Which Patrol Arcade Game Should You Play? A Guide to All 14
Patrol Arcade now has fourteen free police games, and they are surprisingly different from each other. Some are calm puzzles you can think about for as long as you like; others ask for quick reflexes and a steady hand. If you are not sure where to start, this guide sorts every game by what it asks of you, how long a round takes and how it plays on a phone, so you can pick the right one for the time and mood you are in.
The quick answer
| If you want… | Try |
|---|---|
| Something relaxing with no timer | Squad Car Escape, Patrol Route, Police Lineup, Evidence Match, Evidence Locker |
| Fast reflexes | Traffic Stop, K-9 Runner, Lost & Found |
| A bit of strategy | Dispatch Rush, Catch the Robber |
| A sharp-eyes challenge | CCTV Spotter |
| To learn something along the way | Radio Code, Parking Patrol |
| An endless score chase | Highway Pursuit, Catch the Robber |
Calm puzzles: take your time
These games have no clock ticking down. Every level can be solved, and the only question is how cleverly you do it.
- Squad Car Escape is a sliding-block puzzle: the police car is parked in, and you slide cars and trucks out of its way. There are 40 levels from Rookie to Chief, with undo and hints. Our guide to sliding block puzzle techniques helps with the harder ones.
- Patrol Route asks you to draw one continuous route from the station that drives down every street exactly once. Its 24 maps grow from 4×4 to 8×8, and a hint button cuts your route back to the last correct street.
- Police Lineup is a pure logic game. A witness describes the culprit; you compare hats, glasses, hair, height and positions and pick the one person who matches every clue. Twenty cases, with a cross-out mode for ruling suspects out.
- Evidence Locker is a code-breaking game: guess the secret code on each evidence locker and use the green and yellow clue lamps to narrow it down. Twelve lockers grow from a three-symbol code to a five-symbol vault, and each has a par number of guesses for three stars. Our Evidence Locker guide walks through a full game.
- Evidence Match is a memory game with a twist: study the crime scene, then flip cards to match pairs of evidence, avoiding red herrings in the later cases. There is no timer; stars depend on how few moves you need.
These five are the best choice for younger players and for anyone who wants a quiet break rather than an adrenaline rush.
Quick reflexes: short and intense
- Traffic Stop puts you on radar duty. Each car shows its speed; tap the ones above the limit and leave the rest alone. Ten 40-second shifts, and on the later ones the speed limit changes halfway through.
- K-9 Runner is a runner game starring Rex the police dog. Jump over cones, duck under banners and collect bones to close the gap on the thief across 12 chases.
- Lost & Found is a sorting game at the lost property desk. Items roll along a belt and you tap the right bin before they drop, watching out for red evidence stickers and bins that move.
Each round in these games lasts about a minute, which makes them perfect for a short break. We explain why that length works so well in why short browser games are so much fun.
Strategy: think ahead
- Dispatch Rush makes you the police dispatcher. Calls pop up around town and you decide which patrol car goes where, routing around roadworks and sending two cars to alarms. Ten shifts, and every one of them can be finished without missing a call.
- Catch the Robber is a top-down stealth game. As the town sheriff you sneak up behind robbers, staying out of their vision cones, and stop them before they reach their getaway vans. Each level builds a new town layout.
Sharp eyes and learning
- CCTV Spotter is a spot-the-difference game set in a security control room: compare yesterday's and today's camera pictures and tap every change across 15 street scenes.
- Radio Code teaches the international spelling alphabet (Alfa, Bravo, Charlie…) by asking you to find the car whose number plate was read over the radio, or to choose the radio call that spells a plate correctly. Our police radio alphabet guide has the full list of words.
- Parking Patrol is telling-time practice in disguise: read the clock, work out when each parking meter runs out and ticket only the cars that are late. It starts with whole hours and ends with clock faces, adding minutes across the hour and the 24-hour clock. See the Parking Patrol guide for worked examples.
Endless score chases
Highway Pursuit is the one game without a fixed number of levels. You drive a patrol car through highway traffic, stay close to the getaway car to fill the arrest meter, and every arrest makes the next pursuit faster. It is all about beating your own best score. Catch the Robber works the same way: levels keep coming until you run out of lives.
Which games work best on a phone?
Every game can be played with touch, but some suit a small screen better than others.
- Great held upright: Traffic Stop, Highway Pursuit and CCTV Spotter are designed for tall, narrow screens.
- Best turned sideways: Dispatch Rush, Lost & Found, Radio Code, K-9 Runner and Catch the Robber have wide play areas and larger targets in landscape.
- Fine either way: the puzzle games, because nothing is moving while you think.
For more on playing comfortably, see our tips for playing browser games on mobile.
Stars, saving and replaying
Almost every game gives up to three stars per level, and the rule is usually the same: fewer mistakes, more stars. Any finished level unlocks the next one, so you never get stuck. Stars and best scores are saved in your browser on your device; they stay there until you clear your browser data. Nothing requires an account, and there are no in-game purchases.
Choosing for a child? Our parent's guide to free police games for kids sorts the games by age and by how much reading or speed they need. If you like thinking games best, read detective games online for techniques that earn more stars.
Where to start
If you only try one game today, make it Traffic Stop for a quick burst of action, or Squad Car Escape for a relaxing puzzle. If you have a little more time, Dispatch Rush is the one that most rewards planning. And if you enjoy them, every game has its own guide in the Guides section with rules, scoring details and tips.