Getting into a pool

The subject line reads You're invited to join, followed by the pool's name. Inside is a Join Now button, with the same address repeated in plain text underneath in case your mail program strips the button.

1. 1 Press Join Now. If you are already signed in, a dialog titled Pool Invitation opens on the pool you were invited to.
2. 2 If you are signed out you land on the sign-in page instead. Sign in and you are returned to the same invite — you do not need the email a second time.
3. 3 Press Accept Invitation. You join on the spot, the pool's manager is notified, and you are taken to the pool.

Where the name fields are

This is the reliable way in when a link has gone missing or was never sent to you directly. The tab carries a count of what is waiting, and while an invite is outstanding the browser tab itself reads Pools - New Invitations with the number in front.

Each card carries an Invited pill, the pool's name, how many players have joined so far — or Be the first to join if nobody has yet — and an Invited by line naming the manager, so you can tell which pool it is before you commit.

1. 1 Open /pools and choose the Invitations tab.
2. 2 Find the pool's card and check the Invited by line against who you expected.
3. 3 Press Join Pool. A Success dialog offers Go to Pool, which takes you there, and Stay Here, which leaves you on the list to deal with another invite.
4. 4 Or press Decline. A Decline Invitation dialog asks you to confirm, with Keep Invitation as the way back out.

Invite links come in two shapes that open the same pool: a short one with /p/ followed by the pool code (what the Copy buttons produce), and a long one with /pools/invite/ followed by the pool's id. Older /tournaments/invite/ links forward to the current address.

Open the short link — or enter the code — while signed in and you join on the spot and land on the pool: the code is what admits you, whether the manager invited your email address or a friend forwarded it. The exceptions announce themselves first: an old long link without its code, and any pool whose manager reviews joiners, show a Request to Join button that sends the manager your request instead, and a pool you previously left or were removed from always asks again before putting you back in.

• Signed out: you see a preview of the pool first — name, format, weeks — with buttons to create a free account or sign in, and you are brought back to the pool afterwards.
• Already an active member: you are told so and sent to the pool itself.
• Waiting on the manager's approval: the pool sits under Waiting for approval on Your Pools until they decide, and you get an email either way.

The pool code is the short piece inside the /p/ link — it looks like K3XW-7Q2M — and it travels on its own. Press Find a pool — in the sidebar from any page, or at the top of /pools — and type it in; the same dialog also lists any invitations already waiting for you. The code box on the browse page finds the same pool. Dashes, spaces and lowercase do not matter.

The tab's own line reads Open pools anyone can join — no invite required. Each card shows a Public pill, the week range it covers, the number of players in against the pool's cap, and a bar that fills as it does. Near the top it flags Filling Fast; otherwise it counts down how many spots are left.

Press Join Now and you are in. The pool moves onto Your Pools, the card's pill changes to Joined and its button becomes View Pool.

The list is deliberately short. It covers the current NFL regular season only, drops any pool whose start week has already gone by, and shows one pool per week range, so you never see five near-identical options.

The dialog says which it is before you commit: the button reads Request to Join rather than Join Pool, and the line above it says the pool requires the manager's approval. Confirm and you see Request sent — you'll get an email when the manager approves.

While they decide, the pool sits under Waiting for approval at the top of Your Pools, with a Withdraw button if you change your mind. There are no picks to make yet.

The request is not silent on their side. The manager gets an email saying you want to join, a count beside Pools in their sidebar, and a card on their pools page headed with the number of pending join requests. When they approve you, you get an email whose subject starts You're in.

The manager's side of the same request

Every way in runs the same three checks on the pool — it has to be active, it has to have a seat free, and a Survivor pool must not have started — and then one more on you, which is whatever your own membership row already says. The message you get names exactly one of them.

How a pool's capacity works, and who sets it

There is no second approval step once you are a member, and nothing else has to be accepted. The pool's manager is emailed that you joined.

1. 1 Open the pool from the Your Pools tab at /pools.
2. 2 Go to its picks screen and make your picks for the week that is open.
3. 3 Set a display name for that pool if you would rather not be shown under your account name. It applies to that one pool.

Joining part-way through a season is allowed in every format except Survivor, so a pool that is already several weeks old will still take you.

Where the picks screen is