---
title: "Container sorting puzzles"
package: "@phaser-ae/container-sort"
tier: Pro
version: 3.0.0-3
released: 2026-10-14
updated: 2026-10-20
description: "The rules of tube-sorting colour puzzles, pouring the top colour between tubes until each holds one, with seeded deals proven solvable, hint solvers and undo."
url: https://phaser.io/packs/container-sort
site: Phaser - https://phaser.io
---

# Container sorting puzzles

The rules of the tube-sorting puzzles: pour the top colour from tube to tube until every tube holds one colour.
Pouring liquids and moving balls are two settings of the same rules, and every generated deal is proven solvable.

## What it does

Each tube is a stack of colours, bottom first, with a capacity. A move takes the top colour of one tube and puts it
in another that is empty, or that has the same colour on top and room for it. In the run mode, in the style of Water
Sort, the whole matching top run pours, as much as fits. In the single mode, in the style of Ball Sort, one piece
moves at a time. The puzzle is solved when every tube in use is full of a single colour.

You send `apply({ from, to })` and get back one event saying which colour moved and how many, for your presenter to
animate the pour. An invalid move returns a reason, such as a different colour, a full tube or an empty source, and
changes nothing, so the game can wobble the tube and say why. `legalActions` lists every move, and `undo`, `redo` and
`reset` are built in.

The generator shuffles each colour into full mixed tubes plus empty spares and keeps a deal only when a solver solves
it, so a player is never handed an impossible level. It measures how mixed the deal is and keeps trying until it
reaches the tier's target. For hints there are three solvers: an exact search for the shortest plan on small
puzzles, a guided search that is far faster on full-size deals, and the deal's own solution, used instantly while the
player is still on its route.

## Features

- **Two pouring rules** — `'run'` pours the whole matching run; `'single'` moves one piece.
- **Mixed tube sizes** — one capacity for every tube, or one per tube.
- **Move limits** — an optional `maxMoves`, after which an unsolved puzzle is lost.
- **Part-filled levels** — `requireFull: false` allows uneven colour counts, with each colour gathered as tightly as
  the tubes allow.
- **Proven seeded deals** — `generateContainerSort` deals from a seed and proves each deal solvable before returning
  it.
- **Four difficulty tiers** — from 3 colours in tubes of four up to 9 colours in tubes of five, each with two spare
  tubes.
- **Hint solvers** — `solve` for the shortest plan, `solveGuided` for speed, `solveBest` to follow the deal's own
  solution.
- **Clear refusals** — every invalid move has a named reason and leaves the puzzle as it was.
- **Undo, redo and reset**, and a preview of any move without playing it.

## Good for

- **Liquid-sort puzzles**, in the style of Water Sort, with pours that fill as much as fits.
- **Ball-sort puzzles**, in the style of Ball Sort, moving one ball at a time.
- **Stacking variants** such as nut-sort and hoop-stack games, on the same pour-onto-its-match rule.
- **Level-based mobile puzzles** that need an endless supply of solvable levels at rising difficulty.
- **Hand-made levels** with uneven tubes, part-filled colours and a move limit.

## Make it yours

A level is a configuration: the tubes and their colours, one capacity or one per tube, whether a sorted tube must be
full, a move limit and the pouring rule. Authored levels can use any of these, so a tight hand-made puzzle with a
small tube and a move limit is just data.

The generator takes a difficulty tier and lets you override any of its settings: the colour keys, the tube capacity,
the number of spare tubes, the pouring rule the deal is proven under, the seed, the mixing target, the number of
attempts and the solver's budget. It can also build a deal by playing moves backwards from a sorted position, which
can leave tubes part full.

Two very different games: a liquid-sort ladder of generated deals, from easy three-colour levels to very hard ones
with nine colours in tubes of five; and a hand-made ball-sort level with four tubes, one of them shorter, one ball a
move and a limit of twelve moves.

## A quick look

A hard seeded deal, a move played, and a hint:

```ts
const deal = generateContainerSort({ seed: 23, difficulty: 'hard', transfer: 'run' });
const tubes = createContainerSort(deal.config, deal.solution);
const r = tubes.apply({ from: 0, to: 4 });
if (r.valid) pour(r.events[0]!);         // { type: 'transferred', from, to, color, count }
else wobble(r.reason);                    // 'different-color', 'full-destination', ...
const hint = tubes.solveBest(20000).actions[0];
```

## Works with

- `shelf-sort` — for moving single goods between shelf slots into any free space.
- `boarding-queue` — for colour matching that boards passengers onto vehicles.
- `tween` — to animate the pours and moves the events describe.

## Good to know

- Hidden colours, locked or frozen tubes, ice and extra-tube boosters are not built in; model them in the game or
  author the starting position.
- The exact solver grows very quickly on full-size deals; use `solveBest` or `solveGuided` for hints, with a small
  budget inside a frame. A search that runs out of budget never means the puzzle is impossible.
- How mixed a deal is measures its fragmentation, not how hard a person finds it.
- Levels hold 2 to 24 tubes, each of capacity 1 to 32.

---

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