What your score means
Your score is the largest number of tiles you remembered in one go. Research on visual working memory finds that people hold about four separate objects at a time. You can beat that here because tiles on a grid can be grouped into shapes, which your memory stores as one thing.
| Tiles remembered | Rating |
|---|---|
| Fewer than 5 tiles | Warming up |
| 5–7 tiles | Typical |
| 8–10 tiles | Strong |
| 11 or more | Exceptional |
These bands are a rough guide from how the game scales, not published norms.
The magic number four
In 1997, Steven Luck and Edward Vogel showed people brief arrays of colored squares and asked whether anything changed after a short gap. Accuracy stayed high up to about four squares, then fell. Remarkably, people could hold four objects whether each had one feature or several, such as color and orientation together. That suggested visual memory counts objects, not details.
What the visual memory test measures
It measures visual working memory: holding an image in mind for a few seconds while you act on it. You use it to remember where you left your keys a moment ago or to compare two products on a shelf. Children’s versions of the Wechsler intelligence scale include a picture-based working memory task for the same reason.
How to remember more tiles
- See shapes: three lit tiles in a row are a line, four in a block are a square.
- Name the pattern: “an L in the corner and a dot in the middle” is easier than six positions.
- Split the grid: remember the top half and the bottom half as two smaller pictures.
- Tap the hard ones first: lone tiles fade fastest, so get them before the easy clusters.
Visual memory test FAQ
What is a good visual memory test score?
There is no published norm for this exact game. As a rough guide, remembering 5 to 7 tiles is typical and 8 or more is strong. Watch your own best score climb as you learn to see the tiles as shapes.
Is visual memory the same as photographic memory?
No. Visual working memory holds a few items for a few seconds. True photographic (eidetic) memory, a lasting and detailed image of a whole scene, is very rare in adults, if it exists at all.
Can you improve your visual memory?
Your score on this game improves quickly with practice, mostly because you get better at grouping tiles into patterns. That skill helps with similar tasks, but there is little evidence it raises general intelligence.
Why does the grid get bigger?
A larger grid means more possible places for each tile, so you can’t rely on simple shapes as easily. It keeps the game hard as the number of tiles grows.
Sources
- Luck, S. J., & Vogel, E. K. (1997). The capacity of visual working memory for features and conjunctions. Nature, 390, 279–281.
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Take the free IQ testBy the MyIQTest team · Reviewed November 2026