A turn in Mexican Train is short: you play one domino, or you draw one. This explains where you’re allowed to play, what the different trains mean, and what happens when you’re stuck. The app highlights every legal spot, so you can also just look for the outlines.

Your three choices

1. Play a domino — on your own train, on anyone’s open train, or on the Mexican Train.
2. Draw — if you can’t play, take a domino from the boneyard.
3. Pass — if you still can’t play after drawing, your train opens up to everyone and your turn ends.

If the boneyard is empty and you have no legal move, the app passes for you automatically — you’ll never be left waiting with nothing to do.

Private and open trains

• Your train starts private — only you can play on it.
• If you can’t play after drawing, a marker goes on your train and it becomes open: now anyone can play there.
• Playing on your own open train removes the marker and makes it private again.

The Mexican Train

The Mexican Train is a shared, community train that anyone can play on at any time. Any player can start it with a domino matching the engine number.

It’s worth starting when you’re stuck, when you’d like to open the game up for everyone, or simply because you enjoy a more communal game.

What counts as a legal play

• Dominoes join end to end, and the touching numbers have to match.
• You can only play on a train whose end number matches one of the numbers on your domino.
• The app rotates each domino for you — you never have to think about which way round it goes.