What Ludo is, and why it never went away
Ludo is the simplified British take on pachisi, the cross-shaped race game India has played for centuries; legend says Emperor Akbar used a palace courtyard as a life-size board. It was patented in England in 1896 and is now a phone favorite across India. Most Americans know the idea from Parcheesi or Sorry!: roll, race around, knock rivals back to start, and get all four pieces home first.
The Ludo rules we use
Two to four players, each with four tokens in red, yellow, green or blue. The track is a 52-square loop; every color has its own start square and a six-square home column leading to the center.
- Roll a 6 to get out. One die. A token leaves the yard only on a six and lands on your start square.
- Move exactly what you roll. You pick the token. No legal move? The turn passes on its own after about a second.
- Sixes roll again. Every 6 earns a bonus roll, but a third 6 in a row is burned: it can’t be used and the turn passes. Moves made with the first two sixes stand.
- Capture by landing. End your move on a square holding exactly one rival token and it goes back to its yard — and you roll again.
- Safe squares. The four start squares (▸) and four stars (✦) can’t be attacked. Neither can any square where two or more rival tokens stand together.
- No blockades. Tokens never block the path; you can move past a pair or even share its square.
- Exact roll to finish. Overshoot the center and that token can’t move this turn.
- First to bring all four home wins, and the game ends right there; the other places go by distance covered.
Play Ludo online with friends — free, nothing to download
- Type a nickname, pick Ludo and create a room. No account, no app — it runs in any phone or laptop browser.
- Text your friends the link or the four-character room code (letters and digits). A room seats up to four.
- Short on people? The host adds bots. You need just two seats filled to start, so one human plus one bot is a game.
- Tap the die to roll, tap a glowing token to move. Each step has a 25-second clock; when it runs out, the game rolls or moves for you.
- Lost your connection? Reopen the same link to get your seat back. After the game the host starts a rematch, and the first turn rotates.
Staying for the evening? Switch the same room to Dominoes or Generala from the lobby; a running scoreboard gives 3 points for a win, 2 for second, 1 for playing (bots excluded).
How it compares with the versions you grew up with
The American two-dice classic lets you enter on a five, rewards captures with 20 bonus spaces and lets two pieces form a blockade; Spanish parchís is similar. Expect a faster, swingier game here: one die, sixes to enter, no blockades, no bonus spaces. There are no rule options in the lobby, which settles the “that’s not how we play” argument early. Every case, plus the dice odds, is in our Ludo rules and tactics guide.
Strategy tips that actually win
- Keep two tokens in play. With one, a bad number walks it into danger; with two you can choose.
- Count the six squares behind you. A lone rival token 1–6 squares back needs one exact number — about a 1-in-6 shot. Two of them push it toward 1 in 3.
- Fear the yard exit. The six squares right after a rival’s start are the most dangerous on the board: a token that just came out on a six gets an immediate bonus roll.
- Every start square is safe, not just yours — free insurance.
- Capture late, not early. Hitting a token fresh out of the yard costs your rival one six; hitting one near its home column costs a full lap.
- Line up the finish. A token two squares from the center needs exactly a 2, so keep another token moving while it waits.
Want dice with deeper decisions? Try Backgammon, the two-player racing cousin.