Tap the Beat is a daily rhythm game. Each day there are 5 things to tap along to: a cat's heart, an elephant's heart, a brisk walk, a car's turn signal, the beat of a famous song or a woodpecker pecking a tree. There's no number on screen while you tap, so you have to go by feel.
Then we show how close you were, with both hearts beating side by side, and a fun fact about why that rhythm is so fast or so slow.
- How is my rhythm measured?
- We look at the time between each pair of your taps and take the middle (median) gap, so one stumble doesn't ruin it. Then we turn that gap into taps per minute: a gap of half a second means 120 a minute, one second means 60.
- How are the points calculated?
- Anywhere inside the real range scores 100. Outside it, you lose points in proportion to how far off you are: about 14 points for every 10% away, down to 0 at half or double the range. For example, a cat's heart beats 120 to 140 times a minute: tapping 150 scores 90, 180 scores 64, 100 scores 74, and 60 or 280 scores 0. A beat counts as right from 50 points.
- How can I match a rhythm better?
- Use simple anchors: 1 tap a second is 60 a minute, 2 a second is 120 and 3 a second is 180. A clock's second hand ticks at 60, and your own resting pulse is around 60 to 100, so you can feel it on your wrist and compare. Count "one, two, three…" in your head to keep a steady pace before you start tapping, and tap at least 6 to 8 times so the measurement settles.
- Where do the numbers come from?
- Animal heart and breathing rates are the normal resting ranges from the Merck Veterinary Manual. Others come from official guidelines (like 100 to 120 chest compressions a minute in CPR), sports research (like Usain Bolt's 41 steps in his 100 m record) and the commonly listed tempos of famous songs, with a few beats of margin.
- Some beats are impossible to tap!
- That's part of the fun: a hummingbird's heart can beat about 1,200 times a minute in flight. On a phone, try tapping with two fingers.