Shut the Box

How to play Shut the Box

Shut the Box is a dice game played with a box of numbered tiles, 1 to 9. The aim is simple: roll the dice, then flip down (“shut”) tiles that add up to the number you rolled, and keep going until you either shut every tile or get stuck.

1. Roll two dice. Add them up – say you roll a 5 and a 3, that's 8.
2. Shut tiles that add up to the roll. For 8 you could shut the 8, or 7+1, 6+2, 5+3, 5+2+1, 4+3+1, and so on. Any number of tiles is fine as long as the total is exactly the roll.
3. Roll again and repeat. Each tile can only be shut once.
4. When no combination of open tiles adds up to the roll, your turn is over. Your score is the total of the tiles still open – lower is better. If you shut every tile, that's a “shut the box”, the best possible result.

Rules

• One die or two: once the 7, 8 and 9 are all shut (and the 10, 11 and 12 too, on bigger boxes), you may choose to roll just one die before each roll. Until then you always roll two.
• Scoring: add up the open tiles. A fresh 9-tile box is worth 45, and shutting the box scores 0.
• Several players: each player takes a complete turn with the box reset. The lowest score wins, and anyone who shuts the box wins on the spot. Equal lowest scores are a draw.

Variants

The classic box has 9 tiles. Many boxes have 10 (1–10) or 12 (1–12) tiles, which makes shutting the box much harder – pick the size above the box. Some players read the open tiles as a number instead of adding them (open 1 and 5 = 15); this page always adds them up.

Odds of each roll

With two dice, 7 is the most common total and 2 or 12 the rarest:

Strategy tips

• Shut the big tiles first. With a roll of 9, shut the 9 rather than 4+3+2. High tiles are the hardest to get rid of later, and low tiles give you more ways to match future rolls. Computer analysis of every position on this page agrees with “take the biggest tile” about 9 times out of 10.
• Roll one die when the open tiles add up to 6 or less. If you are going for a shut box, one die is the better bet once your open tiles total 6 or under – you cannot shut more than that anyway, and two dice would often roll too high. With 7 or more open, stick with two dice.
• Don't count on shutting the box. Even perfect play only shuts the 9-tile box about 9.8% of the time, so treat a low score as a win. The Hint button shows the move with the best chance of shutting the box from the current position.

Chance of shutting the box

Playing the best possible move every time, with the one-die option used when it helps:

These numbers come from working through every possible position, and the Hint and the Hard computer on this page use the same calculation.

History

Where Shut the Box comes from is not known for certain. It has long been played in English pubs, and some accounts trace it to the Channel Islands or to Normandy in northern France. Wooden boxes with hinged tiles are still made today, and the game is popular as a quick family game and as a way for children to practise adding up.

FAQ

• What is a good score? With best play the average on 9 tiles is about 11.0, so anything under 10 is a good turn and 5 or less is very good.
• Why is the starting score 45? It is 1+2+…+9. With 10 tiles the box starts at 55, with 12 tiles at 78.
• Do I have to shut the exact tile I rolled? No – any set of open tiles whose total equals the roll is fine. For a 6 you can shut 6, 5+1, 4+2 or 3+2+1.
• What does “shut the box” mean? Shutting every tile in one turn. It ends the game immediately and is the best result, worth 0 points.
• Is Shut the Box luck or skill? Mostly luck, but the choices matter: in tests the Hard computer beats a typical beginner about 6 games in 10.

How to play on this page

• Pick a mode above the box: Solo, vs CPU (Easy, Normal or Hard, with 1 to 3 computer players), 2 players taking turns on one device, or Today's dice – the same rolls for everyone, new every day, with your streak saved on this device.
• Press Roll (or tap the dice, or press Space). Then tap tiles – they flip down as soon as the selected tiles add up to the roll. Tap a selected tile again to deselect it. On a keyboard, keys 1–9 and 0 (for 10) pick tiles.
• Hint lights up the best tiles to shut. Your results for each box size and level are saved on this device, and a game in progress continues when you come back.