks. The wind rises with the keeper’s rating, from a range of about 8 to 18 km/h against the weakest to 13 to 29 km/h against the strongest, and each kick has a 40% chance of a top-corner ring. All of it comes from the date, down to the random numbers behind a keeper’s guess at the strike. Play it as often as you like, and the app keeps your best score for the day.

So treat the first go as a scouting run. A keeper who dives early on a kick does the same on that kick next time, unless he’s Kenji or Idris, whose guesses follow your earlier kicks, and nobody guesses behind a wall. That makes the Daily Kick the one place to plan a chip. On a penalty where the keeper went early, a slow chip down the middle adds 150 points to the goal.

Shootout and Practice

Shootout is five penalties each, then sudden death, against the CPU or a friend on one phone, and you kick first in every round. Against the CPU the difficulty sets the keeper and ground as in Quick Play, in a breeze of up to 6 km/h. In goal, tap where to dive, and your keeper goes the moment your finger lands. The CPU shoots 1.6 to 2.4 s after the ball is placed and can see an early dive, so wait for the strike. Our post on where to aim a penalty kick covers placement and how often each difficulty punishes an early dive. With a friend on iPhone Duo folded like a laptop, the shooter swipes on the flat half and the keeper taps the standing goal.

Practice has no score and no end. You pick from Quick Play’s kick types, an empty net or a Rookie-to-Legend keeper, any ground and corner rings on or off. The wind can be Calm, Breeze (5 to 12 km/h), Strong (15 to 25 km/h, gusting) or Storm (25 to 38 km/h, gusting and swirling). Corner rings, an empty net and calm air teach where to let go for top bins and bottom corners, and Storm shows how far each power drifts.

Football Kick tips: a checklist before every kick

• Read the wind badge and aim into the wind, more for soft and long kicks. In gusts, wait for a lull.
• Pick the bonus first. Top bins starts 2.35 m out and 1.5 m up, a bottom corner 2.6 m out and under 0.6 m.
• On a phone, let go exactly over the target. On the Duo’s flat half, set the direction and length, and start each swipe the same way.
• Keep your finger fast as it lifts. About 0.8 power from the spot is a rocket.
• For a curler, bow the swipe at least 11%, and more from the spot.
• Check who’s in goal. Change corners against Kenji and Idris, and remember that nobody guesses behind a wall.
• In Streak, take the shot you trust. In a Daily Kick replay, remember what the keeper did on this kick last time.

For every level of the World Tour, see the World Tour guide. To play a shootout against a friend, see our roundup of two-player penalty games.

Frequently asked questions