Playbook
How to play Slide Nine
Tap a tile beside the empty square to slide it. Restore 1 through 8 in reading order as quickly as you can. There are no lives—only a score that rewards fewer moves and a cleaner finish time.
Controls
Tap a numbered tile that shares an edge with the empty square. It slides into the gap. Tiles cannot jump or move diagonally. Shuffle starts from a solved board using legal slides, so every puzzle is solvable.
Scoring and lives
A solve scores more with fewer moves and less time. There are no lives. You can reshuffle at any moment. A scramble you no longer understand is worth a fresh board, not a random mash.
Habits that raise the ceiling
Place 1, 2, and 3 in the top row first, then the middle row, then finish the last three. Treat the empty square as a tool you walk around the board, not as a hole you fear.
Common mistakes
- Sliding whatever is next to the empty square without a plan
- Solving the last row before the first row is locked
- Racing the clock into an unrecoverable shuffle
A two-minute drill
Solve one board with the top-row-first method and ignore the timer. Solve the next board the same way, then look at time. Method first.
This page is a complete how-to, not a wrapper around an ad. If you want more depth, the journal explains practice, lives, and fair difficulty for the whole arcade.