Match 3 – Play Online for Free

In Match 3 you swap two neighboring stones so that three or more of a kind stand in a row. The row disappears, everything above it drops down, and new stones slide in from the top. If that happens to form the next row, it clears away right along with it. One of the earliest games of the kind is considered to be Shariki, a game with colorful balls that the Russian programmer Eugene Alemzhin wrote for MS-DOS.

The idea became famous with Bejeweled®: the three founders of PopCap Games put it online as a browser game in 2000 under the name Diamond Mine, by 2008 it had been downloaded some 150 million times, and in 2020 it was inducted into the World Video Game Hall of Fame. In 2012 King took up the principle with Candy Crush Saga®, which only a year later was the most played game on Facebook. Our Match 3 is a version of our own with no link to either company. You can play it online for free with no sign-up and no download, with bombs, crosses and stars and a best score for every level, in short games of 30 moves that fit into any break.

Swap, Clear, Cascade: Rules and Tips for Match 3

A game has 30 moves. In that time you collect as many points as you can and try to beat your own best score:

• The board: eight by eight stones. Every color has its own shape, red a circle, yellow a triangle, green a square, blue a diamond and purple a hexagon, and on the higher levels an orange heart and a white drop join in. That way you can tell the stones apart even without the colors.
• Swapping: drag a stone onto the square next to it, above it or below it, or click two neighbors one after the other. A swap only counts if it makes at least one row of three matching stones. Otherwise the stones jump back and the move is not used up.
• Clearing and cascades: all rows of three or more stones vanish at once. The stones above them drop down, new ones come in from the top, and every row formed along the way clears itself.
• Points: every cleared stone earns 10 points. In the second wave of a move it counts double, in the third triple, and so on.
• Bomb: four of a kind in a row leave behind a bomb, a glowing stone with a white spark. When it is cleared, it takes the square of nine cells around it along.
• Cross: when a row across and a row down meet, as an L or a T, you get a stone with a white cross. When it goes off, it clears its whole row and column.
• Star: five in a row make a rainbow star. Swap it with a neighbor and every stone of that neighbor's color vanishes, and two stars swapped with each other clear the whole board. If another special stone's blast hits a star, it takes the color with the most stones on the board.
• Chain reactions: a new special stone appears in the color of its row on the square you swapped to, otherwise where the rows meet or in their middle. It goes off as soon as it lies in a row itself or is hit by another, and sets off further special stones along the way.
• No move left: the game then reshuffles the stones on its own without costing you a move and briefly lets you know.
• Hint: if you touch nothing for five seconds, two stones that can be swapped into a row start to wiggle.
• Levels: Easy plays with five colors, Normal with six and Hard with seven. The fewer colors in play, the more often falling stones form new rows on their own. Each level keeps its own game and its own best score.
• Keyboard: the arrow keys move a yellow frame across the board, Enter or the space bar selects the stone inside it, and an arrow key then swaps it in that direction. Escape cancels the selection.
• New Game: if you have already moved, the button asks once more. After the last move the game shows your result, and "Play Again" or Enter starts the next game. Your progress and best scores stay saved in your browser.

A few tricks get more out of your 30 moves:

• Start at the bottom: a swap low on the board sets many stones moving, and the more of them move, the likelier chains become that count double and triple.
• Set up fours and fives: before you push three of a kind together, see whether another move lines up four or five. A bomb or a star usually pays off more later than three quick stones.
• Bombs belong in the middle: at the edge a bomb clears only six cells, in a corner just four. Placed centrally, it gets all nine.
• Aim the star: swap it onto the color with the most stones on the board right now. Bombs and crosses of that color then go off along with it.
• Link special stones: when two special stones lie close together, set off one so that its blast catches the other. Then the second one goes off too, and lots of stones fall at once.
• Save nothing for the end: a special stone still on the board after the last move earns not a single point. In your last moves it pays to set them all off.

Still Up for Rows, Pairs and Falling Stones? Five More Games

If you like spotting patterns and making stones disappear, your next pastime is here:

• Tic Tac Toe: the classic from the back of a notebook. Instead of swapping stones you place X or O, and three of your own in a line decide the duel against the computer or a friend.
• Bubble Shooter: match colors by aim instead of by swapping. Shoot a bubble into the cluster, and three or more of one color that touch burst together.
• Falling Cubes: here the blocks fall on their own, and you turn and shift them until a row is filled without gaps. Then it clears, much like a row of three.
• 2048: one swipe slides all tiles in one direction, and two equal numbers merge into one twice as big. Thinking a few moves ahead gets you furthest.
• Mahjong: instead of rows you look for pairs; any two identical free tiles vanish with a click, and the layout shrinks until nothing is left.