Air Hockey

How to play Air Hockey

Air Hockey brings the fast, satisfying clack-and-slide of the classic tabletop game to your phone or browser — an original, trademark-free take built for a portrait screen. Two mallets guard the top and bottom ends of a narrow rink; a single puck skids between them, bouncing off the side walls and off whichever mallet gets there first. Score by sliding the puck past your rival’s mallet and through the narrow goal mouth in their end wall; concede and the puck comes right back at you. First to seven goals wins the match. The rules take seconds to learn, but reading angles, timing a swat and guarding your own goal at the same time give it real depth. Play a friend on the very same screen, top half against bottom half, or take on the computer at three difficulty levels and earn ranking points for every win. Everything runs in your browser and works offline, so a quick match is always one tap away.

The goal

The aim is simple: be the first player to score seven goals. Every rink has two goals — a narrow gap in the wall at the very top, and a matching gap at the very bottom — each defended by one mallet. Send the puck through the gap at your opponent’s end and you score; let it through the gap at your own end and they score. Because both goals are narrow compared to the width of the rink, most shots are stopped by a well-placed mallet, and the match becomes a constant back-and-forth of attack and defence rather than a race to overpower the other side.

The rink and the layout

Air Hockey is played in portrait orientation on purpose: this version places the goals at the TOP and BOTTOM of the rink rather than the left and right, so two players can sit opposite each other on a single phone, each controlling a mallet with a thumb (or a whole hand) near their own edge — and a solo player against the computer can rest their hand comfortably toward the bottom of the screen. The puck bounces off the left and right side walls, and off both mallets. Each mallet can slide anywhere inside its OWN half of the rink — it can move freely left, right, forward and back, but it can never cross the centre line into the opponent’s half, and it can never leave the rink through a side wall. A dashed centre line and a faint centre circle mark the halfway point. The blue mallet defends the bottom goal, the amber (or red, versus the computer) mallet defends the top goal.

Rules of play

• The puck starts each rally at the centre of the rink and is sent toward one player. It slides in a straight line, gradually losing a little speed, until it meets a wall or a mallet.
• The puck bounces off the left and right side walls, keeping its speed and simply reversing its sideways direction — exactly like a ball bouncing off a table edge.
• When the puck reaches a mallet, the mallet knocks it back toward the other end. A mallet that is standing still still deflects the puck cleanly; a mallet that is MOVING when it makes contact — swatting rather than just blocking — sends the puck away noticeably harder and in roughly the direction the mallet itself was travelling. Learning to move into a shot, not just place your mallet in its path, is the heart of the game.
• If the puck slides past a mallet and through that player’s goal mouth, the other player scores one point and the puck instantly returns to the centre, ready to be served again toward the player who just conceded — so the next rally always starts from the loser’s end.
• A puck that reaches the end wall OUTSIDE the goal mouth simply bounces back into play, exactly like the side walls — only a puck that passes cleanly through the narrow goal gap counts as a score.
• The first player to score seven goals wins the match. A winning banner appears with the final score, and you can start a fresh match at any time with New game.

Controls

In the two-player game the blue player at the bottom uses W, A, S and D to slide their mallet in any direction, and the amber player at the top uses the arrow keys. On a touch screen there is no keyboard: instead, each player drags a finger anywhere inside their own half of the rink, and their mallet follows the finger directly. Dragging in the bottom half moves the blue mallet; dragging in the top half moves the amber mallet. Because both players see the whole rink at all times and each mallet is physically confined to its own half, there is no hidden information and no way to reach across — same-screen play is completely fair.

In Air Hockey vs Computer you control only the blue mallet at the bottom. Use W, A, S and D, the arrow keys, or simply drag anywhere on the rink — your mallet follows your finger or mouse directly, confined to your own half. The red mallet at the top is the computer, defending the top goal.

Playing the computer (ranked)

In Air Hockey vs Computer you pick one of three difficulty levels before you start. The computer plays a pursuing mallet: when the puck is heading toward its own goal, it predicts where the puck’s path will cross its territory and moves to meet it there; when the puck is heading away, it falls back to a defensive position near its own goal line instead of wandering forward. What changes with difficulty is how fast the mallet can slide, how far in advance it reacts, how deep into its own half it is willing to chase the puck, and how accurately it aims its intercept. On Easy the computer is slow to react, moves at a gentle pace, stays close to its goal line and often aims a little off, so a beginner can beat it. On Normal it reacts sooner, moves faster, chases further and aims more accurately. On Expert it reacts almost the instant the puck turns toward it, slides at full speed, chases deep into its half and predicts the bounce with real precision — you will need quick angles, wall shots and genuine speed to beat it. However fast it looks, the computer’s mallet can never leave its own half of the rink or exceed its level’s speed limit — the same physical rules apply to it as to you. The computer thinks entirely on your device, so it works completely offline. Beat it to earn ranking points: Easy is worth 10, Normal 30 and Expert 100. Sign in and your best result appears on the leaderboard.

Strategy tips

• Meet the puck, don’t just block it. A mallet that is moving toward the puck when it makes contact sends it away much harder and with more control than a mallet that is simply sitting in its path — step into your shots.
• Use the side walls to change the angle of attack. A puck that bounces off a wall on the way to the goal is much harder for your opponent to line up against than one travelling in a straight line, especially when you time your hit to send it wide.
• Recover to the middle of your half after every shot. From the centre of your own territory you can reach a puck heading to either side in the least time; drifting to one corner leaves the far side of your own goal wide open.
• Against the computer, mix up your angles and your pace. The pursuing AI reads a straight, predictable shot easily; a fast wall-assisted shot, or a sudden change of angle right before contact, gives it the least time to react — and on the higher levels those are the shots that eventually get through.

Frequently asked questions