How to play Gomoku — the complete beginner's guide.
First time playing? This page covers the rules, how to win, how Gomoku differs from Go, what Renju forbidden moves are, and five beginner-friendly opening ideas. Read it and start a game.
What is Gomoku and how do you play?
Gomoku (Japanese: 五目並べ gomokunarabe; Chinese: 五子棋 wǔzǐqí) is a two-player board game played on a 15×15 (standard Renju) or 19×19 (shared with Go) grid. The board starts empty, players take turns placing a stone on an empty intersection, and Black moves first. Stones cannot be moved or captured once placed. The winner is the first player to form an unbroken line of five stones — horizontally, vertically, or diagonally.
A game of Gomoku typically ends in 10–20 minutes. The rules are extremely simple, but the tactical space is much deeper than tic-tac-toe — professional Renju matches regularly require several dozen moves to decide.
How is Gomoku different from Go?
Gomoku and Go both use black and white stones on a grid, but they are two completely different games. In Gomoku you win by getting five in a row, and stones cannot be captured. In Go you win by surrounding territory, and stones can be captured when fully surrounded.
A Gomoku game lasts about 10–20 minutes; a professional Go game can run for hours. Go is considered one of the most complex board games ever invented; Gomoku is loved for being simple to learn, gently progressing, and still tactically deep. Many players learn Gomoku first. WUZIQI is a Gomoku app, not a Go app.
What is Renju? What are "forbidden moves"?
Renju is the formal international competitive version of Gomoku, named in 1899 by Japanese journalist Kuroiwa Ruikō. The key difference from casual Gomoku is that Renju introduces forbidden moves for Black (the first player): double-three, double-four, and overlines (lines of six or more stones). If Black plays a move that creates any of these shapes, Black immediately loses.
Forbidden moves exist to offset Black's first-move advantage, which makes Gomoku a theoretically won game for the first player. Professional Renju tournaments apply these rules along with specific opening rules (Soosõrv-8, Taraguchi-10, etc.) to further balance the opening phase. For casual play, most people simply play without forbidden moves — "first to five in a row wins" is all you need to start.
Beginner strategy — five ideas to start with
First, control the center. Opening near the middle star point (tengen) gives your stones the most directions to extend in. Second, build "open threes" before "fours". An open three (three in a row with both ends unblocked) forces your opponent to respond, keeping you on offense; a four can often be blocked with no further threat.
Third, always watch both sides — never attack without defending. Beginners most often lose by focusing only on their own stones and missing the opponent's double-three. Fourth, learn to recognize winning shapes like double-threes and double-fours: one move creating two independent three-in-a-row threats forces the opponent to block only one side, letting you win on the next move. Fifth, practice, practice, practice — WUZIQI's Novice AI is a great first sparring partner.
How low is the barrier to entry, and what's Gomoku good for?
Gomoku's rules can be explained in one sentence: "the first to get five of your stones in a row wins." Compared to Go (which requires learning "liberties" and captures to play at all), Gomoku has a much gentler onboarding — it's one of the friendliest abstract strategy games for someone picking up a board game for the first time.
Typical use cases include same-room play with a family member or friend (WUZIQI's two-player hot seat mode works on a single iPhone), a 10-minute break during a busy day (more focused than scrolling video), low-signal travel (the core match runs offline on airplanes and subways), and learning strategic thinking step by step (via the AI's graded difficulty tiers).
Has Gomoku been "solved"? Does it matter for regular players?
Mathematically, standard Gomoku with no forbidden moves has been solved as a first-player win — Allis, van den Herik et al. proved this in 1994. This is the core reason Renju introduced forbidden moves: to re-balance the game.
In practice, this has almost no effect on regular players. The optimal play requires memorizing enormous opening trees and rarely appears in real games. For beginners and intermediates, Gomoku still offers plenty of tactical surprise. WUZIQI's AI is tuned to "play a reasonable, well-mannered move within its thinking budget" — not to theoretically always win.