How to play
- Press StartThe clock starts the moment the grid appears.
- Find 1, then 2, then 3The number you are looking for is shown above the grid, so you never lose your place.
- Mind the wrong tapsEach one adds a second to your time. Found numbers stay on the board.
- Tap 25 to finishThe clock stops on that tap and your time appears.
What a Schulte table is
A Schulte table is a square grid with numbers in random order. You find them from smallest to largest as quickly as you can. It is named after the German psychiatrist Walter Schulte and became a standard attention test in Russian clinical psychology, where it is still done on paper: the person points at each number and says it out loud while someone times them. Speed-reading courses picked it up later as an exercise for taking in more of a page at once.
This version keeps the classic rule that found numbers stay where they are. Many phone apps grey them out, and that makes the second half much easier because there is less left to search. Here the 24 is just as hidden among the other numbers as the 2 was.
This is a timed search game. It is not an ADHD self-assessment.
What counts as a good time
The badge on your result follows this table. Times are stored in milliseconds, so both units are shown. The middle of it comes from published data on the same 5×5 task. In a 2021 tablet study by Khramova and colleagues, adults aged 18 to 20 took 37.7 seconds on average. A Russian Ministry of Health guideline treats 40 to 50 seconds per table as the normal range for adults.
| Time | Badge | Where the line comes from |
|---|---|---|
| under 12 s (12000 ms) | Superhuman | About half a second per number, search included. Two standard deviations faster than the tablet study's average. |
| 12-18 s (to 18000 ms) | Pro tier | One and a half standard deviations faster than the tablet study's average. |
| 18-25 s (to 25000 ms) | Skilled | One standard deviation faster than the tablet average. Close to how fast young adults finish the similar Trail Making Test A. |
| 25-40 s (to 40000 ms) | Standard | Where most adults land, around the 37.7 s tablet average. |
| 40-50 s (to 50000 ms) | Warming up | Still inside the clinical normal range of 40 to 50 seconds. |
| 50 s or more | Needs practice | Above that range. Tiredness shows up here first. |
The Trail Making Test A is a pen-and-paper cousin: you draw a line through 25 circles from 1 to 25. Tombaugh's 2004 norms put adults aged 18 to 34 at about 23 to 24 seconds. That task scatters the circles over a whole sheet, while this one packs the numbers tightly, but the search is the same.
What it measures
Most of your time goes into visual search: sweeping your eyes over the grid until the right number turns up. Getting faster mostly means taking in more of the grid with each glance, so you need fewer glances per number.
The test also checks how well you ignore what no longer matters. By the time you reach 20, nineteen numbers you have already used are still on the board. Each one is a small distraction that you have to keep pushing aside, which is why this version leaves found numbers in place.
Finally it measures staying on task for half a minute or more without a break. A single wandering thought ("where was 14 again?") costs two or three seconds, and on a test this short that can move you down a badge.
Getting faster
Look at the middle
Keep your eyes near the center of the grid and let the edges come to you. Speed-reading courses use the table exactly this way, to train taking in a wider area without moving your eyes.
Notice what is coming
While you hunt for 8, you will pass the 9 and the 10. Note roughly where they sat. The next search then starts in the right corner.
Do not rescan from the top
Reading the grid like a page, top-left to bottom-right, every time is the slowest way. Search outward from where your eyes already are.
Accuracy before speed
A wrong tap costs a full second, which is more than most searches take. Tap when you see the number, not when you think you see it.
Your time on a phone and your time with a mouse will differ, because a thumb covers part of the grid and a mouse has to travel. Compare runs on the same device. Your first few rounds usually improve quickly, mostly because you pick up the search habits above.
Frequently asked questions
Why did my time jump while I was playing?
You tapped a wrong number. Each wrong tap adds one second at once, and a red "+1 s" appears on that square. The result shows how many misses you had.
Why did the round stop when I switched tabs?
Browsers slow timers down in hidden tabs, so the time would no longer be accurate. The round is cancelled and you can press Start to play a fresh one.