Hex Minesweeper

How to play Hex Minesweeper

Hex Minesweeper takes the logic of the classic mine-clearing puzzle and rebuilds it on a honeycomb of hexagons. The rules feel instantly familiar — reveal cells, read the numbers, avoid the hidden mines — but the hexagonal grid changes the geometry in one crucial way: every hex touches six neighbours instead of the eight squares you are used to. That single difference reshapes every deduction you make, so even veteran minesweeper players have to re-learn their patterns. Your job is simple to state and satisfying to solve: uncover every hexagon that does not hide a mine, as quickly as you can, without ever tapping a mine.

The goal

Clear the whole board. A game is won the moment every safe hexagon — every hex that does not contain a mine — has been revealed. You never have to reveal the mines themselves; flagging them is optional and only there to help you keep track. If you reveal a mine, the game ends immediately and the whole minefield is shown. The faster you clear the board, the higher your ranked score, so there is a constant tug-of-war between playing carefully and playing quickly.

Six neighbours, not eight

This is the heart of what makes the hexagonal version different. On a normal square minesweeper each cell has up to eight neighbours: four sides and four diagonals. On the hex board there are no diagonals at all — each hexagon shares an edge with at most six others, and those six are its only neighbours. The board itself is a slanted rhombus of hexagons: for any hex the six neighbours sit to its left and right, one up-left and down-right, and one up-right and down-left. Cells along the edges have fewer neighbours, and the two sharp corners of the rhombus touch only two hexes each. Because a number now counts mines out of six rather than eight, the same digit means something different — a "3" on a hex is proportionally far more crowded than a "3" on a square.

Controls

• Reveal a hex: left-click it on a computer, or simply tap it on a phone or tablet. This uncovers what is underneath — an empty hex, a number, or (unluckily) a mine.
• Flag a hex: right-click it on a computer, or press and hold (long-press) on a touch screen. A flag marks a hex you believe hides a mine so you do not tap it by accident. Flagging is never required to win.
• Remove a flag: right-click or long-press the same hex again to toggle the flag back off.
• Start over: press the smiley face or the New Game button at any time, or change the difficulty from the Level dropdown to deal a fresh board.

Your first tap is always safe

Like modern minesweeper, Hex Minesweeper never lets you lose on the very first move. The mines are not placed until after you make your first tap, and the game deliberately keeps that hex — and all of its neighbours — free of mines. That guarantees your opening tap reveals a zero, which then floods open a whole connected area of empty hexes and their bordering numbers, giving you a foothold to reason from. Because of this, there is no reason to hesitate on the first move: tap anywhere, ideally somewhere central where an open region gives you the most information.

Reading the numbers

• A number on a revealed hex tells you exactly how many of that hex’s six neighbours contain mines. A blank (zero) hex touches no mines at all, which is why blanks open up automatically.
• When a numbered hex already touches exactly that many flagged or known mines, every other neighbour of it must be safe — you can reveal them with confidence.
• When a numbered hex has exactly as many unrevealed neighbours as its number, every one of those neighbours must be a mine — flag them all.
• Compare two adjacent numbers to break a position open. The overlap of their neighbour sets often forces a specific hex to be a mine or to be safe, even when neither number could be solved on its own.

Flagging strategy

• Flags are a memory aid, not a scoring mechanic. You win by revealing safe hexes, not by flagging mines, so use flags however helps you think.
• Flag the mines you have proven, then use those flags to satisfy nearby numbers and unlock fresh safe reveals in a chain.
• The "Mines remaining" counter shows the total mine count minus the flags you have placed. It follows your flags, not the truth — a wrong flag makes the counter lie, so trust your deductions over the number.
• On the fastest clears, expert players skip most flags entirely and only reveal safe hexes, because flagging costs time. Flag only where it genuinely prevents a misclick.

Difficulty levels

• Easy — a small board with seven hexes per side and a gentle mine density. A good place to learn how six-neighbour numbers behave.
• Medium — nine hexes per side with more mines packed in, where reading overlapping numbers becomes essential.
• Hard — eleven hexes per side at the highest mine density, demanding careful chains of deduction and a steady nerve for the ranked leaderboard.

How scoring works

Hex Minesweeper is timed, but it submits a POINTS score where higher is better — not a raw time. Your score is the difficulty’s base value minus the seconds you took, plus a completion bonus: base is 1000 on Easy, 2000 on Medium and 3000 on Hard, and the completion bonus is 100 / 200 / 300 respectively. In short, clearing the board faster earns more points, a finished game always scores at least 1, and every score is capped at 99,999 to fit the leaderboard. Only completed (won) games submit a score; losing a game submits nothing.

Winning and losing

You win the instant the last safe hexagon is revealed — the timer stops, your score is calculated and, if you are signed in, uploaded to the leaderboard for that difficulty. You lose the instant you reveal a mine: the board flips over to show where every mine was hiding so you can see what caught you. Either way, press Play Again or the smiley face to deal a brand-new board and try to beat your time.

Strategy tips

• Open in the middle. A central first tap tends to flood a larger area than one near an edge, handing you more numbers to work with straight away.
• Work the frontier. Almost every safe deduction happens on the border between revealed and hidden hexes; scan along that edge for numbers you can fully satisfy.
• Re-count for six. Muscle memory from square minesweeper assumes eight neighbours — consciously remind yourself that a hex number is out of six, which changes which cells are forced.
• Chain your reveals. One satisfied number often frees a safe hex whose reveal satisfies the next number; follow those chains as far as they go before guessing.
• Guess last, guess smart. If you are truly stuck, pick the hex with the lowest probability of being a mine — usually one bordering the smallest numbers or the most open space — rather than a random tap.

Frequently asked questions