Tic-Tac-Toe
Tic-Tac-Toe is the three-in-a-row duel everyone learns as a child and nobody quite outgrows. Take turns claiming squares on a 3 by 3 grid and be the first to line up three of your marks in a row, column, or diagonal. Play against a friend on the same device, or face a computer opponent that you can dial from forgiving to flawless.
How to play
The board is a 3 by 3 grid of nine squares. One player uses X and the other uses O, and the two take turns placing a single mark in any empty square. The first player to own three squares in an unbroken line — horizontally across a row, vertically down a column, or diagonally from corner to corner — wins the round on the spot. If all nine squares fill up without anyone completing a line, the round is a draw. Because the grid is so small, a round rarely lasts more than a few seconds.
Choose your setup before you start. In vs Computer mode you pick a difficulty from Easy, Medium, or Hard and choose whether to play as X or O; X normally moves first. The 2 Players mode hands the board back and forth for two people sharing one device. The First move button decides which mark opens the round, and Alternate starter flips that choice automatically after every completed game so the advantage moves around. Click or tap a square to play, or move with the keyboard and press Enter or Space. The winning line lights up, and your Wins, Losses, and Draws are saved in your browser until you press Reset Scores.
Tips and strategy
Perfect play always ends in a draw, so most rounds are won by punishing a careless move. The single most valuable habit is watching what your opponent is threatening rather than what you are building.
- Open in a corner if you can. Corners create more winning lines than edges, and they are the hardest squares to defend.
- Before every move, ask whether your opponent has two squares on a line. If they do, block the third immediately — ignoring one threat ends the game.
- Build forks: set up two threats at once so your opponent can only answer one of them. The classic fork uses a corner plus the centre.
- Take the centre when it is free. Four of the eight winning lines pass through it, which makes it the strongest single square.
- Against Hard, aim for the draw. It never gives away a win, so a clean draw is a good result and proof you defended every threat.