Mancala
Collect the most stones in your store!
How to Play
Goal
Collect more stones in your store (large pit) than your opponent.
Gameplay
Pick a pit on your side. All stones are distributed one by one counter-clockwise. The opponent's store is skipped.
Extra turn
If your last stone lands in your store, you get another turn.
Capture
If your last stone lands in an empty pit on your side and the opposite pit has stones, both are captured into your store.
End
When one side is empty, remaining stones go to that player's store. Most stones wins.
Strategy & tips
Before every move, check which one ends in your own store — that earns you another turn. Chains of several such moves in a row are the most common route to a large lead.
Keep the pits near your own store full and the distant ones empty. Stones close to the store reach safety quickly; stones at the far end of your row stay vulnerable for a long time.
Look at the opposite pit before you empty one of yours. If your last stone lands in an empty pit on your side, you capture everything across from it. That is exactly why keeping a pit deliberately empty pays.
Variants
Oware
The West African version captures only when the final pit reaches two or three stones. Considerably more tactical and less forgiving.
Multiple rounds
Pits are refilled after each round, and a player without enough stones loses pits. Across rounds it becomes a slow bleed.
Clockwise
The sowing direction is reversed. Every familiar movement pattern inverts.
How it works
1. Create a game
Click "Create Game" and receive a 6-digit code.
2. Share the code
Share the code with your friends – via WhatsApp, Telegram, or just tell them.
3. Play instantly
Your friends enter the code and you start playing immediately. No login required!
Origin
Mancala games are among the oldest in the world. Temple stones in Egypt and Ethiopia carry worked hollows that have been used for play for thousands of years.
The version played here, Kalah, is a modern American simplification from the 1940s. Africa and Asia hold hundreds of distinct variants with entirely different sowing and capturing rules.
Frequently asked questions
How does a move work?
Take all stones from one of your pits and drop them one by one anticlockwise into the following pits — including your own store, but not your opponent's.
When do I get an extra turn?
When your final stone lands exactly in your own store.
When does the game end?
As soon as one side has no stones left in its pits. The remaining stones go to the other player.