A city that keeps living
Windows warm up and go dark on their own schedule. Red beacons pulse on the broadcast masts. The water keeps catching the light. It all moves slowly enough that you never catch it repeating.
Always in motionA calm little web toy
Endless retro skylines, generated in your browser.
CityGlow builds a pixel city from a number, then leaves it running. Office lights switch on and off, rooftop beacons blink on the tall towers, the moon arcs overhead, and it all wavers back at you in the water. Press Generate and somewhere else entirely appears.
New every time
Fullscreen ambient mode
Pixel nearest-neighbor
Local only
Inspired by Maxis-era skyline screens. Calm reflections, deliberate pixels.
What it does
Never the same city twice
Skyline shape, building proportions, window patterns, rooftop gear and signage all come out of a single number. Change it and you get somewhere new. Keep it and you get the same city back, exactly.
Deterministic seedsBuilt to be left running
Fullscreen in one click. The controls fade out until your pointer comes looking, and the screen will not sleep while the city runs.
Ambient display modePixel discipline
Everything is drawn in logical pixels and scaled by whole numbers. No blurry filtering, no half-pixel smear — the grid stays honest at any size.
Nearest neighborGallery
Every panel below is the real app, running live on its own seed. Open one to keep that city going in the full app.
FAQ
Is CityGlow free?
Yes — no cost, no account, no signup.
Can I export or save a city?
Not yet — the Export button in the app is a placeholder until it lands. In the meantime, note a city's seed and you can rebuild it exactly.
Does it send my data anywhere?
No. Everything is generated on your own machine — no account, no upload, no server doing the drawing. Close the tab and it is gone.
Can I use it as an ambient display?
It is what CityGlow is best at. Hit fullscreen and the controls fade out on their own. The screen stays awake as long as the city is running.
Does it work on a phone or tablet?
Yes. Pinch to zoom, drag with two fingers to pan, and tap near the bottom to bring the controls back.