IIF Certified Assessment
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IIF Certified Assessment
Brain Games · Memory
The path starts at 3 steps and grows by one each round. One slip ends the run.
In short
A sequence memory test lights up tiles one after another, and you tap them back in the same order. Each round adds one step until you slip, and your score is the longest path you repeat. It is the online cousin of the Corsi block test, which psychologists have used since 1972.
Below: Grid, Tones and Backward, how fast the lights go, tips for longer paths, and what the test says about memory and IQ.
How to play
Pick a mode at the top and press Start. Watch while the lights play, then tap. Taps during playback are ignored, and the result shows exactly where a path slipped.
Holding the order of places.
Order, with sound to help.
Holding a path and turning it around.
Fair timing
Each light stays on this long, with at least 0.18 to 0.25 s of dark before the next one, so a tile lit twice in a row always shows twice.
| Mode and length | Light on |
|---|---|
| Grid, steps 1 to 7 | 0.50 s |
| Grid, steps 8 to 12 | 0.42 s |
| Grid, 13 steps and up | 0.35 s |
| Tones, steps 1 to 5 | 0.60 s |
| Tones, 14 steps and up | 0.30 s |
| Backward, every length | 0.70 s |
There is a 0.8 s pause before each playback and 0.6 s after a right round.
Tips
These help you use the memory you have. They do not make it bigger.
Simon-style
Yes. Our Tones mode plays like the Simon game, the electronic toy launched by Milton Bradley in 1978: four pads, each with its own colour and note, and a sequence that grows by one every round.
Tones gives each pad a colour, a shape and a sound, so you can play by ear, by eye or both. Simon is a trademark of Hasbro; this is our own game.
With the sound on, the notes form a short tune you can hum back. That makes Tones a sound memory game as much as a visual one.
Simon says is the playground game of following orders. This test is about memory: watching a pattern, then playing it back.
A good score
There is no fair norm for online grids, so compare with your own best. Sites disagree because they play different games: some add one step to the same path, others start a new path, and lives and start lengths vary.
The Corsi block test uses nine blocks and a span score, with published norms for adults (Kessels and colleagues, 2000). Those norms do not carry over to a phone grid.
Grid and Backward are a visual memory test: you hold places, not names. Tones adds a sound for each pad.
Grid works like Human Benchmark’s sequence memory test: a 3 × 3 board, with one step added to the same path each round.
Skills
Holding a series of places in order. Psychologists measure it with the Corsi block-tapping test.
Following every light as it plays. One missed light breaks the path.
Keeping the picture of the path in mind while you tap it back.
And IQ
Yes, through working memory: the ability to hold and use information for a few seconds. Working memory is one of the five areas a modern IQ test reports. A sequence memory test looks at its visual side: holding a path of places.
In a reanalysis of 14 data sets, working memory and reasoning shared about half their variance (Kane and colleagues, 2005). Read memory and IQ, explained, or take the IQ test to see your memory next to reasoning and speed.
The five areas of a modern IQ test
The five primary index areas of the WISC-V (children, 2014) and the WAIS-5 (adults, 2024). See WAIS-5 index scores explained.
FAQ
You watch a path of lights, then repeat it. The path grows by one step each time you get it right, and your score is the longest path you repeated in full.
There are no fair published norms for online versions, so we show no percentile. The best comparison is with your own past runs on the same mode.
Number memory asks you to hold digits; sequence memory asks you to hold places in order. Both use working memory, in different ways.
Yes. Tones works like Simon, the electronic game from 1978: four pads, each with its own colour and note. Ours adds shapes, so you can play without colour or sound. Simon is a trademark of Hasbro.
The research version of this game, described by Philip Corsi in 1972: an examiner taps a series of blocks and you repeat it. Grid and Backward follow the same idea on a screen.
No. It looks at one part of working memory. A full IQ test measures reasoning across many kinds of questions.
Most slips are swaps: two neighbouring steps in the wrong order. Your result shows the exact step that slipped and says when it was a swap.
Say the colours or hum the notes as they play, group them in threes, and keep your eyes on the middle so you see every pad at once.
Yes. In Grid and Backward, the number pad’s 7-8-9, 4-5-6 and 1-2-3 match the tiles, and so do Q-W-E, A-S-D and Z-X-C. In Tones, use the arrow keys or 1 to 4.
Yes. Practice replays the round after a slip, so nobody is out after one mistake.
Yes. After a run, send the link: your friend gets the very same sequence and sees both scores.
Yes. It is free to play, with no signup, and your scores stay in your browser.
Sources
The full picture
Each game looks at one skill. The IQ test brings speed, reasoning and memory together in one score, with your percentile and a certificate.
