Escape room difficulty varies from room to room and location to location – with some escape companies preferring to specialize in extremely difficult rooms, while others contain a mix of difficulties. Although there is no exact figure for escape success rate, some people in the industry have the number as low as 40%!

If you were to browse a random assortment of escape room websites from around the world, one of the first things you’ll notice is that they all have one thing in common: a difficulty rating for each room. What do these ratings mean in the context of escape rooms? Let’s find out!

Max Difficulty Rating: What Does This Mean?

If you’re interested in an escape room with a max difficulty rating and are curious about what makes that specific room so difficult, you’re not alone! As there’s no standardized difficulty rating system, prospective escapees are often left wondering what the room will entail.

Here are the common features of a ‘difficult’ escape room:

- Intricate logic-based puzzles
- Ambiguous clues with little explanation
- Multiple separate puzzles that are difficult to complete in only 60-minutes
- Live actors that hinder your progress
- An extreme horror theme that forces terrified players to quit!

Max Difficulty Rating: What’s Their Purpose?

To put it simply: people like a challenge! The general consensus is that people enjoy the experience more when they successfully escape, and in an ideal world, every group would escape with only seconds to spare as though they were participants in an action movie plot!

However, as the concept continues to grow in popularity, more and more people are quickly becoming escape room experts! The average escape room simply isn’t challenging enough for them, so extremely difficult rooms are constantly being developed to satisfy their needs!

But remember – you can try ANY room you want! There are no rules! If you’re a newbie who happens to be feeling brave and adventurous, go for the most difficult room available. It’s completely up to you!

How Can I Tell Beforehand?

Like we’ve already mentioned, there’s no standardized difficulty rating system – each company will have their own. They’re usually simple to understand and only require some common sense to grasp. There are star systems, number/10 systems, success rate % systems, descriptive systems and more! Just be sure to look out for them before making your decision!