Play Peg Solitaire Online
The classic single-player board puzzle. Jump pegs over one another to remove them from the board. Choose from 6 board shapes and aim for the perfect solution — one peg remaining.
What Is Peg Solitaire?
Peg Solitaire — also known as Brainvita, Solo Noble, Hi-Q, or simply Solitaire in the United Kingdom — is a classic single-player board puzzle that dates back centuries. The game is played on a board with holes arranged in a pattern, filled with pegs (or marbles). One hole starts empty. The player jumps one peg over an adjacent peg into an empty hole, removing the jumped peg from the board. The objective is to remove every peg except one.
The ultimate goal is to achieve a perfect solution: ending with a single peg in the centre hole of the board. Peg Solitaire is a combinatorial puzzle that rewards careful planning and logical thinking. Despite having simple rules, it offers surprising depth — mathematicians and puzzle enthusiasts have studied its solutions for centuries.
How to Play Peg Solitaire
- Starting position. The board is filled with pegs in every hole except one (usually the centre). Select a board layout above — each has a different shape and number of holes.
- Select a peg. Tap or click on one of the pegs on the board. Valid jump destinations will be highlighted.
- Jump over an adjacent peg. Tap a highlighted empty hole to jump. Your selected peg leaps over the adjacent peg and lands in the empty hole. The jumped peg is removed from the board.
- Jumps are orthogonal. On square-grid boards, pegs can jump horizontally or vertically only — no diagonal jumps. On the triangular board, pegs can jump along all six axes of the triangular grid.
- Continue jumping. Repeat until no more jumps are possible. Use the Undo button to backtrack if you get stuck.
- Win! The puzzle is solved when only one peg remains on the board. For a perfect solution, that last peg should be in the centre.
Board Layouts
English Board (33 Holes)
The English board is the most well-known Peg Solitaire layout. It has 33 holes arranged in a cross (plus sign) shape — a 7×7 grid with the four 2×2 corners removed. This is the version most commonly sold as a physical board game. Starting with the centre hole empty, it has a known perfect solution that finishes with the last peg in the centre.
French Board (37 Holes)
The French board (also called the European board or 37-hole board) is an octagonal variant with 37 holes. It extends the English cross shape by adding four extra holes in the corners, creating a more rounded shape. The additional holes give more possible moves and make finding a solution both easier and harder — easier because there are more options, but harder to optimise.
German Board (45 Holes)
The German board uses a full 45-hole arrangement — the cross shape extended further with additional corner cells. It offers the most complex standard rectangular variant with a large number of possible move sequences to explore.
Diamond Board (41 Holes)
The Diamond board rotates the playing field into a diamond shape with 41 holes. This creates a distinct strategic feel — pegs near the edges are harder to reach and easy to strand. The diamond layout is popular in advanced Peg Solitaire circles.
Triangular Board (15 Holes)
The Triangular board (also called the Cracker Barrel puzzle) uses a triangular grid of 15 holes arranged in 5 rows. Unlike square-grid boards, pegs can jump along six directions (the three axes of a triangle). With only 14 pegs, this compact board is a great introduction to Peg Solitaire — quick to play but still tricky to master.
Cross Board (9 Holes)
The Cross board is a minimal 9-hole plus-shaped board — perfect for beginners and for understanding the core mechanics of Peg Solitaire. Its small size makes it ideal for quick warm-up rounds.
Peg Solitaire Strategy Tips
1. Work from the Outside In
The most common mistake beginners make is removing pegs from the edges too early, leaving isolated pegs stranded with no neighbours to jump over. Focus on clearing pegs from the outer edges first and working inward toward the centre. This keeps your remaining pegs close together where they can still interact.
2. Avoid Leaving Isolated Pegs
An isolated peg — one with no adjacent pegs and no way to reach it — is a guaranteed failure point. Before each move, check whether your jump will strand any peg. If a move creates an unreachable peg, look for an alternative.
3. Look for Chain Jumps
While this version uses single jumps per move, planning sequences of moves that create chain reactions is key. Set up a line of pegs so that after one jump, the landing position enables another jump on your next move. Skilled players think several moves ahead to create these cascading sequences.
4. Maintain Symmetry
The English and French boards are symmetrical, and the known perfect solutions exploit this symmetry. Try to keep your board state roughly symmetrical as you play. If you remove a peg from one side, try to mirror the removal on the other side. This approach naturally guides you toward the centre-peg finish.
5. Learn the Parity Constraint
Peg Solitaire has a mathematical property related to parity. On the English board, positions can be classified into three groups based on a modular arithmetic colouring. A move always changes the peg counts in these groups in a specific way. Understanding this constraint helps you recognise unsolvable positions early and avoid dead ends.
6. Start with the Triangular Board
If you're new to Peg Solitaire, the 15-hole triangular board is the best place to start. With fewer pegs and more jump directions, it's easier to experiment and learn the fundamental strategies before tackling the larger English or French boards.
History of Peg Solitaire
The origins of Peg Solitaire are debated, but the game is at least 300 years old. The earliest known reference is an engraving from 1697 showing the French aristocrat Princess de Soubise playing the game at the court of Louis XIV. The French called it "jeu de solitaire" — simply "the solitary game."
The game spread across Europe during the 18th century. The English adopted their distinctive 33-hole cross-shaped board, while the French continued with the rounder 37-hole variant. In Germany, Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz — the co-inventor of calculus — studied the game mathematically and praised it as an ideal puzzle for a single player.
In the 20th century, Peg Solitaire gained renewed popularity as a mass-produced plastic board game. Brands like Hi-Q (by Kohner Bros.) and Brainvita (popular in India) made it a household staple. The triangular version became iconic through the Cracker Barrel restaurant chain in the United States, where wooden peg puzzles are placed on every table.
Mathematicians have studied Peg Solitaire extensively. In 1985, John Beasley published The Ins and Outs of Peg Solitaire, the definitive mathematical treatment of the game. Research has revealed deep connections to group theory, linear algebra over GF(2), and combinatorial game theory. The game continues to be a popular subject in recreational mathematics and computer science.
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