World Tiles
A classic sliding puzzle on real photographs from NASA archives (US government public domain - no stock photos). Pick any grid from 3x3 to 50x50, peek at the full shot, and zoom when the tiles get tiny. Boards are shuffled by sliding the gap, so every deal is solvable.
How to play World Tiles
⌨️ Keyboard & mouse
- Arrows/WASD
- slide into the gap
- Space
- peek
📱 Phone & tablet
Tap a tile by the gap, pinch/drag to zoom and pan, Peek for the full photo
Controls guide →- Free, no sign-up
- Plays in the browser
How World Tiles works
A photograph is cut into a grid with one tile missing. Tap a tile next to the gap and it slides in; keep going until the picture is whole again. The board is scrambled by making hundreds of legal slides from the solved picture, which is the point: a puzzle built that way is always solvable, unlike one scrambled by shuffling tiles at random.
Work in order rather than chasing tiles about. Finish the top row, then the left column, and treat what you have finished as out of bounds — the rest of the puzzle is then a smaller one. The last two tiles of a row are the awkward pair: place them together by cycling them in as a corner, not one at a time.
Grid sizes run from 3×3 up to 50×50, and each size keeps its own record: fewest moves first, then the fastest time on that many moves. Peek shows the whole photo while you hold it, and a new photo is one tap away.
Tips for World Tiles
- Solve the top row, then the left column, and the puzzle shrinks to a smaller one.
- Place the last two tiles of a row together; one at a time usually undoes the first.
- Use peek to check the photo when the tiles get tiny, and zoom in on big grids.
