How to solve a Survivor slide puzzle

Slide puzzles have been deciding Survivor challenges since at least 2002. In the first episode of Thailand (season 5), Chuay Gahn reached the puzzle first. Then Ghandia panicked and got stuck. Jed solved the puzzle for Sook Jai, and Sook Jai won immunity.

More than twenty years later, the puzzle still shows up at the end of the hardest challenges. Players reach it out of breath, after the swim and the climb. What wins it is a plan you’ve done a hundred times, so your hands keep moving when your head is tired.

This guide gives you that plan. Every board on this page is live, so you can try each move as you read.

How a slide puzzle works

A slide puzzle is a frame of tiles with one empty space. The only move is to slide a tile into the space. You win when every tile is home.

The most useful habit is to watch the space, not the tiles. Every move shifts the space one step. If you want a tile to go left, the space has to get to its left side first. Good solvers steer the space around the board like a cursor.

You can also push a whole line at once. If the space sits at the end of a row, you can shove two or three tiles in one motion. Real frames work that way, and so does our game.

The method: one row at a time

Don’t try to solve the whole board at once. Shrink it.

1. Solve the top row. Once it’s done, never touch it again.
2. Keep solving rows until only two rows are left. On a 3×3, that’s right after the top row. On a 4×4, it’s after two rows.
3. Solve the last two rows one column at a time, from left to right.
4. When only a 2×2 square is left, spin the last three tiles around until they drop in.

Each step turns a big puzzle into a smaller one. A 4×4 becomes a 3×4, then a 2×4, then a 2×2. You only ever think about a few tiles at a time.

The trap at the end of every row

Everyone hits this. You put 1 home. You put 2 home. Now 3 has to go in the corner, and there’s no way in without knocking 2 out.

The fix is to bring the last two tiles in together, like a domino:

• Put 2 in the corner where 3 belongs.
• Put 3 right under it.
• Bring the space to where 2 belongs. Come around from below so you don’t bump them.
• Slide 2 left. Slide 3 up. The row is done.

It feels backward the first time. After a few tries, it turns into one smooth motion.

A 4×4 works the same way. Place 1 and 2 one at a time. Then set up 3 and 4 as the domino.

The same trick, turned on its side

The last two rows are solved one column at a time. Each column is a pair. On a 3×3, the first pair is 4 and 7. If you drop 4 in first, 7 can’t get under it. So turn the domino on its side:

• Put 7 where 4 belongs.
• Put 4 just to the right of it.
• Bring the space to where 7 belongs, right below.
• Slide 7 down. Slide 4 left.

The last square

Now only a 2×2 square is left: three tiles and the space. Move the space around the square in one direction, again and again. The three tiles ride around like a carousel. Stop when they line up.

If it looks like it’s getting worse, turn the other way. It never takes more than a few laps.

What the winners did

The show has used this puzzle at least 19 times. A few of those moments are worth studying.

Look before you move

In Cambodia (season 31), Spencer and Kelley reached the final puzzle close together. Spencer studied the puzzle before each move. Kelley rushed. Spencer won immunity. Before your first move, find 1 and 2 and plan a few moves ahead. A few seconds of looking can save a lot of undoing.

Check before you call

In Worlds Apart (season 30), Dan called Jeff over again and again to check his puzzle. It was wrong every time, and Joe won. A false finish costs you time and your nerve. Before you call, read the tiles in order, row by row. It only takes a moment.

Know the method cold

In the first episode of David vs. Goliath (season 37), the Goliaths picked the two Davids they thought were weakest: Christian and Lyrsa. According to the Survivor Wiki, Christian had written programs to solve slide puzzles back in college. The pair blew past the Goliaths on the puzzle and won. You don’t need to write code. You need to know the method so well that you stop thinking about it.

Practice for the puzzle you’ll face

In Palau (season 10), Ulong practiced the slide puzzle before the challenge. The real thing was a giant floating puzzle with 16 squares, run by a caller and two movers. Koror still won. A small puzzle in your hands feels very different from a giant one you have to talk your way through. Practice both ways.

If you’re the caller

Some challenges split the job. One person sees the puzzle and calls the moves. Others do the sliding. Palau’s floating puzzle worked this way. In Survivor 48, a caller had to talk a blindfolded tribemate through a slide puzzle.

• Call the tile, then the direction: “Seven, left.”
• Use the mover’s left and right, not yours. Agree on this before the challenge starts.
• Give one move at a time, and wait for it to land.
• Only call the next move once the last one is done.

A practice plan

1. Learn it slowly. Play the 3×3 in Practice mode. Each hint shows the next move of this exact method and names the step you’re on.
2. Make it automatic. Switch to Challenge mode and try to solve without stopping. The results screen shows how many moves the method needed for your scramble, so you can see where you wander.
3. Step up to 4×4. It’s the same method with one more row. Palau’s floating puzzle had 16 squares, the same as a 4×4.
4. Add pressure. Play the Daily. Everyone gets the same board, and only your first try counts.
5. Say it out loud. Have a friend call your moves, then switch roles.

Play the slide puzzle

Why half of all slide puzzles can’t be solved

In 1879, two mathematicians named Johnson and Story proved something strange. Half of all the ways you can arrange the tiles can never be solved, no matter what you do.

That’s why the puzzle writer Sam Loyd could safely make a famous offer. He promised $1,000 to anyone who could swap just the 14 and the 15 on a 4×4. Nobody could, because it can’t be done. Loyd also claimed he invented the puzzle. He didn’t. Historians credit a postmaster named Noyes Chapman, in the 1870s.

This matters if you practice on a real puzzle. If the tiles pop out, put them back in solved order. If you put them back at random, there’s a one-in-two chance you’ve built a puzzle that can’t be finished. Every scramble in our game is checked first, so it can always be solved.

How many moves does it take?

A 3×3 never needs more than 31 moves. We checked all 181,440 of its solvable layouts by computer to be sure. If pushing a whole row counts as one move, the most it ever takes is 24.

A 4×4 never needs more than 80 moves. Researchers proved that with huge computer searches, published in 1999.

The method won’t find the fewest moves. It finds a sure path, every time. For 3×3 boards, our results screen shows both numbers. In a race, a longer path you can run without stopping often beats a shorter one you have to figure out.

Not every Survivor “slide puzzle” is this kind

Sometimes the show uses a different puzzle that also slides. Blocks of different sizes share a frame, and the goal is to get one big block out. In All-Stars (season 8), players had to free a piece with a knife in it from the center slot. In the first episode of Edge of Extinction (season 38), tribes slid a huge crate piece out of the middle. That kind is called a Klotski puzzle. It takes a different skill, and it will get its own game here.