With Poker Now A Mind Sport, Will Jigsaw Puzzles Follow?
Mind sports are competitive games focusing on intellectual skill rather than physical aptitude. Plenty of fascinating activities fall under the official roster, but jigsaw puzzles have yet to be part of the fray.
Apr 30, 2025153 Shares4.2K Views
Mind sports are competitive games focusing on intellectual skill rather than physical aptitude. Plenty of fascinating activities fall under the official roster, but jigsaw puzzles have yet to be part of the fray. Despite that, many puzzling championships are happening throughout the globe. In April, over 200 UK jigsaw puzzleenthusiasts participated in the country’s first federation-approved championship to complete 500-piece puzzles as fast as possible.
Contender Abigail Hills noted that speed puzzling was “the perfect sport” for solo and pair activities. The International Mind Sport Association (IMSA) is in charge of officially recognizing mind sport activities, with poker beating out puzzlers in 2024. This announcement followed a two-year effort from the World Poker Federation (WPF), marking another significant addition to the disciplines alongside heralded classics like chess and bridge. Does this mean the time is now for jigsaw puzzles to join the fold?
What makes a mind sport?
People may be surprised to find poker an official mind sport due to their preconceived notions, but it’s the best example of why jigsaw puzzles should have the chance to be considered seriously. IMSA President Nandan Jha has noted that more than games, these sports are meant to foster “intellectual growth, strategic thinking, and empathy.”
These factors are also quantified by certain criteria—established rules, intellectual skill, regular competitions on national and international scales, long-standing history, ethical standards, and the ability to participate in the sport regardless of language. With this set of guidelines, eSports have also been recognized due to their use of quick strategy and cognition during matches. Poker was officially added in November 2024 after being a provisional member since 2022, thanks to the WPF’s work establishing its international scope and mentally aligned characteristics.
The long road to recognition was also helped by figures who made the sport and its professional potential gain more widespread traction in the past two decades. The poker boom was a critical turning point when Chris Moneymaker joined the 2003 World Series of Pokeras one of an unprecedented number of participants from online platforms. This scale was broadcast live on ESPN, creating a meteoric rise to fame for Moneymaker, who won the Main Event, and showed a whole new audience how much tournaments of this nature were like sports championships. From there, poker saw massive growth and now sees over 50 million players in America alone.
It’s clear that the criteria for mind sports are the legitimacy of their competitive settings, the growth of their community, and, of course, the importance of cognitive skill and mental focus to excel in the activity. The potential of jigsaw puzzling as a mind sport shines most in global contests. This is evidenced by the surge of different puzzle-solving competitions around the globe, arguably the biggest being the international World Puzzle Championship. Over 30 countries participate yearly in solving different logic, numbers, and visual puzzles. Just behind that, the World Jigsaw Puzzle Championship brings in teams and solo competitors from various continents to complete puzzles in the shortest time.
Will jigsaw puzzles ever join the ranks?
In terms of technical eligibility, by simply looking at the core rules of the activity, jigsaw puzzles have a lot of potential to become a mind sport by official standards. Solving the puzzle alone already requires a variety of problem-solving, memory, and spatial reasoning skills, but adding a timer adds skill and mental fortitude. Its battle lies in proving its eligibility as a legitimate international sport with a rich competitive community and guidelines. Though seemingly from different worlds, this is again made clearer by looking at poker's journey to becoming an official mind sport.
While poker has existed since the 1800s (jigsaw puzzles preceded it in the 1700s), the sport truly changed in the noughties. This came from the advent of American online poker, which expanded the potential and accessibility of tournaments. As mentioned, Chris Moneymaker is largely considered its biggest propagator and continues to do so as an ambassador of the Americas Cardroom website. This platform hosts the biggest poker tournaments online from the US, and Moneymaker himself tours with tons of events across skill levels to promote the game.
That is crucial when considering why it finally got officially recognized last year. As more tournaments happen on national, international, and virtual stages, the community has only continued to grow. Various skill levels and variations have shown that the current state of the sport is truly, as WPF President Igor Trafane put it, a culmination of “the dedication of thousands who view poker as a genuine intellectual discipline.”
So, how does this missing piece fit into place for jigsaw puzzles? The key may be a united effort to establish an international body to regulate and promote the sport. This body will also have to make a formal effort to join IMSA and get recognition. The ball is already rolling worldwide, as evidenced by the first New Zealand online puzzleNationals held in 2024. The community of sports enthusiasts grows due to the digital medium, and established rules are being formed and followed internationally. This includes rules against peeking at other people’s work and following a 500-piece standard for speed puzzling.
As techniques become more complex and the gap between different cultures is bridged through this shared intellectual activity, there is a real possibility that jigsaw puzzles will follow in poker’s footsteps and win the mind sport pot.
Interested in more news, tips, and interesting facts about puzzles? Read more articles on Lucid Puzzle.
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