Click any cell to start
Your Statistics
F2 = new game · Right-click or long-press = flag · Click number = chord reveal
How to Play Minesweeper
Choose a Difficulty
Select Beginner (9×9, 10 mines) for a quick introduction, Intermediate (16×16, 40 mines) for a moderate challenge, or Expert (30×16, 99 mines) for the full classic experience. You can also choose Custom to set your own grid size and mine count. The mine density percentage shown next to each difficulty gives you an idea of how crowded the board will be.
Click Any Cell to Start
Left-click any cell on the board to reveal it. Your first click is always safe — the mines are placed after you click, so you will never explode on the first move. A blank area will flood-fill outward from your click, and number clues will appear along the border showing how many mines neighbor each revealed cell. Use these numbers to figure out where mines are hiding.
Flag Mines and Reveal Safe Cells
Right-click (desktop) or long-press (mobile) any unrevealed cell to place a red flag marking a suspected mine. The mine counter in the top-left decrements with each flag placed. Once you have flagged a number cell's neighboring mines, you can chord-click the number to automatically reveal all its remaining unrevealed neighbors — a huge time-saver when clearing known-safe areas. Continue revealing safe cells and flagging mines until the board is cleared.
Win by Clearing All Safe Cells
You win when every safe cell on the board has been revealed. The timer stops, the smiley button turns into a cool sunglasses face, and any unflagged mines are automatically flagged for you. Your finish time is recorded and compared against your personal best for the difficulty. Click the smiley face or press F2 at any time to start a fresh game with the same settings.
Frequently Asked Questions
Why is my first click always safe?
Minesweeper generates the mine layout after you make your first click, not before. This design choice — introduced in the Windows XP version — ensures you can never randomly lose the moment you start a game. The clicked cell and all eight of its immediate neighbors are excluded from mine placement, so you always open into a comfortable area with useful number clues visible from the start. This makes every game fair from the first move and gives you a meaningful starting position to reason from rather than starting blind next to a mine.
What does chord clicking do?
Chord clicking is an advanced technique that speeds up play dramatically. When you click a revealed number cell, the game checks whether the count of flagged cells adjacent to it matches the cell's number. If they match — meaning you have correctly identified all neighboring mines with flags — clicking that numbered cell automatically reveals all of its remaining unrevealed, unflagged neighbors simultaneously. This can cascade into a large flood-fill reveal. If you have incorrectly flagged a neighbor, a chord click on that number will still trigger and may detonate a mine, so use it only when you are confident in your flags.
What is the difference between a flag and a question mark?
A flag (right-click or long-press) marks a cell you believe contains a mine. It prevents accidental left-click reveals on that cell and counts against the mine counter display. A question mark is an optional intermediate state accessed by right-clicking a flagged cell when the question-marks option is enabled. It marks a cell as uncertain — you suspect it might be a mine but are not sure enough to commit. Question marks do not decrement the mine counter. Right-clicking a question-marked cell clears it back to blank. You can toggle the question-marks feature on or off in the options row below the board.
Are there situations where I have to guess?
Yes. Standard random Minesweeper boards can produce unavoidable guess situations, typically at the end of a game when two or more cells are completely symmetric and no available number clue can distinguish between them. The most common scenario is a 50/50 corner where two hidden cells touch only one number and either arrangement of mines is logically consistent. In these cases you must guess and have a 50% chance of winning. Experienced players minimize guess situations by carefully managing the order in which they reveal cells, but some boards simply require a lucky guess to complete without dying.
How are personal best times saved?
Your best completion times for Beginner, Intermediate, and Expert difficulties are stored in your browser's localStorage, along with your total games played and win count. This data is saved automatically whenever you complete a game and persists between visits in the same browser. The data stays only in your browser and is never sent to any server. If you clear your browser's localStorage or site data, your saved statistics will be reset. Stats are tracked separately per difficulty level, so your Beginner best time is independent of your Expert best time.
How do I play on a phone or tablet?
On mobile devices, a single tap reveals a cell just like a left-click on desktop. To place a flag, use a long press — hold your finger on a cell for about half a second until the flag appears. This is the standard mobile control scheme used by all major Minesweeper implementations. Chord clicking works the same way on mobile: tap a revealed number cell once its neighboring mines are all flagged, and it will auto-reveal the remaining neighbors. The game board scrolls horizontally if it is wider than your screen, so you can always access all cells on the Expert 30-column grid from a phone.