Four in a Row — rules & free online play

Four in a Row is a two-player game on a grid seven columns by six. Players take turns dropping a disc into a column; it falls to the lowest empty square. The first to line four of their discs across, down or diagonally wins; a full board without one is a draw. Games last three to five minutes.

Your first game

The board stands upright: seven columns across, six rows down, forty-two spaces in all. Pink plays first.
On your turn you choose a column and drop a disc into it. You do not choose the space — the disc falls to the lowest free one in that column, and sits on whatever is already there.

Pink drops a second disc into the middle column. It falls onto the two already standing in it and stops there. The only choice a player makes in this game is which column.

Win by connecting four of your own discs in a straight line — across, up and down, or on either diagonal.

Pink's fourth disc lands on the bottom row and connects four. The four that won are drawn with a heavier outline. Yellow had three in a row directly above and was one move too late.

Then the turn passes and your opponent chooses a column. That is the whole game.

The rules

The board and the drop

The board is seven columns wide and six rows deep. There are forty-two spaces, so a game that fills the board is twenty-one discs each.

A move is a column, never a space. The disc lands in the lowest free space of the column you chose, and that is the only place it can land. You may not drop into a column that is already full — this board does not offer one — and there is nothing else a turn can be: you cannot pass, and you cannot move a disc you have already played.

After every accepted move the turn passes to the other player. There is no equivalent of paper soccer's bounce here, and no way to take two turns in a row.

Four in a line wins

The moment a disc completes a line of four of your own discs, the game is over and you have won. The line may run:

across a row,
up and down a column,
or along either diagonal.

Pink's disc lands in the fourth column and completes a line running up and to the right from the bottom-left corner. A diagonal counts exactly as a row does, and it is the one people miss.

A line longer than four still wins — it simply contains one. And a line is counted through the disc you just played, so it wins whether the disc closed the line at one end, at the other, or in the middle of it.

Nobody wins a full board

If every one of the forty-two spaces is filled and neither player has four in a line, the game is a draw. Neither player wins. Two equal ratings do not move at all and two unequal ones move toward each other, the record says drawn rather than naming anybody, and your profile counts it as a draw and not as a loss.

A game nobody can win is over

This site ends a drawn game as soon as it is decided, rather than making you fill the board first.

Every line of four on the board — and there are sixty-nine of them — is dead once it holds at least one disc of each colour, because neither player can ever complete it. When every line is dead, no move by either player can win, and the game is declared drawn there and then.

Yellow's disc lands in the second column. That was the last line either player could still have completed, so the game is drawn immediately, with two spaces still empty at the top of the board. A full board is one way a game is drawn here, not the only one.

This is a rule of this site and not of the published game, which ends when the board fills. Nothing downstream can tell the two endings apart: both are recorded as a draw with no winner, and the early ending is worth having because playing out a position nobody can win is twenty moves of nothing with a clock running on every one of them.

The board in numbers

What	How many
Columns	7
Rows	6
Squares	42
Discs each	21
In a line to win	4
Lines a four can lie on	69 — 24 across, 21 down, 24 on the diagonals

Commonly got wrong

"Does a diagonal really count?"

Yes, and both diagonals do. It is the most common way a game is lost by somebody watching only rows and columns.

"Can I put a disc on any space I like?"

No. You choose a column, and gravity chooses the space. That is what makes the game — every disc you play also builds a platform for your opponent.

"Do I get another turn if I connect three?"

No. Nothing but four in a line does anything at all; three is just three discs, and the turn passes as it always does.

"The board is not full — why has it said it is a draw?"

Because no line of four could still be completed by either player. See A game nobody can win is over above: on this site that ends the game rather than waiting for the last twenty forced moves.

"Is a line of five a win?"

Yes. Four is the number that ends the game, and any longer line contains four.

Sources

The board, the drop, the win and the drawn full board follow the published rules of the boxed game — Hasbro's Connect 4 instructions: a grid seven columns wide and six deep, twenty-one discs each, discs dropped into columns, and a win for the first player to get four of their own in a row horizontally, vertically or diagonally, with a full board and no line recorded as a draw.

Ending a decided game early is this site's rule and not theirs, and it is marked as such above.

Connect 4 is a registered trademark of its owner. It is named here only to identify the published instructions these rules follow; this game is Four in a Row, and this site is not affiliated with or endorsed by the trademark holder.

Updated 22 September 2026

Go deeper

Four in a row: why start in the middle column

Good to know

Players: 2
How long a game takes: 3–5 min
Boards: 7×6