Dots & Boxes is a pencil-and-paper classic turned digital: players take turns drawing a line between two adjacent dots, and completing the fourth side of a box claims it — and earns another turn.
Click between two adjacent dots to draw a line on that edge. If your line completes a box, that box is marked with your color and you get to move again. Most claimed boxes when the grid is full wins.
Avoid drawing the third side of any box, because it hands your opponent a free capture. Near the end, count the chains and loops to decide who is forced to open them.
The French mathematician Édouard Lucas described this game in 1889, and it has fascinated puzzle fans for over a century.
Yes. Dots & Boxes is completely free and runs directly in your browser. There is nothing to download or install and no account is required.
Yes. Pixel Arcade is built to work on desktop, tablet and mobile browsers, and the controls adapt to touch screens as well as keyboards.
Dots & Boxes is played solo, so you can chase your own best score. Several other games here, including Tic-Tac-Toe, Four in a Row, Checkers, Reversi, Snake and Memory Match, offer online rooms with a shareable code.
Your progress, coins and achievements are stored on your device, and you can optionally back them up by signing in from the main arcade page.