Nimble Axe
Steer the snake around the board and eat the glowing dots — each one you catch makes you a little longer and a touch faster. Keep clear of the walls and your own tail. Use the arrow keys or WASD on a keyboard, swipe on the board, or tap the on-screen pad. Your best score is saved on this device.
- Score 0
- Best —
How to play Snake
Quick start
- Press Start. The snake begins moving to the right on its own — it never stops.
- Steer with the arrow keys or WASD, by swiping the board, or with the on-screen pad.
- Eat a glowing dot to score 10 points, grow one segment, and speed up slightly.
- Avoid the four walls and every part of your own body.
- Press the same button again to pause, and once more to resume.
How it works
Controls
- Mouse / trackpad
- Click the four arrow buttons under the board. Click Start to begin, pause, or resume.
- Touch
- Swipe anywhere on the board in the direction you want to turn — a swipe shorter than 18 pixels is ignored, so a stray tap will not kill you. The on-screen pad works too.
- Keyboard
- Tab to the board, then use the arrow keys or W, A, S and D. The board announces every score change and the final result to a screen reader.
Tips
- You cannot reverse straight into yourself. Once the snake is longer than one segment, a direction exactly opposite the current one is thrown away, so a panicked 180° turn does nothing at all. Turn twice instead.
- Chasing your own tail is safe. The square your tail is about to leave does not count as a collision, so you can follow the end of yourself around a tight loop forever.
- The speed stops increasing after the 24th dot, at 73 milliseconds per step. Everything past a score of 240 is played at exactly the same pace, so the difficulty curve is flat from there on.
- Hug the walls early and leave the middle open. The dot is placed uniformly among the free squares, so a clear centre means shorter journeys later.
Frequently asked questions
Does the snake speed up forever?
No. It starts at 145 milliseconds per step and takes 3 milliseconds off each time you eat, until it reaches 73 milliseconds. That happens on the 24th dot, at a score of 240, and it never gets any faster than that.
Can I turn back on myself by accident?
No, and the game will quietly ignore you if you try. While the snake is longer than one segment, a direction exactly opposite to the current one is discarded rather than applied.
Is it safe to follow my own tail?
Yes. The square your tail is about to vacate is not treated as a collision, so you can chase the very end of yourself around the board indefinitely.
What happens if I fill the whole board?
The game ends and records it as a perfect run. Many versions of Snake freeze at that point, hunting forever for an empty square to put the next dot in. Ours checks whether a free square exists before placing one.
Where is my best score kept?
In this browser's local storage, on this device. We never receive it, and clearing your browsing data erases it for good, because there is no copy anywhere else.
Can I pause a game?
Yes. Press the Start button again — it reads Pause while you are playing and Resume once you have stopped.
Can the dot ever appear underneath the snake?
Never. Before placing a dot, the game builds a list of every square the snake does not occupy and chooses from that list, so the dot is always reachable.
How many points is each dot worth?
Ten, always. There is no bonus for speed and no multiplier, so your score is exactly ten times the number of dots you have eaten.
