Number Trail and Lights Out — the same puzzles for everyone, a new set every day
Every day starts with Number Trail: five number sequences, easy to hard, the same five for everyone. Type the number that comes next — two tries each, 20 points first time and 10 on the second — then share a spoiler-free score and come back after the countdown. Then there is one numbered puzzle: a 5×5 Lights Out board generated from the date, so everyone who opens this page on the same day gets the same board. Turn every light off in as few taps as you can — par is the true minimum, worked out by solving the board, not a guess. Below it, one game is chosen each day and everyone plays the same one. It takes a few minutes, it builds your streak, and because the whole world is on the same challenge the daily leaderboard is an actual like-for-like comparison rather than a mix of games.
Number Trail is five number sequences generated from the date, so everyone who plays on the same day gets the same five. They get harder as you go: the first two follow a single step, the middle ones use growing gaps, square numbers or sums of the two numbers before, and the last mixes rules or weaves two sequences together.
Type the next number. A wrong first answer reveals which kind of rule the sequence follows; a second wrong answer shows the answer and moves on. A first-try answer scores 20 and a second-try answer 10, for 100 in all.
A new trail goes live at midnight UTC — the countdown shows when. Finishing today's trail extends your streak, and the last seven days stay playable as practice that never changes your streak or best score.
The share button copies your score and one mark per round (🎯 first try, ✳️ second try, ✖️ missed) with a link, never the numbers, so friends can play the same trail without spoilers.
Tapping a light flips it and the lights directly above, below, left and right of it. The board starts with some lights on; the goal is to switch them all off. Every board is built by pressing six to ten random cells on a dark board (ten at the weekend), so it is always solvable.
Par is the smallest number of taps that solves the board. A 5×5 board always has exactly four press patterns that solve it, and par is the shortest of them. Finish at par for a star.
The puzzle changes at midnight in your own time zone and carries a number (#1 was 13 September 2026) that matches the Daily Puzzle in the Mind Skills Arcade app, so a result shared from the app or the site names the same day.
Stuck? The hint lights up one cell from the shortest solution of the board as it is now, so it helps from any position without giving the whole answer away.
Spacing is the single best-supported principle in learning research. Five minutes on six days produces more durable improvement than thirty minutes on one, for essentially every task on this site.
Short sessions also avoid the fatigue problem. Accuracy on memory and attention tasks falls off sharply after about twenty minutes, and a tired run teaches sloppy habits rather than good ones.
A rotating daily game also stops you specialising. Playing only what you are already good at is the commonest way people plateau.
Completing the daily game extends your streak. Missing a day ends it, and nothing is taken away when that happens — no lost XP, no locked features, no notification chasing you back.
The streak lives in your own browser, so it does not follow you between devices.
The daily challenge: five number sequences, easy to hard, the same for everyone each day. Type the next number in two tries; 20 points first time, 10 on the second.
At midnight UTC. The countdown on the page shows exactly how long is left.
Yes. The last seven days are playable as practice. They never change your streak or your best score.
Yes. The board is generated from the date, so everyone who plays on the same day gets the same board and the same par.
At midnight in your own time zone, the same rule the Mind Skills Arcade app uses.
Par is the fewest taps that switch every light off. It is calculated exactly for each board.
Yes. The Mind Skills Arcade app for Android and iPhone has its own Daily Puzzle with the same number, rotating through games such as Nonogram, Futoshiki and Skyscrapers, plus a streak shield and a reminder.
Yes. One game is chosen per day and every player gets the same one, which is what makes the daily leaderboard a fair comparison.
The streak resets. Nothing else changes — no XP is lost and nothing is locked.
No. There are no accounts. The streak is kept in your own browser.
A few minutes. The daily game is always one that can be completed in a single short session.