Learn Pathfinding Algorithms Interactively
A visual, hands-on textbook for understanding how computers navigate through space. Draw maps, run algorithms, and watch every decision happen in real time.
What you'll find here
Everything you need to truly understand pathfinding — not just memorise it.
Interactive Grids
Click and drag to draw walls, place terrain, and reposition start and goal nodes. Your map, your rules.
Step-by-Step Traces
Scrub a slider through every decision the algorithm makes — see exactly which nodes are explored and why.
Algorithm Comparison
Understand how A*, Dijkstra, and BFS differ in their search strategies on the same map.
Algorithms
Start with A*, then explore the broader family of graph search algorithms.
Depth-First Search
Dives deep before backtracking. Not optimal, but illustrates how graph traversal fundamentally works.
Breadth-First Search
The simplest pathfinder. Explores layer by layer and finds the shortest path on unweighted graphs.
Dijkstra's
A* without a heuristic. Explores in all directions equally, guaranteed to find the optimal path on weighted graphs.
A* Algorithm
The gold standard for single-source pathfinding. Combines actual cost and a heuristic to find the shortest path efficiently.
Anytime Weighted A* (AWA*)
Finds a valid path immediately using an inflated heuristic, then improves it phase-by-phase until the optimal solution is proven.
How it works
Choose an algorithm
Pick from our growing library of pathfinding algorithms, each with its own tutorial page.
Draw your map
Place walls, terrain, start, and goal on the interactive grid. Change it at any time.
Step through the trace
Hit Run, then drag the slider or press Play to watch every decision unfold step by step.