Simon Says
Four pads, one growing sequence. Watch it play, repeat it back, and each time you succeed the pattern gets one step longer and a little faster.
Press Start and watch the pads light up.
One mistake ends the game — and every round is worth double. Off by default. Each pad has its own tone.
🎮 Controls
Tap or click a pad, or use the keys 1 2 3 4 — the arrow keys work too (up, right, down, left). Press Enter to start a game and R to replay the current sequence.
🏆 Best on this device
How to play
- Press ▶️ Start. One pad lights up.
- Repeat it by clicking, tapping or pressing its number key.
- The game replays the same pad and adds a new one. Repeat the whole sequence, in order, from the beginning.
- Every round adds one more step and shortens the flash slightly, so the pattern grows longer and faster at the same time.
- Get one wrong and the sequence replays so you can try again — unless strict mode is on, in which case the run is over.
The pads respond to 1 2 3 4 and to the arrow keys (up, right, down, left). Press Enter to start a game and R to replay the current sequence if you lost the thread. If you have asked your system to reduce motion, the flash is shown as a brief border change instead of a brightness and scale animation.
Rules
A round is one complete pass: the game shows the sequence, then you reproduce it. Three things can happen.
- You finish the sequence. The round is scored, one new pad is appended, and playback starts again.
- You press a wrong pad, normal mode. The mistake is counted, the same sequence plays once more, and your level stays where it is. There is no limit on retries, so a relaxed run can go on as long as your patience does.
- You press a wrong pad, strict mode. The run ends immediately with your best level and score recorded.
Presses are ignored while the sequence is playing, so you cannot accidentally start answering early — the pads become active the moment playback ends.
Scoring
Each completed round pays ten points per step in the sequence. Clearing level 1 is worth 10, level 2 is worth 20, and so on, so the totals climb steeply: reaching level 10 in a clean run scores 550 points, because every earlier round paid out on the way.
| Situation | Points |
|---|---|
| Clear level 5 | 50 |
| Clear level 5 in strict mode | 100 |
| Clean run to level 10 | 550 |
| Clean strict run to level 10 | 1,100 |
| A wrong pad | 0 |
Strict mode doubles every payout, which makes the two modes roughly comparable in reward for very different risk. Your record stores the deepest level you reached; ties are broken by score, so a strict run and a relaxed run that both stopped at level 12 are separated by the points.
The badge beside your best level is a rough band rather than a grade: 🌱 up to 4, 🙂 5–8, 🧠 9–13, 🚀 14–19 and 🏆 from 20.
Tips to improve
- Chunk, do not list. Nobody remembers fourteen separate pads. Break the sequence into groups of three or four and remember the groups — triangle-circle-square, then diamond-diamond-triangle. This is the single biggest jump most players make.
- Say it out loud, or under your breath. Speaking the numbers converts a visual sequence into a verbal one, and verbal memory holds a longer span for most people. Rhythm helps even more than the words.
- Turn the sound on. Each pad has its own tone, so the sequence becomes a short melody. Melodies are far stickier than arbitrary positions, and this is exactly why the original electronic game used tones.
- Watch the whole board, not the lit pad. Fix your eyes on the centre and take the flashes in peripherally. Chasing each flash with your gaze wastes the fraction of a second you need to encode it.
- Rehearse during playback. Do not wait passively — silently replay the part you already know while the game re-shows it, and you only have to add the last item.
- Use the replay button early. Getting one more clean look at a level 8 sequence costs you nothing and builds the pattern properly instead of guessing.
- Stop when you get sloppy. Working memory tires quickly. Three sharp attempts beat twenty tired ones, and pushing on past fatigue mostly teaches you to make mistakes.
Practising in relaxed mode builds the sequence; switching to strict mode tests whether you really own it. Most players find their strict best sits two or three levels below their relaxed best, which is a fair measure of how solid the memory actually is.
Privacy
The sequence is generated in your browser, the sound is synthesised locally with the Web Audio API, and nothing about your play leaves this device. The audio context is only created after you turn sound on, so the page never makes noise by itself. Your best level and score live in this browser’s localStorage and can be wiped at any time with the clear button.
Frequently asked questions
What is a good level to reach in Simon Says?
Most people manage somewhere between four and seven on a first attempt, which matches the usual span of short-term memory for unrelated items. Getting past ten consistently means you have stopped memorising individual pads and started chunking them into groups. Reaching twenty is genuinely rare and takes deliberate practice.
What does strict mode change?
In normal play a mistake simply replays the same sequence so you can try again, and the pattern never gets shorter. In strict mode one wrong pad ends the run immediately — and because there is no safety net, every completed round is worth double the points.
Does the game get faster?
Yes. The flash time shrinks by about twenty milliseconds per level, from roughly 560 ms at level one down to a floor of 190 ms. The sequence never becomes unwatchable, but by level fifteen you have noticeably less time to encode each pad.
Can I play without sound?
Sound is off by default and the game is fully playable silently — each pad is identified by its shape, its number and its colour, and the flash is visible on its own. Turning on the 🔊 toggle adds a distinct tone per pad, which most people find makes long sequences noticeably easier to remember.
Is it usable if I cannot distinguish the colours?
Yes. No information is carried by colour alone. Every pad also shows a distinct shape (triangle, circle, square, diamond) and a number from 1 to 4, the flashing pad gains a thick border, and the current level is announced to screen readers.
Where is my best level stored?
In this browser's localStorage, on this device only. It is never uploaded, it does not sync to your other devices, and the clear button — or clearing your site data — removes it.
Related tools
- Memory MatchFlip two cards, find the matching emoji, clear the board. Three board sizes, a live timer, a star rating and your personal bests kept on this device.
- Reaction Time TestThe classic red-to-green reflex test. Wait for the colour change, click as fast as you can, and see how your milliseconds stack up against the typical human range.
- Daily Word PuzzleOne five-letter word, six guesses, and a fresh puzzle for everybody at midnight UTC. Colour clues after every guess, and a spoiler-free grid you can share.
- Typing Speed TestType the words as they appear and find out your real speed — net WPM, raw WPM and accuracy, with every keystroke scored as you go.
- 2048Slide, merge, repeat. Get two matching tiles together and they fuse into their sum — keep going until a 2048 tile appears, or until the board jams up.
- MinesweeperClear the field without stepping on a mine. Every number tells you how many mines touch that square — the rest is deduction, and the first click is always safe.
Last reviewed: