24 Game

How to play

1. How do you start a game of 24?: Four cards are dealt as soon as the page opens — there is no start button. Tap anywhere during the deal to flip all four at once. The default deck is Ace to 10 on Easy; the first time you play, a three-step coach bar points at the card to tap first.
2. How do you make 24 with the cards?: Tap a card (it lifts with a teal outline), tap an operator + − × ÷, then tap another card: the two merge into one amber card showing the result, with the little equation underneath. Four cards become three, then two, then one — if the last card is exactly 24, you've solved it. You can also tap the operator first.
3. What if the last card isn't 24?: The card shakes, turns red and the status line tells you what you got. There is no game over: Undo steps back one merge and Restart returns to the four original cards. Dividing by zero is refused with a reason and the table stays as it was.
4. How do hints work in the 24 game?: Hint 1 tells you the last step of the suggested solution, hint 2 marks the first two cards and the operator, hint 3 plays the whole solution. Solving after a hint still counts but earns fewer stars; skipping or watching the demo doesn't. After each puzzle you see every distinct solution, with yours marked.

Rules & variants

The 24 game rules: four cards are dealt from a standard deck without jokers. Use every card exactly once with addition, subtraction, multiplication, division and any grouping to reach exactly 24. Aces count as 1; with the full Ace–King deck, Jack, Queen and King count 11, 12 and 13. The default deck here is Ace to 10 (40 cards), the classroom version; switch to all 52 cards in the menu.

Instead of typing an expression, you build it with taps: pick a card, pick an operator, pick a second card, and the two merge into a new card with the result. Three merges take four cards down to one, so the order you merge in is your parentheses. Subtraction is always the bigger number minus the smaller — negative numbers are never needed in 24. Intermediate results may be fractions, shown stacked on the card, such as 8/3.

What counts as a different solution: rearrangements by the commutative and associative laws are the same solution, so 2×3×4×1 and 4×3×2×1 count once, and (4×6)×(3−2) equals 4×6×(3−2). Every solution is reduced to a canonical form before comparing, so “N distinct solutions” really means N different ideas. The list is ordered with fraction-free and fewer-division solutions first.

Difficulty levels: Hard means exactly one solution, or every solution passes through a fraction (3 3 8 8, 1 5 5 5). Easy means at least three solutions that don't all need division. Every other solvable hand is Medium. Intro only deals hands that can be solved with + and −, and shows only those two keys — good for younger players. Every puzzle is checked by the solver first: of the 715 rank combinations in the Ace–10 deck, 566 can make 24; with Ace–King it's 1,362 of 1,820.

Hints and stars: hint 1 gives the suggested solution's last step (“the last step is 3 × 8”), hint 2 marks the first step's two cards and operator, hint 3 plays it out to 24. Stars on a solve are 3 minus the highest hint level used. If the cards left on the table can no longer reach 24, the hint doesn't level up — it tells you to undo a step instead.

Four modes: Practice deals puzzle after puzzle at your chosen difficulty and tracks solves, your current streak and the fastest no-hint time per level. Daily gives everyone the same puzzle each day — Medium Monday to Saturday, Hard on Sunday — and counts a streak. Sprint is a 90-second clock: +10 s per solve, −15 s per skip, getting harder as you go. 2P buzzer puts two players face to face on one phone: buzz first, solve within 30 s, or your opponent gets 30 s to steal; first to 3, 5 or 7 wins.

Classic hard 24 puzzles: 3 3 8 8 has a single solution, 8 ÷ (3 − 8 ÷ 3). 1 5 5 5 is (5 − 1 ÷ 5) × 5, 3 3 7 7 is (3 + 3 ÷ 7) × 7 and 4 4 7 7 is (4 − 4 ÷ 7) × 7. Each one needs you to build a fraction first and cancel it with multiplication or division. Common hands with no solution include 1 1 1 1, 1 6 7 8 and 3 4 6 7.

24 game strategy: look for factor pairs of 24 first (3×8, 4×6, 2×12) and try to build one factor from two cards; remember that two equal cards give 0 when subtracted and 1 when divided, which lets you absorb a spare card; shrink big cards early (10 − 6 = 4); and when a hand has a repeated number and nothing obvious works, think fractions.

Deal codes and sharing: every puzzle has a deal code made of its four cards — rank plus suit, like 3s3h8d8c (s spades, h hearts, d diamonds, c clubs, T for 10). After solving, tap “Copy deal link” and a friend opens the same puzzle; you can also type a code in the menu. Daily results copy as a short text line with stars, time and streak. Everything is stored only in your browser.

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