Monopoly City Streets: Best Tips, and What to Play Now (2026)

Remember Monopoly City Streets? In September 2009 Hasbro and Google launched a free online Monopoly game played on real Google Maps streets. You bought actual roads anywhere in the world, built houses and skyscrapers, collected rent and sabotaged rivals with hazard buildings. I was hooked from the first week and wrote these tips while climbing the leaderboard. The game ended in January 2010, but people still search for it. Here’s what it was, the strategies that worked, and Monopoly-style games you can play online in 2026.

Quick answer: Monopoly City Streets was a promotional game that ran from September 2009 to January 2010 and can no longer be played. For a similar experience today, try Monopoly GO! on phones, the official Monopoly game from Marmalade on PC, consoles and mobile, or free browser games like Richup.io that let you play a Monopoly-style board with friends online.

What was Monopoly City Streets?

Every player started with M$3 million to buy real streets on a Google Maps layer. Longer streets cost more but could hold more buildings, and buildings earned daily rent. Chance cards let you build bonus buildings that protected your streets, hazard buildings (like a prison or sewage plant) that stopped a rival’s rent, or demolish cards to clear them. Millions of people signed up, and the servers struggled for the first few days.

The September 2009 reset and new rules

The first week was chaotic. Top players created multiple accounts and sold streets between them at inflated prices, offers locked up your money for a week while sellers ignored them, almost every street in big cities was already taken, and pages loaded slowly. Hasbro listened, took the game down on 17 September 2009 and restarted it from scratch a day later with new rules:

• One trade per street per day, which stopped price inflation through multiple accounts.
• “For Sale” signs showing unowned streets you could buy instantly from the bank.
• Street tax: your first five streets were tax-free, then each extra street added 3% tax (25 streets meant 60%).
• No hazard protection for streets that were part of a negotiation.
• Inactive accounts lost their streets to the bank after two weeks.
• Rent only on days you logged in, which kept players active and deals moving.

After the restart, players rushed to grab the newly freed streets, and the strategies below were built around these rules.

The best Monopoly City Streets strategies (2009)

For anyone curious how the game was won, these were the tactics that worked for me:

1. Buy long streets: longer streets cost more but could hold many more buildings and paid far more rent.
2. Build lots of small houses first: cheap houses earned rent close to their cost and filled space so rivals couldn’t drop hazards.
3. Own about five streets: owning more triggered a tax per extra street, which ate your rent.
4. Protect your best street with bonus buildings rather than spreading them thinly.
5. Don’t panic-sell sabotaged streets: a bonus building restarted rent even with a hazard in place.
6. Keep a low profile and don’t make enemies: sabotage invited revenge.
7. Log in every day: rent was only paid on days you logged in.
8. Bid on inactive players’ streets: if the owner didn’t respond in seven days, the street was yours.
9. Have fun: trade, spy on top players and enjoy the game.

Monopoly games you can play online in 2026

• Monopoly GO!: the hugely popular free mobile game from Scopely, built around dice rolls, boards and collections.
• Monopoly by Marmalade Game Studio: the official digital board game on Steam, consoles and mobile, with online multiplayer and classic rules.
• Richup.io: a free browser game inspired by Monopoly; create a room and share the link with friends.

Miss the days of games inside Google Maps? You can still play the Google Pac-Man doodle, or try the classic Google Gravity trick.

FAQ

Can I still play Monopoly City Streets?

No. It was a time-limited promotion and closed in January 2010.

Why was Monopoly City Streets reset?

To stop cheating with multiple accounts and fix slow trading. The game restarted on 18 September 2009 with new rules, including a daily trade limit and a tax on owning more than five streets.

Who made Monopoly City Streets?

Hasbro, with Google Maps providing the streets, to promote the Monopoly City board game.

What is the closest game to it today?

Location-based games like real-estate tycoon apps come closest, while Monopoly GO! and Richup.io capture the Monopoly fun.