Memory Games for Adults

What each game asks you to remember

Memory games differ in what you hold and what you do with it, so pick by the kind of remembering you enjoy.

• An order: Echo Steps asks for the exact sequence, and repeated steps count.
• A picture: Tile Recall asks where the filled squares were.
• A number that keeps changing: Ghost Train asks for the running total after a string of updates.
• Something you have to rework: Code Shift and Signal Switch ask you to hold a code or a rule and change it as instructions arrive.

Not the card-matching kind

Many sites use "memory game" for the card game where you turn over two cards at a time to find pairs. Altamens does not have that game. Here you study a sequence or a pattern, hide it when you are ready and rebuild it from memory, so each round depends on what you held rather than on lucky first flips.

The last three games above are working memory tasks: you keep information active while you use it. The working memory skill page explains that skill and lists more games that rely on it.

How to remember more in each round

Short-term memory holds only a few items at once, about four chunks in adults by one well-known estimate (Cowan, 2001). Our research note on chunking and digit span shows why a list with a pattern is easier to hold than a random one. These habits make each chunk carry more:

1. Group the sequence. Six steps such as 2, 4, 4, 1, 3, 2 in Echo Steps are easier as two groups of three: 2 4 4, then 1 3 2. Say the groups to yourself before you hide them.
2. Name the shape. In Tile Recall, read the filled squares as one figure, such as "an L in the top left plus the far corner", instead of remembering each square on its own.
3. Update out loud. In Ghost Train, say the new total after every change instead of waiting for the station.
4. Track positions, not just digits. In Code Shift, 3 8 5 becomes 5 8 3 after swapping the first and last digits, 5 9 3 after adding 1 to the second and 5 3 after removing the largest. Most mistakes come from applying a step to the wrong position.
5. Study before you hide. Echo Steps and Tile Recall wait until you choose to hide the sequence or picture, so rehearse it once before you do.

How the games get harder

Each game raises the load in small steps, so the first rounds are an easy place to start. In Echo Steps and Tile Recall a run ends after 12 rounds or three mistakes.

• Echo Steps: sequences start at 3 steps and grow by one every two rounds, up to 8.
• Tile Recall: 3 to 8 filled squares, on a 3×3 grid at first and a 4×4 grid from round 5.
• Ghost Train: chains get longer, and from station five you track two carriages at once.
• Code Shift: codes grow from 3 to 5 digits, with up to 5 changes to apply.

What memory games can and cannot do

Getting better at these games shows that you have learned these tasks: their rules, their patterns and strategies like the ones above. Reviews of working memory training find gains on the trained tasks and on very similar ones, but no convincing evidence of gains in broader abilities such as reasoning, reading or arithmetic (Melby-Lervåg and Hulme, 2013; Simons et al., 2016). Read what the research says.

So play them as short, absorbing challenges and compare your results with your own earlier runs. The digit span test is an informal self-check, not an IQ, medical or diagnostic test, and Altamens publishes no norms for it.