How to play Snake
- Start. Press Space, Enter or any arrow key, or tap the board.
- Steer. Arrow keys or W, A, S, D on a keyboard. On touch screens, swipe on the board or use the four direction buttons under it.
- Eat. Each apple is worth 10 points and adds one segment. The next apple appears on a random free cell.
- Do not crash. Running into a wall or any part of your body ends the run.
- Pause a solo game with P, Esc or the Pause button. Switching tabs pauses it too.
Rules of this classic Snake game
| Rule | How it works here |
|---|---|
| Board | 20 by 20 cells with solid walls, no wrapping |
| Start | 3 segments in the middle, heading right |
| Apple | +10 points and +1 segment |
| Speed | Slightly faster after each apple, topping out after about 45 apples |
| Reversing | Pressing the opposite direction is ignored |
| Tail | Moving into the cell your tail is leaving is safe |
The toolbar shows your time, length and score. Solo scores feed the Snake leaderboard, so a single long run can put your name on it.
Snake strategy for long runs
Short games are about reflexes. Long games are about keeping your own body out of the way. These habits help with both:
- Use the slow start. The first apples come at low speed, so practice clean, deliberate turns instead of racing.
- Travel along the edges. Keeping the middle open leaves room to turn when you are long.
- Sweep in rows. Back-and-forth lanes keep the body tidy and the gaps predictable.
- Check the exit before you eat. Every apple makes you longer right where you are; make sure there is a way out.
- Skip small pockets. A space with fewer free cells than your length is a trap.
- Follow your tail when boxed in. The tail always moves away, so chasing it is the safest line.
- Turn less at top speed. Fewer, planned turns beat frantic zigzags.
- Pause before a tight spot. In solo play there is no penalty for stopping to think.
Snake race: 2 minutes, same apples
Snake Race puts two players on separate boards at the same time. Play online with whoever is available, or send a private link to a friend.
- Same apple sequence. Apples are placed from a shared seed, so nobody gets an easier spawn.
- 2 minutes. The race ends at the buzzer, or earlier if both snakes crash.
- Highest score wins. A crash stops your run but keeps your points, so a steady player can beat a fast one who crashes in the first minute.
- Watch your rival. A live mini board shows the other snake while you play. Races cannot be paused.
Racing changes priorities: with only 120 seconds, a long snake matters less than eating quickly and staying alive until the clock runs out.
Snake on a phone
On a phone, short swipes anywhere on the board turn the snake, and the direction pad below gives you exact taps when you need two quick turns in a row. Holding the phone upright keeps the square board and the pad on screen together. To launch it like a native game, add NitroPlayer to your home screen. A solo run is saved from the first step and returns paused if the page reloads.
A short history of the retro snake game
The idea dates to the 1976 arcade game Blockade, where players steered growing lines and tried not to collide. Home computer versions followed through the late 1970s and 1980s, and in 1997 a version preinstalled on Nokia phones made Snake the first mobile game for millions of people. The formula of eat, grow, avoid yourself has barely changed since.
Want more arcade action? Stack pieces in the falling blocks battle, or switch to the calmer number merging of 2048.
