Jet Lag: The Game is an American travel competition video series by Wendover Productions published on Nebula and YouTube. Created by and starring Sam Denby, Adam Chase, and Ben Doyle, the series launched in May 2022. Each season features a game that sends players to achieve a geographical objective in some part of the world, some of which are inspired by playground and board games. Some seasons also feature other content creators as guest competitors, such as Brian McManus, Toby Hendy, Michelle Khare, and Tom Scott.
During seasons, episodes are published weekly on Nebula, and a week later on YouTube. Wendover has produced nineteen seasons of the series, and the channel on YouTube has amassed over 1 million subscribers. The Jet Lag crew also produces a companion podcast, called The Layover, where additional behind-the-scenes discussion takes place involving the gameplay experience and design of the season. The show was nominated for a Streamy Award in 2023, and received a popular-vote Webby Award in 2025.
Gameplay Each season features a game structure adapted to the geographic area and transportation modalities available in its filming location. These games have included requiring the players to visit and claim regions across countries or continents; circumnavigate the globe via air travel; play tag in sections of Europe; race between the northernmost and southernmost points of countries; and compete in games of hide-and-seek across countries, amongst others. Players must often endure randomly assigned restrictions to progress through the game. These restrictions may be in the form of a challenge, requiring the player to perform a certain task before progressing. It may also be in the form of a curse, which restricts their travel or adds a distracting element to the game. Depending on the format of the game, the players may be able to track each other to monitor their location. Most games primarily involve travel by trains, planes, and walking; they occasionally use bikes, buses, or ferries. In locations where public transit options are limited, they have used cars, but the producers feel doing so is less "strategically exciting" than using scheduled public transit.
Team format changes across seasons, depending on the structure of the game. In three-player games, two of them form a team, while the other player is on their own, rotating roles when the solo player is caught/found. In seasons where the trio are joined by a guest, Chase and Doyle typically compete as one team, while Denby allies with the guest. In the game involving three guests, each was paired with one of the regular players. The series's guests have included Brian McManus, Toby Hendy, Michelle Khare, and Tom Scott, among other content creators.
Production
Jet Lag: The Game was created by Sam Denby, founder of Wendover Productions and chief content officer of streaming platform Nebula, with writers Adam Chase and Ben Doyle, all of whom compete each season. The first season was released on May 25, 2022. The show is created primarily for streaming on Nebula, which supports its relatively expensive per-video budget. Episodes are released first on Nebula and a week later on YouTube. They typically release four seasons a year overlapping the planning, recording, and editing of each season with those before and after.
Jet Lag format was partially developed during a previous Wendover Productions show, Half as Interesting's Crime Spree, which had Chase and Doyle pursuing Denby as he attempted to break obscure laws in US states. Denby has also cited The Amazing Race and Taskmaster as inspirations for some of the show's various game mechanics.
Locations are chosen based on the availability of "strong, frequent, reliable, or semi-reliable, public transportation", according to Denby. Consequently, the most common regions have been Europe, North America, and East Asia. To address the climate impacts of the show's use of air travel, Wendover purchases Gold Standard carbon offsets worth ten times the show's estimated emissions. "We knew from the get go that we would get some criticism for what is clearly somewhat frivolous travel", Denby stated.
The players travel without any production crew. Instead the video is recorded by the players themselves, using just handheld or tripod-mounted phones and wearable microphones, an approach that Denby says allows the competitors to focus on content rather than production.
Seasons
As of May 2026, Jet Lag: The Game has released 18 complete seasons, plus a two-episode special.
Season 1: Connect 4
The first season premiered on May 25, 2022. Starting at Chicago O'Hare Airport, Denby and guest Brian McManus competed against Chase and Doyle. The game area consists of the 22 contiguous states of the United States west of the Mississippi River, in a game of geographical Connect 4, with the goal of claiming 4 states in a row on a direct east–west or north–south line. Teams must travel to their target state's capitol building, draw a challenge card at random, then successfully complete it to claim that state.
By the end of the game, Chase and Doyle had claimed Colorado, Oregon, Arizona, Utah, and Wyoming, whereas Denby and McManus had claimed California, Nevada, and Idaho. Both teams converged at Salt Lake City, Utah, with Chase and Doyle claiming the state, and boarded the same flight to Butte, Montana. From there, the teams traveled to Helena, Montana, with whoever completed their challenge first winning. Denby and McManus drew a card that allowed them to claim the state immediately, thereby connecting four states and winning the game.
Season 2: Circumnavigation The second season premiered on June 29, 2022. Starting and ending at Denver Union Station, Denby and Joseph Pisenti, host of the YouTube channel RealLifeLore, compete against Chase and Doyle to be the first to circumnavigate the world. To count as a circumnavigation, each team must travel at least and cross all meridians. Teams start with a travel budget and can earn more by completing challenges selected from a deck of cards. Once a team completes a challenge, the same challenge cannot be completed by the opposing team. To encourage onward travel, the second challenge completed within a radius is worth half the stated value, and any subsequent challenge is worth one quarter of its stated value.
