Intermediate Minesweeper
Intermediate Minesweeper uses a 16x16 board with 40 mines, giving you a larger puzzle than Beginner while staying more readable than Expert.
Play Intermediate Minesweeper Online
Intermediate is the training ground for players who know the rules and want deeper deduction. The board creates more edge patterns, chained openings, and situations where chording can save a lot of time.
Live Intermediate Minesweeper Statistics
The current Intermediate record on Minesweeper.now is 35.140s, held by 1761723. 9 players hold a ranked time in this category. Over the last 7 days, 29 Intermediate games were finished here with a 86.2% win rate. See the full rankings →
More deduction
A wider board creates richer number chains and more chances to combine clues.
Speed training
Intermediate rewards cleaner chording and fewer wasted flags.
Bridge to Expert
Use this mode to prepare for 30x16 Expert boards without jumping too far at once.
Intermediate Minesweeper Strategy
Intermediate is where chording becomes essential. Clicking a satisfied number (one whose mines are all flagged) reveals every remaining neighbour at once. On a 16x16 board with 40 mines, a clean chording habit can cut your solve time nearly in half compared to revealing cells one by one.
Work the perimeter of each opening before diving into fresh territory. The 15.6% mine density produces long number chains along opening borders, and chains are where multi-cell patterns like 1-2-1 and 1-2-2-1 appear. Solving a whole chain in one pass is far faster than hopping between distant clues.
Track your 3BV/s rather than raw time while you train here. 3BV measures how many clicks a board minimally requires, so 3BV/s tells you how efficiently you actually played, independent of whether the board was friendly. Players who reach roughly 1.0 3BV/s on Intermediate are ready to compete on Expert.
Go deeper with the Minesweeper patterns guide and the efficiency & 3BV/s guide.
Intermediate Minesweeper FAQ
What size is the Intermediate Minesweeper board?
Intermediate Minesweeper uses a 16x16 grid with 40 mines - 256 cells at about 15.6% mine density. It is the middle of the three classic difficulties, between Beginner (9x9, 10 mines) and Expert (30x16, 99 mines).
What is a good Intermediate Minesweeper time?
Under 120 seconds is respectable for a casual player. Experienced players aim for under 60 seconds, and competitive Intermediate specialists clear boards in under 20 seconds using full-board pattern recognition and constant chording.
When should I move from Intermediate to Expert?
When you win most Intermediate games without long pauses and your times stop improving, the Expert board's higher density will teach you more. Many players keep Intermediate as their speed-practice board even after switching to Expert for ranked play.
More questions? Visit the full Minesweeper FAQ.