Go is one of the oldest board games in the world — over 4,000 years old. You play Black ⬛ against the AI (White ⬜). Your goal is to surround more territory than your opponent by the time both players pass.
Tap any empty intersection on the 9×9 grid to place a black stone. Stones never move once placed — they stay on the board unless captured. Black always moves first, then players alternate turns.
Every stone needs at least one adjacent empty space (called a liberty) to survive. When you surround all the liberties of an enemy group, those stones are captured and removed from the board. Each captured stone earns you 1 point.
A group of your stones with two separate internal empty spaces (eyes) can never be captured — your opponent can never fill both at once. Building two eyes is the key to making your groups permanently safe.
No suicide: You cannot place a stone where it would have zero liberties — unless that move captures enemy stones first. Ko rule: You cannot make a move that returns the board to its exact previous state, preventing infinite capture loops.
When you have no useful moves left, tap Pass. When both players pass consecutively, the game ends and scoring begins.
Your final score counts territory (empty intersections fully enclosed by your stones) plus captures (enemy stones removed). White receives 6.5 komi (bonus points for going second), which also eliminates ties. The higher total wins.
The difficulty setting controls how deeply the AI thinks — from pure random moves at Beginner to thousands of strategic simulations at Cyborg ☠. Start on Beginner to learn the flow, then work your way up as you improve.
Play Go 9×9 free online — no download required, no sign-up needed. This browser-based version uses a Monte Carlo Tree Search (MCTS) AI engine that simulates thousands of possible game outcomes to find the strongest move. On a 9×9 board, games are fast and tactical — perfect for learning Go fundamentals before moving to larger boards.
The daily challenge resets every midnight — the same opening seed for all players worldwide. Beat the AI, share your score, and challenge friends with a direct link to your exact game setup.