Focus game
Schulte mix — numbers and letters, one alternating trail
Tap 1, then A, then 2, then B — and keep the pattern going as fast as you can. This is the Schulte table with a rule-switching twist layered on top of the visual search.
Free to play, no sign-up. Want to track your progress across six skills? The Axolumi app is coming to Google Play.
How to play Schulte Mix
- A grid appears with numbers and letters shuffled together — a 4×4 holds 1–8 and A–H, a 5×5 holds 1–13 and A–L.
- Tap them in alternating order: 1, A, 2, B, 3, C, and so on. The prompt always shows your next target.
- Keep your eyes near the center of the grid and search with your peripheral vision while you hold both sequences in mind.
- A wrong tap costs 2 seconds — the classic slip is tapping two numbers or two letters in a row.
- Finish a table and a freshly shuffled one appears. Clear as many as you can in 60 seconds.
What Schulte Mix trains
- Focus · 40%
- Logic · 35%
- Speed · 25%
Schulte mix takes everything the classic table trains — visual search, sustained attention, a wide field of view — and adds task switching on top. Every tap means flipping between two mental tracks: the number line and the alphabet. Psychologists call the split second that flip costs you the switch cost, and alternating-sequence exercises like this one (a close cousin of the Trail Making Test used in cognitive assessment) are a direct way to practise shrinking it.
That switching load is why this variant leans toward logic as much as focus. You are not just finding targets — you are holding two ordered sequences in working memory, tracking your place in each, and applying an alternation rule under time pressure. It is a compact workout in cognitive flexibility, the skill of moving between rules without losing the thread.
Tips to improve
- Say the sequence quietly in your head as you go — one-A-two-B. The rhythm keeps you from tapping two numbers in a row.
- Keep your gaze near the center and search with your peripheral vision, just like the classic table.
- If you lose your place, pause for a beat and rebuild from your last tap. A calm reset costs less than a 2-second penalty.
- Comfortable with the number and letter tables on their own? This is the natural next step — the grids are the same, only the switching is new.
Frequently asked questions
It is a Schulte table containing both numbers and letters, tapped in alternating order: 1, A, 2, B, and so on. A 4×4 grid holds 8 numbers and 8 letters; a 5×5 holds 13 numbers and 12 letters. The alternation adds a rule-switching load on top of the classic visual search.
Task switching is moving between two different rules or mental tracks — here, the number sequence and the alphabet. Each switch carries a small time cost, and everyday life is full of them, from juggling apps to changing tasks mid-thought. Alternation exercises let you practise making those switches quickly and cleanly.
The grid and the searching are the same; the difference is the alternation rule. In the single-type tables you follow one sequence. Here you hold two at once and flip between them on every tap, which adds working memory and cognitive flexibility to the mix.
It is closely related. Part B of the Trail Making Test, a widely used cognitive assessment, asks you to connect numbers and letters in the same alternating pattern. Schulte mix turns that format into a repeatable, game-shaped exercise — though playing it is training practice, not a clinical test.
That is the switch cost at work — your brain stays on the track it was just using, so after 3 it wants 4, not C. It is the single most common mistake in alternating tasks. Saying the sequence in your head as a rhythm helps, and the slips genuinely get rarer with practice.
