High school senior Venus "Vee" Delmonico longs to leave her home in Staten Island for college, but is afraid to tell her mother about being admitted to the California Institute of the Arts, as she is still grieving from the death of her brother, who died before starting college. Her friend Sydney becomes popular in Nerve: an online reality game where people either enlist online as "players" or pay to watch as "watchers". Players accept dares from watchers, receiving monetary rewards. Sydney and her other friends chastise Vee's unadventurous nature. When Vee refuses to talk to her crush J.P., Sydney approaches J.P. herself and reveals that Vee is interested in him. J.P. rebuffs her, and Vee runs away embarrassed.

Furious, Venus signs up as a player on Nerve. The game collects her personal data and explains the three rules: all dares must be recorded on the player's phone, earned money will be revoked if a player fails or "bails" a dare, and "snitches get stitches." In addition, the top two most-watched players will compete in a highly sought-after final round. Vee's first dare is to kiss a stranger at a diner for five seconds. Vee goes to the diner with her friend Tommy, who has a crush on her, and kisses Ian, who is reading Vee's favorite book To the Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf. Afterwards, Ian starts dancing around the diner and sings to Vee on a dare, revealing that he's another player. The watchers then dare Ian to take her into New York City, believing they make a good couple. Vee accepts the dare and rides into the city with Ian on his motorcycle, leaving Tommy at the diner.

In the city, Vee is dared to try on a $4,000 dress. Ian is also dared to try on formal attire. Vee and Ian find each other in the store and then discover that their clothes have been stolen. They are dared by the watchers to leave the store, so they strip off the fancy clothes and flee the store in their undergarments. They return to Ian's motorbike, where they find the clothes they tried on with a receipt, indicating the watchers paid for the clothes. Vee is then dared to get a tattoo chosen by Ian, who draws out a tattoo and refuses to show Vee. When Vee becomes impatient, he distracts her with Wu-Tang Clan's "C.R.E.A.M." on the radio, one of her brother's favorite songs. While Vee is getting her tattoo, she briefly discusses her brother with Ian and reveals his death. She then raps along with the song until the finished tattoo is revealed to be a lighthouse. Ian's next dare is to ride his motorbike through the city blindfolded at 60 mph, using Vee to steer his body; once completed, the two kiss. Vee and Ian soon become among Nerve's top players.

Jealous at Vee's rise of popularity, Sydney accepts a dare to walk across a ladder suspended between two buildings. Though terrified of heights, Sydney participates in the dare but bails out when her phone drops, thereby losing the game. Ian takes Vee to Sydney's party and Vee catches her making out with J.P. After arguing with Sydney, Vee receives and completes the dare on which Sydney bailed. Vee's friend Tommy reveals that he was watching Ian's profile; Ian had accepted a dare to make Vee and Sydney fight. Vee realizes how dangerous Nerve is and reports the game to the police, but they do nothing. As punishment, all of the money is depleted from Vee and her mother's bank accounts. She is then punched in the face by elite player Ty as a dare.

Vee wakes up in a metal shipping container with "snitches get stitches" spray painted on the walls. An iMac G3 in the container informs her that she broke the rules and is now a part of the game. Vee escapes the box and finds Ian, who confesses that he and Ty were players whose friend, Robbie, was killed in a dare. When they tried to alert the authorities, their families' jobs, bank accounts, and identities were confiscated, trapping them in the secret third category of the game: "prisoners". Vee is now a prisoner, too, and only the winner of the final round can regain their identity and their freedom.

Vee, Tommy, and Sydney recruit Tommy's hacker friends to alter the game's online code, but it is impossible to shut down Nerve, as all the watchers act as a server to the game. After hanging from a crane for five seconds - the same dare that killed Robbie - Ian earns a spot in the finals in order to protect Vee. During the finals, which take place at Battery Weed on Staten Island, Vee and Ian are each given a revolver: one must shoot the other to win. Ian offers to throw the competition and let Vee shoot him, but she refuses and Ty jumps from the audience to take Ian's place. Vee criticizes the watchers, whose identities are concealed behind masks, and tells them to show "nerve" at who they are and reveal themselves. She singles out a girl and urges her to take off her mask and reveal her name; though the girl looks uncertain, she does neither. The watchers then cast a vote regarding if Ty should kill Vee, with Ty egging them on. The majority vote is "yes", and Ty shoots Vee. She dies instantly and collapses in Ian's arms. Vee's mother, who has reached Tommy and is watching the events unfold on a TV, panics.

Tommy and his hackers modify Nerve's source code to decrypt the watcher's code names and send them a message: "You are an accessory to murder". All watchers immediately log out of Nerve, closing down the game's servers and effectively ending it once and for all. Ian aims his gun at Ty and Vee immediately sits up and tries to stop him, revealing that she is alive; she and Ian embrace. Vee tells Ian she is unharmed; she and Ty had staged her murder to scare the watchers into disbanding Nerve by loading Ty's gun with blanks and using fake blood for Vee. One of Tommy's hacker friends restores Vee's money and identity.

A few months later, Vee and Sydney have reconciled, Vee and Ian are a couple, and Vee is attending California Arts. Ian reveals that his real name is Sam, and they introduce themselves again in a moment of casual banter. The movie ends off with a kiss between Sam and Vee, with someone holding their phone and videotaping it.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nerve_(2016_film)
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