Glyphs are the language of the Shapers, the race that seems to be authoring the crisis on earth. Glyphs namely appear in the game as part of Glyph Hacking, but may have a deeper meaning in the Ingress Lore.
Glyphs are a language comparable to Anglo-Saxon and Norse runes, where characters stand alone as words rather than as letters, like in most modern languages on Earth. Glyphs are written on an eleven-dot matrix by connecting adjacent points with straight, unbroken lines. The Glyph language so far seems to be limited to nouns and verbs, which are combined to make simple yet entirely understandable phrases.
Glyph Hacking
- Main article: Glyph Hacking
Glyph Hacking is a mini-game Agents can enable when hacking both enemy and friendly portals. It involves memorizing a sequence of glyph characters and tracing them back on the array as quickly as possible. Sequences can range from one to five characters long, depending on the level of the Agent and the portal being hacked. If a glyph is repeated back correctly, the Agent gains 50 AP. If an entire sequence is repeated correctly, the Agent gains 100 AP and a bonus for speed, if applicable.
Glyph hacking rewards the Agent with bonus item drops and possible medals.
Glyph Channel Command
Glyph Channel Command is a feature that is added since version 1.90.1 that activates before glyph sequence started. You can send some commands / glyph that will change the result of the hack just after the "COMMAND CHANNEL OPEN" message.
Known commands that work are:
 More
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Potentially rewards 1 or more Portal Keys  , even with keys already in Inventory.
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 Less
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Never give any keys. |
 Simple
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Slower glyph sequence. |
 Complex
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Faster glyph sequence. |
Glyph Phrases
Glyph Hacking sequences often make phrases related to Lore or gameplay. All of the words in the Glyph dictionary are related to the Ingress Universe, The Enlightened, The Resistance, or the war for humanity. The phrases they make up give us insight into the purposes of the Shapers. Phrases vary from one to five glyphs long.
Some glyphs have antonym pairs. These pairs are direct antonyms such as less \ more, attack \ defend, and create \ destroy. The glyphs in the pair are mirror images of each other- i.e. attack is drawn as a chevron, defend is drawn as a 'V'.
Glyph Translations
Glyphs have one or more meanings. The known meanings of the glyphs are shown below.
 Abandon
 Adapt
 Advance
 After
 Again-Repeat
 All
 Answer
 Attack-War
 Avoid-Struggle
 Balance-Perfection
 Barrier
 Before
 Begin
 Being-Human
 Body
 Breathe-Live
 Capture
 Change-Modify
 Chaos-Disorder
 Chase
 Civilization
 Clear
 Close All
Complex
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 Conflict
 Consequence
 Contemplate
 Contract-Reduce
 Courage
 Create
 Creativity
 Danger
 Data
 Defend
 Destination
 Destiny
 Destroy
 Deteriorate
 Die
 Difficult
 Discover
 Distance-Outside
 Easy
 End
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 Enlightened
 Equal
 Escape
 Evolution
 Failure
 Fear
 Follow
 Forget
 Future
 Gain
 Grow
 Harm
 Harmony-Peace
 Have
 Help
 Hide
 Human
 I-Me-Self
 Idea
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 Ignore
 Imperfect
 Improve
 Impure
 Intelligence
 Interrupt
 Journey
 Knowledge
 Lead
 Legacy
Less
 Liberate
 Lie
 Live Again-Reincarnate
 Lose
 Message
 Mind
More
 Mystery
 Nature
 New
 Not-Inside
 N'Zeer
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 Nourish
 Now-Present
 Old
 Open All
 Open
 Past
 Path
 Perspective
 Portal
 Potential
 Presence
 Pure
 Pursue
 Question
 React
 Rebel
 Recharge-Repair
 Resistance-Struggle
 Restraint
 Retreat
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 Safety
 Save
 Search
 See
 Self
 Separate
 Shapers
 Share
Simple
 Soul
 Stability-Stay
 Strong
 Sustain
 Sustain All
 Technology
 Together
 Truth
 Unbounded
 Us
 Use
 Victory
 Want
 Weak
 Worth
 XM
 You-Other
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The Imperfect Glyph
Drawing the Imperfect glyph
With one exception, each Glyph is drawn by connecting adjacent nodes, without backtracking. That is to say, the lines that connect two nodes never overlap another node.
The Imperfect Glyph is the sole exception. To correctly draw the Glyph, the agent must connect the left node of row 5 directly to the right node of row 3, bypassing the center node at row 4. Then, the agent must backtrack and connect the right node of row 3 to the center node at row 4, then connect that to the left node of row 5.