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Minesweeper Rules: How to Play (With Examples)

Minesweeper is a logic game played on a grid of hidden squares, some of which hide mines. Open a safe square and it shows a number: how many of the eight squares around it are mines. Use the numbers to work out which squares are safe and which are mines. Open every safe square without setting off a mine to clear the field.

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The rules

  1. Tap (or click) a square to open it. If it’s a mine, the game is over.
  2. A safe square shows a number: how many of its eight neighbours, including diagonals, are mines. A square with no mines around it is blank, and opens its neighbours for you.
  3. Flag the squares you know are mines. Long-press, right-click, or switch to Flag. Flags don’t count towards winning; they’re your notes.
  4. Open every safe square to win. The counter at the top shows the mines left, less the flags you’ve placed.

That’s all. Everything else is working out what the numbers tell you.

What a number means

A number counts the mines among the eight squares around it. A 3 means exactly three of those eight are mines, and the other five are safe.

A 3: three of the eight squares around it are mines A revealed 3 in the middle of eight hidden squares. Three of them, the top-left, middle-right and bottom-left, are mines. 3
A 3: three of the eight squares around it are mines.

On their own, numbers rarely say which squares are mines. It’s numbers next to each other, sharing squares, that pin them down.

The first tap

The mines are only laid after your first tap, and never on that square or (when there’s room) the eight around it. So the first tap always lands on a 0, and opens up an area.

The first tap on a Beginner board A 9 by 9 board after one tap in the middle. The tap landed on an empty square, which opened every square around it, and the opening spread across 53 squares, edged with numbers. 1 1 1 1 2 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 2 1 2 1 1 1
One tap in the middle of a Beginner board opens 53 squares, edged with numbers.

The two deductions that start every board

Most of a game is two simple checks, done over and over on the numbers at the edge of the open ground.

When a number has exactly as many hidden squares around it as mines it needs, they’re all mines. Here the outlined 1 has only one hidden square around it, so that square is a mine. Flag it.

A 1 with one hidden square: a mine The 1 at row 4, column 6 has only one hidden square around it, so that square, row 5, column 7, is a mine. It is flagged. 1 1 1 1 2 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 2 1 2 1 1 1
The outlined 1 has one hidden neighbour, so it’s a mine, and it’s flagged.

When a number already has all its mines flagged, its other hidden squares are safe. The outlined 1 below touches the flag just placed. That’s its one mine, so the three hidden squares on its right are safe to open.

A 1 with its mine flagged: the rest are safe The 1 at row 6, column 7 already touches the flagged mine, so its other hidden squares are safe to open. 1 1 1 1 2 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 2 1 2 1 1 1
This 1 already has its mine, so the three squares marked with dots are safe.

Each safe square you open shows a new number, and the checks start again. This board, from the game, clears all the way to the end with these two checks and one more (comparing two numbers that share squares), without a single guess. The how to solve page covers the rest.

Chording

Tap a number that already has all its mines flagged, and the game opens its other hidden neighbours at once. It’s a shortcut for the second check above. Make sure the flags are right first: a wrong flag means a mine goes off.

Common mix-ups

  • Forgetting the diagonals. A number counts all eight neighbours, corners included.
  • Thinking flags win the game. They don’t: opening every safe square does. A board with every mine flagged but a safe square still closed isn’t finished.
  • Chording with a wrong flag. Chording trusts your flags. If one is wrong, the square it should have covered is opened, mine and all.

Next steps

Questions

Is the first click always safe?

On PeerPuzzles, yes. The mines are laid only after your first tap, away from that square and, when there’s room, from the eight around it too, so the first tap always opens some ground.

What does a blank square mean?

It’s a 0: none of its eight neighbours is a mine. The game opens all of them for you, and keeps going while it finds more 0s, which is why one tap can open a big area.

Do I have to flag every mine?

No. You win once every safe square is open; flags are for you. They do help, though: they keep track of mines you’ve found, and they let you chord (open a number’s other neighbours in one tap).

Do you ever have to guess?

Not on PeerPuzzles, unless you choose Classic. By default every board is dealt so it can be cleared by logic alone from your first tap. Classic boards are dealt at random, the traditional way: logic alone clears 87% of Beginner boards, 59% of Intermediate and only 13% of Expert, measured on 200 boards each from a first tap in the middle. The rest reach a point where no square is certain.

What are the three sizes?

The classic fields: Beginner is 9×9 with 10 mines, Intermediate 16×16 with 40, and Expert 30×16 with 99.