Memory match rules

What the game is

Memory match is a matching-pairs puzzle. Each symbol appears on exactly two cards. You finish by remembering where those twins sit, not by racing an opponent or building Ace-to-King foundations. This site has no second seat and no alternating colors.

English names vary—Concentration in much of the United States, Memory elsewhere—but the loop is the same: flip two, compare, keep or hide.

How many cards, and the grid

Six pairs is twelve cards in four columns and three rows. Eight pairs is sixteen cards on a four-by-four, the default. Twelve pairs is twenty-four cards in six columns and four rows. Column count follows the pair setting; rows fill out the rest. Shuffle only changes which pair sits in which cell. The grid shape stays put.

Fruit, animals, and shapes only swap the drawn marks. Pairing uses a hidden pair id. Two shapes that merely look similar still mismatch if they are not the same pair.

What counts as a flip

Only a face-down card turns. Each reveal adds one to the flip count. The first card waits; the second goes to the Worker to decide match or miss. A third card cannot enter during the flip animation.

The clock starts on the first valid flip of the round, not on page load. Restarting zeros time, flips, and errors and deals again.

Matches, errors, and the input lock

Same pair id: both stay up, the pair count increases, and a short teal outline marks the take. Different ids: errors increase by one, the faces linger about eight-tenths of a second, then both hide. Input stays locked until that hold ends.

Clicks on cards already up or already matched do nothing. That is the rule, not a bug—it keeps a finished pair out of the next check.

Two situations you will hit

First: you turn a fox in the top-left and its twin has never been seen. Remember the cell, then turn an unknown card. If that unknown is also a fox, it still counts as a match, but the report files it on the “not from recall” side.

Second: that fox already appeared in row two, column three, then hid. When you turn the other fox, go back to that cell. A hit is tagged as spatial memory. A miss adds an error, both cards hide, and both fox locations remain in play.

Easy mistakes

You cannot resolve three cards at once. Checks are always a pair; the next tap waits.

Close colors are not a match. Shape theme in particular will fool the eye; the dealt pair id still wins.

Peek does not leave the board face up. After about two seconds everything hides again. The clock still starts on your first real flip.

Changing difficulty or theme starts a new round. Live pair count, time, and errors do not carry over.

Time, counts, and the report

The fewest flips possible is twice the pair count, because every card must turn at least once. The efficiency score is that minimum divided by the flips you used, then clamped between 5 and 100. Extra mismatches and repeat turns of unknown cards drag it down.

The report also asks whether a pair’s partner had already been seen, and whether errors clustered in the first, middle, or last third. Labels such as spatial, pattern, or exploratory describe this round’s behavior. They are practice notes, not a medical or admissions test.

Fastest time, fewest flips, and high score are stored per 6 / 8 / 12 pairs in this browser. The site does not upload the board or your click trail.

When to play—and when not to treat it as a test

Use it to train short-term recall in a single page, to fill a short wait, or to compare your own times across grids. Do not use it as a graded classroom exam or a clinical attention test. Tips in the report are for the next round, not a diagnosis.

Versus match-3 and solitaire

Match-3 usually needs three identical tiles that already touch. Mahjong solitaire usually needs a free path. Klondike files cards onto foundations by suit and rank. Memory match has none of those spatial or ordering gates: if two cards share a pair, any two cells will do. Difficulty is how many locations you hold at once, not whether a path is open.

FAQ