Minesweeper

How to play

1. Pick a Board size and click New game: - Beginner: 9 × 9 cells, 10 mines; - Intermediate: 16 × 16 cells, 40 mines; - Expert: 16 × 30 cells, 99 mines (turned upright, 30 × 16, on narrow screens).
2. Click or tap any cell to open it. Your first click is always safe: the mines are only placed afterwards, away from that cell and its neighbours, so the game starts by opening an area.
3. A number tells you how many mines touch that cell, including diagonals. An empty cell has no mine around it, and its neighbours open automatically.
4. When you are sure a cell hides a mine, flag it: right-click it with a mouse, long-press it on a touch screen, or turn on Flag mode so that taps place flags. Click a flag again to remove it.
5. Click an open number whose mines are all flagged to open all its other neighbours at once (this is called “chording”).
6. You win when every safe cell is open. Opening a mine ends the game.

The Mines left counter shows the number of mines minus the flags you placed. The timer starts with your first click, and your Best time for each size is kept in this browser.

Keyboard controls

Press Tab to reach the board, then use the arrow keys to move between cells (Home and End jump to the start or end of a row). Enter or Space opens the cell or chords a number, F places or removes a flag, and C chords. Each cell announces its row, column and state to screen readers.

Strategy tips

• Start with the obvious. A “1” touching only one hidden cell means that cell is a mine. A number whose mines are all flagged means all its other neighbours are safe.
• Look for classic patterns. On a straight edge, the pattern 1-2-1 means the two cells facing the 1s are mines, and 1-2-2-1 means the two middle cells are mines.
• Subtract. If a 3 shares two hidden cells with a 1, compare what each number still needs: the difference often proves which cells are safe.
• Flag only when useful. Flags help you chord and avoid misclicks, but skilled players often skip flags to save time.
• Guess wisely when you must. Sometimes the board truly offers a 50/50 choice. Guess early rather than late, and prefer cells that would reveal the most information.

A little history

Mine-hunting grid games date back to mainframe games of the 1960s and 1970s such as Cube, and to Mined-Out (1983) on home computers. The version most people know was written by Robert Donner and Curt Johnson and shipped with Microsoft Windows from 1990 as part of an entertainment pack, then built into Windows 3.1 in 1992. It taught a generation to right-click, and its three levels (beginner, intermediate and expert) became the standard sizes that this game also uses.