Info › Help › Shout-Out & Broadcast

How do Shout-Out and Broadcast work?

Shout-Out and Broadcast are two ways to find a game beyond your usual connections. Shout-Out is for right now; Broadcast is for a trip or a few weeks ahead. Both live in Chat, under the Shout-Outs tab. The Map tab shows a quick preview too — the most recent ones near you, right under Who's Online — and Shout-Out also has its own quick way to send from there.

A Shout-Out has two ways to send it. By your live location, it reaches everyone free nearby — connected or not, in one go. By your home town instead, it reaches your connections only, for today or tomorrow. Either way, it stays live for 24 hours.

A Broadcast always uses your home town — never your live location — plus a neighbouring town if you add one. It always reaches players you're not connected with there; a toggle, on by default, brings your own connections into that reach too. Set it for today, or for a run of days up to two weeks out, and it stays live for up to 14 days.

There's no reply button on a call — connecting is the reply. If you're not already connected to whoever sent it, tap Connect, and it sends the same connection request as anywhere else on 8nOut. If you're already connected, tap I'm in instead — that's recorded straight away, nothing to accept. Either way, you show up on the sender's own list of who's replied. See How does picking a player work, and what do the others see? for what happens after that.

Neither a Shout-Out nor a Broadcast ever includes contact details or a precise location — not in the call itself, and not automatically once you're connected either. If you go on to arrange a game together, sharing exactly where to meet still works the same separate way it always has on 8nOut. Your live location, when you use it, is read once, roughly, only while you're sending a Shout-Out — never stored precisely, and never checked in the background.

Broadcast, and a Shout-Out sent by your live location, are for members 18 and older — sending or receiving either one. A Shout-Out sent to your home town reaches your connections only, so it follows the same age rules as the rest of connected messaging on 8nOut, whatever your age. You can turn Shout-Outs and Broadcasts off entirely, any time — on iPhone, in Settings, under Privacy; in the web app, on the Profile tab, in the same card as Club alerts and Read receipts. Turn it off and you'll stop receiving them right away. Anything sent to you this way can be reported or blocked, the same as a chat message.

The Shout-Out button on the Map tab carries a small pulsing dot whenever something's waiting for you nearby — so you know without opening it. Turn on Reduce Motion and the dot stays still instead of pulsing.