Trampoline Flip: When to Spin and When to Let Go

Updated October 2026

Trampoline Flip is a one-button game about rotation and patience. The trampoline bounces you automatically; your only control is holding a finger on the screen to spin. Land close to the angle you took off at and you keep going, with a point for each full turn. Land crooked and the run is over. It looks like a game of quick timing, but the scores come from understanding the physics well enough to know when a flip is possible at all and exactly when to let go.

What you control and what you do not

The first tap starts the bouncing, and from then on the trampoline launches you every time you land. You never choose when to jump or how high. The only input is the hold: while your finger is down in the air, the gymnast spins clockwise and the spin gets faster the longer you hold, up to a maximum speed. When you lift your finger the spin does not stop. It slows gradually, keeping about 40 percent of its speed after each second, so a released spin keeps carrying you round for a long time.

The landing check happens the moment you touch the trampoline on the way down. If your rotation during that flight is within about 28 degrees of a whole number of turns, it is a clean landing. Zero turns counts as clean too, which matters a lot early on. The points you earn equal the number of full turns completed in that flight.

Notice that the check compares your angle with the angle you took off at, not with perfectly upright. A slightly tilted landing that still passes does not hurt you on the next bounce, because that tilt becomes the new starting reference.

How the bounce grows

Every clean landing, flip or no flip, launches you 28 pixels per second faster than the last one, starting from 820 and capping at 1,380 after twenty clean landings. With the game's gravity that works out to about 0.97 seconds in the air on the first bounce and about 1.62 seconds once you are at full height.

This growth decides when flips become possible. Holding from take-off to touchdown on the first bounce only gets you about two thirds of a turn, and even on the sixth bounce the maximum is just over nine tenths. The seventh bounce is the first one with enough air time to complete a flip within the landing window. Even at full height, the most rotation you can build is a little under two turns, so a double flip is never possible and every bounce is worth at most one point.

The opening: earn height first

Because a flip is physically impossible for the first six bounces, any attempt there can only end in a crash. The correct opening is to do nothing: let six bounces pass with your finger off the screen. Each one lands cleanly at zero rotation and adds height. Holding briefly to "test" the spin in this phase is a common way to lose a run before it has started, because the released spin keeps coasting and can easily push you outside the window.

From the seventh bounce on you can start flipping. On these early flip bounces the margin is tiny, and the only reliable method is to start spinning the instant you leave the trampoline and hold almost all the way down. In our simulation of the game's physics, the window for releasing on bounce seven is about 0.17 seconds wide and sits right at the end of the flight.

Finding the release point at full height

Once the bounce is higher than you need, the problem flips around: the danger is spinning too far. If you press as soon as you leave the trampoline, the coast after release does a large share of the work. At full height our simulation finds that a clean single flip comes from releasing roughly 0.67 to 0.78 seconds after take-off, a window of only about a tenth of a second, just before you reach the top of the jump. Holding any longer and the coast carries you past one full turn and out of the landing window.

The yellow line across the trampoline helps you calibrate. While you are falling, it lights up whenever your current angle would count as clean. If it lights and then goes dark before you land, you are still spinning through the window and have overdone it; release a little earlier next time. If it never lights, you released too early.

Between bounce seven and the cap at bounce twenty-one, the right release moment keeps moving earlier, because each bounce gives the coast more time to work. That is the hardest stretch of the game. Once the height stops growing, every bounce is identical, and the job becomes repeating one rhythm perfectly.

Two ways to time the spin

There are two consistent techniques. The first is to press right at take-off and choose when to let go. The second is to wait and then hold all the way to the landing, choosing only when to press. In our simulation the press-at-take-off method gives a slightly wider timing window at full height, about 0.11 seconds compared with roughly 0.095 for the late-press method, so it is the better default. Pick one and stick with it; switching between methods makes it hard to build a reliable feel.

One mechanical detail helps the first method. A press that starts while you are on the trampoline is ignored, but a finger that is already held down when you land keeps spinning you as soon as you take off again. If you press just before touching down, the extra rotation before landing is very small, and the spin starts building the moment you leave the surface.

Common mistakes

• Trying to flip too early. Bounces one to six cannot fit a full turn. Leave them alone.
• Holding until you look upright. By then the coast will overshoot. Let go while the gymnast is still well short of a full turn.
• Changing technique mid-run. The release timing only becomes reliable through repetition.
• Tapping to correct. A short tap adds spin that keeps coasting. Once you have released, there is no way to slow down.

A practice plan

1. Play a few runs just to bounce six times without touching the screen.
2. Practise the seventh to ninth bounces: press at take-off, hold almost to landing, and watch the yellow line.
3. Then focus on the full-height rhythm, releasing a fraction earlier each time the line flickers off before you land.
4. Once you have that rhythm, aim for streaks of ten or more identical flips.

Trampoline Flip rewards a steady hand and good timing more than fast reactions. Respect the opening, learn the release point, and your score becomes a measure of consistency.