2048
Slide all the tiles one way. Two equal tiles that meet merge into one. Make a 2048 tile.
Controls
- Keyboard
- Arrow keys or W A S D to slide. R starts a new game.
- Touch
- Swipe on the board in the direction you want the tiles to slide.
Your best score stays in this browser only. Nothing is sent anywhere. The game pauses when you switch tabs.
About 2048
2048 is a sliding number puzzle released as free software by Gabriele Cirulli in March 2014. It spread through phones and classrooms within weeks, and it is still one of the best short puzzles for a tea break: a round takes five to twenty minutes, it needs no reflexes, and every move is a small planning problem.
The board is a 4 by 4 grid. Every move slides every tile as far as it can go in one direction. When two tiles with the same number collide, they merge into one tile worth their sum, and that sum is added to your score. After each move a new 2 (or, one time in ten, a 4) appears in a random empty square. The game ends when the board is full and no move can merge anything.
How to play 2048
- Press an arrow key, or swipe on the board, to slide every tile in that direction.
- Tiles with the same number that meet merge into one. 2 and 2 make 4, 4 and 4 make 8, and so on.
- A new tile appears after every move that changed the board.
- Reach the 2048 tile to win. You can then keep going for 4096 and beyond.
A strategy that works
Pick one corner and keep your biggest tile in it. Most strong players use a bottom corner and mostly press only two or three directions, for example down, left and right, pressing up only when forced. Keep the row along that corner full and in order, largest to smallest, so merges run down the row like a chain. Try not to scatter large tiles around the middle, because a big tile stuck in the centre blocks every merge around it.
The maths behind the game is powers of two, which makes it a friendly way to practise binary for anyone starting a computer engineering course: 2048 is 2 to the power of 11, and a perfect game fills the board with the powers from 2 up.
What this version changes
The game logic is the original open-source code under its MIT licence. We changed the look to match Kaamko, in light, dark and plain mode, stored the best score and the unfinished game in this browser only, and removed the tracking the original page loaded. Nothing you play is sent to ICE or anyone else.
Adapted from 2048 by Gabriele Cirulli, MIT licence. Copyright (c) 2014 Gabriele Cirulli. Re-skinned and changed by Imperial College of Engineering; full licence text on the licences page.
Last checked by Imperial College of Engineering. Played through on desktop and a 390px phone screen on this date.