During the game, both teams reached Singapore on the same day with different routes; Denby and Pisenti arrived via Cancún and Amsterdam, while Chase and Doyle arrived via New York City and Milan. Here, both teams aimed to complete some of the same challenges, with Chase and Doyle succeeding in more of them before Denby and Pisenti were able to do so. Denby and Pisenti were stranded in Singapore after gambling away their budget as a last-ditch plan, while Chase and Doyle were able to finish the journey back to Denver via Sydney, Nadi, and Los Angeles to win the game.
Season 3: Tag Eur It
The third season premiered on September 7, 2022. Starting at the Place Ducale in Charleville-Mézières, Denby, Chase, and Doyle play tag. Taking turns as the runner, each player aims to reach their respective destination: Zermatt for Denby, Jersey for Chase, and Borkum for Doyle. After 45 minutes, the other two pursue the runner using their GPS location. The runner completes challenges to earn coins for transportation and can purchase power-ups or veto challenges at the cost of a 30-minute penalty. A player wins upon reaching their destination; otherwise, the player whose destination is closest to the final runner wins.
Doyle was quickly caught in Lille while trying to board a train to Kortrijk. Denby then deliberately stranded himself in Calais to build his budget before being caught. Chase ran toward Paris but was caught at Massy-Palaiseau. Doyle became the runner again, chaining small towns toward Brussels before being caught. Denby then traveled south through Germany toward Stuttgart but was caught on the train. Chase subsequently reached the Champagne-Ardenne TGV station, inside his win area, and hid in the surrounding countryside. Denby and Doyle eventually tagged him, but Doyle could not escape the win area in time, making Chase the winner.
Season 4: Battle 4 America The fourth season premiered on December 7, 2022. Starting in Times Square, Denby and Brian McManus compete against Chase and Doyle to claim the most US states and the District of Columbia over four days. Teams have a travel budget, plus each day. They draw seven challenges and claim states by completing a challenge there, with new challenges replacing completed ones. Some challenges award tokens that can purchase power-ups. Teams can also steal states through battle challenges after claiming two bordering states. Each state is worth one point, with a two-point bonus for the team holding the most land area.
Denby and McManus fell behind early and focused on the area bonus, claiming Texas and California. After competing for Arizona, they challenged Chase and Doyle for Nevada, but lost the battle, decided by a popular vote on Twitter. Chase and Doyle then flew to Ketchikan to claim Alaska, securing the area bonus. Denby and McManus conceded shortly afterward, losing 9–14.
Season 5: Race to the End of the World
The fifth season premiered on March 1, 2023. Starting in Cape Reinga, the northernmost point of New Zealand, Denby and Toby Hendy compete against Chase and Doyle in a road trip to Lookout Point in Bluff. Teams follow predetermined routes across the country, encountering local challenges along the state highway network. Completing or vetoing roadblocks allows teams to advance, while successful challenges awards coins for power-ups, including skipping or placing roadblocks, curses, and Nerf gun darts. A player hit by a dart incurs a 30-minute penalty for the entire team.
The teams remained closely matched early on, reaching Auckland simultaneously and competing to complete its challenge first. Denby and Hendy won and built a lead before taking the first ferry across the Cook Strait to Picton. Although ferry delays reduced their advantage and Chase and Doyle later used a curse to force them onto a slower route, Denby and Hendy maintained their lead and reached Lookout Point first, winning the game.
Season 6: Capture the Flag
The sixth season premiered on May 31, 2023. Starting at Tokyo Station, Denby and Scotty Allen, host of the YouTube channel Strange Parts, compete against Chase and Doyle in a game of capture the flag across Japan. The flag locations are vending machines and the flag is represented by an item purchased from that vending machine. Team members complete randomly drawn challenges, earning coins to purchase transportation in their opponent's territory. If a team member is caught, they forfeit all their coins to their opponent and serve a 30-minute penalty at Tokyo Station before resuming the game. Teams can also place "towers" which impose restrictions on players' movement within their area of effect. If both teams capture and return the same number of flags in a round, the tie is broken by which team has transported their flags over a longer total distance.
The game was divided into three rounds, worth 1, 2, and 3 points respectively, with both teams respectively having 1, 2, and 3 flags each in their territory. Each round covered a progressively larger area of Japan. Chase and Doyle won the first two rounds by capturing all of their opponents' flags. In the third round, both teams captured one flag each, but Denby and Allen transported their second flag over a longer distance, thus winning that round. In the tie-breaker round, the players were not allowed to place towers, competing in a best-of-seven format to collect flags in Tokyo itself. Chase and Doyle collected four flags, and Denby and Allen collected only one, giving Chase and Doyle the victory.
Season 7: Tag Eur It 2