The picture does not sit still
A video jigsaw puzzle, cut from your own footage.
Pick a video off your device, or an animated gif, and the board cuts it into pieces that are still playing. Each fragment in front of you is in motion, the mat underneath with it, and the picture you are trying to rebuild will not hold still long enough to be memorised. Most video jigsaw puzzles are phone apps. This one is a web page, it costs nothing, and the file never leaves your device.
free · no sign-up · in your browser · nothing uploaded
What is a video jigsaw puzzle?
It is an ordinary jigsaw with one thing changed. The cut, the pieces and the way they snap together are the same as always. The picture printed on them is a video playing rather than a photograph sitting still, so the puzzle moves in your hands while you work.
Everything else about the table is where you left it. You drag a piece the same way, neighbours click together when they line up, and the board keeps your place if you close the tab. The face is simply a layer with motion in it now.
The part the app listings leave out
It is harder. How much harder is up to your footage.
The other pages selling this sell it as relaxing. We would rather say the true thing first, because you are about to choose a file and the choice decides whether the next hour is pleasant.
We already run a mode where the picture changes once per successful join, and that is mildly more demanding than an ordinary board, a new kind of challenge rather than a harder one. A video changes the picture twenty-four times a second, and that can be infuriatingly more demanding, depending entirely on the image. Solving a jigsaw by picture means holding a fragment in your head while you hunt for where it belongs, and a hard cut throws away every fragment you were holding, all at once.
So the footage is the difficulty setting. Slow, high-contrast material with large shapes stays solvable, and the board is alive while you work: clouds drifting, a fire, water, a long slow pan. A trailer full of cuts may look striking and still be unplayable, because it is not a puzzle, it is a slideshow that punishes you. Nothing on the board enforces this. You pick the file, and the file decides. The same choice sets what the board has to draw, which is why the piece slider stops where it does.
Why the slider stops earlier
200 pieces with a video, 600 with a gif.
A video face is more expensive to draw than a still one. Every piece has to play the picture, rather than all of them sharing a single image between them, so the piece range for a video stops at 200 where the ordinary board runs to 600.
An animated gif does not pay that cost. The animation travels the same path a photograph does, which means it keeps the whole 25 to 600 range and asks almost nothing extra of your device. For puzzles at a high piece count a gif is the better tool, and playback stays smooth on a phone where a long video would not.
Where your file goes
Nowhere.
Your video is read by your own browser and played from your own device. It is not uploaded, not copied to a server, and not held by us in any form. No data about your file reaches us at all, which is why there is no account to make first, and why our privacy policy is short.
What we want to build next
Two cameras, one puzzle.
The table already seats exactly two people with voice and chat between them, the same as our other two-player games. The thing we want next is for the picture itself to be the two of you: both cameras streaming to each other, and the pair of you rebuilding a live face piece by piece from opposite ends of a long distance.
It is not here yet, but will be at some point in the future.
Questions people actually ask
About video and gif puzzles
What is a video jigsaw puzzle?
A jigsaw whose picture is playing while you solve it. Ordinary jigsaw puzzles print a photograph on the pieces and it stays put. The cut and the snapping here are the ordinary ones. What is printed on them is a video or an animated gif instead of a still, so every piece on the table plays in your hands and on the mat.
Can I use my own video?
That is the only way it works here. There is no library of clips to pick from. You choose a file from your own device, an mp4 or a webm or an animated gif, and the board cuts it up. Most phone videos work as they are. Anything up to 512 MB and ten minutes will load, though a short clip that loops is the better puzzle.
Is my video uploaded anywhere?
No. The file never leaves the device you picked it on. Your browser reads it locally and the board plays it from there, which is also why the whole thing works with no account and no sign-up. In a two-player game the picture is not sent to the other person either, only the positions of the pieces.
Is a moving picture harder to solve than a still one?
Yes, and how much harder is up to the footage. A picture that changes once in a while asks a little more of you. A picture changing twenty-four times a second can be infuriating, because the fragment you memorised is gone before you have found where it goes. Slow footage with strong shapes stays solvable. Fast cuts do not.
What kind of video works best?
Something slow and high in contrast, with large shapes that hold still long enough to focus on and recognise. Drifting clouds, a fire, waves, a slow pan across a valley. Avoid hard cuts between scenes, because each cut throws away the visual clues you were holding at once. Sound is ignored, so a silent clip is fine. You are here to solve the picture, not to watch it.
How many pieces can a video puzzle have?
Up to 200. A video face costs the board real work for every piece it draws, so the range stops earlier than usual. A still picture or an animated gif runs the full 25 to 600, because those share one image between the pieces and the count costs almost nothing. That upper end is where most adults settle in for an evening.
Does an animated gif work as well?
Yes, and it is the lighter option. A gif goes through the same path a still picture does, so it is not capped at 200 pieces and it costs the board almost nothing extra. For a high piece count, use a gif rather than a video and enjoy the extra room.
Can two people solve a video puzzle together?
The table seats two and shares one set of pieces, and each player brings their own picture, so you can already sit on opposite sides of one that plays. Streaming your cameras to each other and building the live picture together is what we want to add next, and it is not here yet.
Is it free?
Yes, and there is no paid tier waiting later in the life of the table. It is a web page. Nothing to install, no account to make, no piece count held behind progress, and no advertising on it. Open it on a phone, a tablet or a laptop and pick a file.
Should I just get a video puzzle app instead?
Maybe. Most of what you will find for this is a phone app, and if you want something that lives on your home screen and works with no signal, go and get one. This is the other thing: a page you open, that cuts up a file you already have, and that never asks for the file. Come here for that part.
Pick something slow.
That is the only advice that matters. Find a clip where the shapes hold still for a second or two, deal a hundred pieces, and see whether you can rebuild a picture that refuses to wait for you.