Connect Four
By Bryan Braun · MIT license. Source · All credits
About Connect Four
Connect Four is the two-player classic. Drop your discs into the grid and try to line up four in a row across, down or diagonally before your opponent does. Quick games, easy to pick up.
How to play
Tap a column to drop your disc into it.
Rules of Connect Four
- The grid is seven columns wide and six rows deep. Players take turns dropping a disc into a column.
- A disc falls to the lowest empty slot in that column, so you choose the column and gravity chooses the row.
- The first player to line up four of their own discs in a row wins. The line can be horizontal, vertical or diagonal.
- A column that is already full cannot be played.
- If all forty-two slots fill with no line of four, the game is a draw.
- The centre column is the strongest opening move, because more winning lines pass through it than through any other column.
- Black always moves first, then play alternates black, red, black, red.
- This build is two players on one device. There is no computer opponent, so the second colour needs a second person.
Controls
- Tap a column to drop your disc into it
What makes it worth playing
- Four in a row wins, in any direction
- Two player on one device
- The board shows whose turn it is
- A win is called out as soon as it happens
Screenshots
Captured from this build on 2026-08-26.
Tips from playing it
- Take the middle column early. More lines run through it than any other.
- Watch your opponent's threats before building your own. One missed three-in-a-row ends it.
- Setting up two threats at once is how you actually win, because only one can be blocked.
Why this game is here, and what we changed
Chosen because it is genuinely good and its licence (MIT) allows us to host and modify it, which we verified in the project's own files. We host it on our own servers, so it loads straight into the game with no third-party ad code and no pre-roll video. It arrived using a gameplay screenshot as its icon, which looks poor at tile size, so we drew it a proper one. We played it through on a real phone-sized screen on 2026-08-26 before publishing this page, and the screenshots above are from that session rather than from the original project.
More on how we pick and fix these: what we changed in the open-source games and how we test a game.
- Category
- Board
- Plays in
- Your browser, no download
- Orientation
- Landscape
- Players
- Two players sharing one device. There is no computer opponent, so bring someone.
- Difficulty
- Easy rules, tactical against a good opponent
- Typical session
- 2 to 5 minutes a game
- Last tested by us
- 2026-08-26
- Created by
- Bryan Braun (MIT)
