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Power Grid

Power Grid

Min number of participants 2
Age 12+ yrs.
Safety support by adult Not required
Min duration 2 h
Cost Medium
Environment Indoor / Outdoor

Bid for power plants at auction, buy resources to fuel them, and expand your electrical network across cities — the player powering the most cities when the grid fills wins in this acclaimed economic game.

The Essentials

Rules

  • Build power plants and connect cities to your network using the game's fixed step order (auction power plants, buy resources, build, then power cities) each round, since skipping or reordering steps breaks the turn structure the whole game depends on.
  • Only bid on power plants you can actually afford and use, since an unaffordable or unusable plant still costs you the auction money and gives you nothing in return.
  • Power as many of your connected cities as your plants and resources allow each turn, since income is based on cities powered, not cities merely connected, so an unpowered city earns you nothing that round.
  • Watch the resource supply on the market board closely, since resource prices rise as they become scarce, and other players buying up a resource type can leave you unable to power plants that depend on it.

Tips

  • Avoid rushing to expand your network too early in step 1, since players building fastest early actually move to a disadvantageous bidding position in step 2 for the rest of the game.
  • Diversify the resource types your power plants use (coal, oil, garbage, uranium, or hybrid/renewable) rather than relying on just one, since this protects you from being unable to power cities when a single resource becomes scarce or expensive.
  • Pay attention to which power plants are removed from the game each round, since this shrinks the available options over time and can make waiting for a specific plant to appear a risky strategy.
  • Track other players' city networks and plant capacities closely in the mid-to-late game, since the step order means the current leader in cities powered actually bids last, which changes optimal auction strategy as positions shift.
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