A sparring partner that's always ready.
The WUZIQI AI answers every move in under a second. It looks several turns ahead — for wins, and for traps you might not see yet. The three difficulty tiers aren't a handicap; they're how far ahead the AI lets itself think. Open the app and play — no network, no sign-up, no "god mode" that crushes you on turn one.
What is WUZIQI's AI? WUZIQI is an iPhone and iPad Gomoku (five-in-a-row) app with three AI difficulty tiers — Normal, Intermediate, Advanced. The AI is a search engine bundled inside the app: every move comes back in 0.1–1 second, running fully on-device with no network, no account, and no uploaded game data. Optional Renju forbidden-move rules are supported.
Three tiers, like a training ladder.
| Tier | What this AI feels like | Typical reply time | When to pick it |
|---|---|---|---|
| Normal | Like a friend who just learned the rules — it'll block the obvious move, but it won't set traps for you. | ≈ 0.1 s | First time opening the app, or teaching someone else |
| Intermediate | Knows how to build. Drop an open three and it'll block; push a four and it'll fire back. | ≈ 0.2 s | Daily single game with a decent sense of the game |
| Advanced | Barely slips. While you're still thinking "should I push a four?", it's already counted out the next ten moves. | ≈ 0.5 s (up to ~1 s) | You want real practice, against a real opponent |
Note: reply time auto-adjusts to board size (13×13 / 15×15 / 19×19). Advanced never exceeds one second.
How does it actually play?
Short version: it reads shapes like a human and counts like a computer. When the AI's turn comes up, it tries every meaningful empty point on the board, simulates what the game looks like a few to a dozen moves ahead, and picks the one that brings it closer to five-in-a-row — or pushes you further away. Internally it keeps a score sheet: open threes, closed fours, double-threes, four-threes, each shape with a fixed weight.
Higher tiers do two things: look further ahead (more plies), and think wider (keep more candidate moves alive during search). The AI doesn't "take it easy" when you're new — it just gives itself less thinking time. That's why losing to Advanced feels earned, not arbitrary.
Why is it so fast?
Because nothing is phoning home. No model to download, no server to wait for, no queue for "AI compute time." The engine is compiled right into the app, sitting on your iPhone like the plus button on a calculator — tap it, you get a result.
On a standard 15×15 board, Normal averages about 80 ms per move, Advanced about 450 ms. In airplane mode, on a spotty subway, on a flight — the reply time is identical. You never wait for "loading," and it never hangs. That "every move under one second" rhythm is the single feeling we optimized hardest for.
Why only three tiers, not five or eight?
Because more tiers doesn't mean a more interesting game. We shipped a five-tier version first, and the most common feedback was: "Challenge and Expert feel the same." They had different parameters, but the felt difference wasn't there.
So we collapsed it into three honest tiers — you can win (Normal), you have to think to win (Intermediate), and you need actual skill to win (Advanced). Each one has a clear use case, and when you switch between them you genuinely feel "the opponent just changed." That's the same discipline that shapes the rest of the app: fewer filler options, each remaining one worth picking.
What's Renju, and does WUZIQI support it?
Yes — flip the "Renju forbidden moves" switch in the new-game settings.
Renju is the international competitive variant of Gomoku, named in 1899 by Japanese journalist Kuroiwa Ruikō. It differs from casual Gomoku in one big way: Black (the first player) has extra restrictions. Black cannot play double-threes, double-fours, or overlines (six or more in a row). These shapes are considered "too strong," and the ban exists to balance Black's first-move advantage — which is why Renju is the rule set used in real tournaments.
WUZIQI's engine checks every Black move in real time and awards the game to White if Black triggers a forbidden move. Works on all three board sizes (13×13 / 15×15 / 19×19). If you're curious about stepping from casual Gomoku into competitive Gomoku, this is the lowest friction on-ramp we could build.
Is "Hint" the same engine?
Yes. Tap the hint button and the app runs the highest search strength to suggest a move for your current position — roughly 0.5–1 second, depending on board size. Same underlying engine that plays Advanced; we just flip the objective from "beat you" to "find you a move that can win."
If you've bought "Remove Ads," hints are unlimited. Otherwise you get a sensible number of free hints per game.