A tiny science museum you can poke.

About

The labs are models, not videos of real experiments. A model keeps the big idea and leaves out the messy details, so every result screen says what the model shows and what it simplifies. The numbers on the rulers and displays are “model units” that let you compare one trial with another.

Teaching with Wonderlabs? The educator guide has objectives, vocabulary, discussion prompts, and printable worksheets.

Privacy

The short version: Wonderlabs does not collect personal information.

• No accounts. There is nothing to sign up for, and the site never asks for a name, email address, or any other details.
• No ads, no tracking. The site has no advertising, no analytics scripts, and no tracking cookies.
• The lab notebook stays on your device. Trials and notes are kept in the browser tab’s own storage so they survive a page refresh. They are never sent to us or anyone else, and they are erased when the tab is closed. “Clear notebook” erases them straight away.
• Hosting. Like every website, the company that hosts Wonderlabs handles basic technical information, such as IP addresses, in order to deliver the pages and keep the service secure. We do not use it to identify visitors.
• Links. The educator guide links to outside sites such as nextgenscience.org and usgs.gov. Those sites have their own privacy policies.

Help

How a lab works

1. Change one thing. Pick a setup in step 1.
2. Predict. Choose what you think will happen in step 2. The result stays hidden until you run the trial.
3. Try it. Press the big button and watch the stage. When it stops, the measurement appears and the trial is written in your notebook.
4. Discover. Read why it happened, then start a new trial and change one thing.

Common questions

What is the difference between “Reset lab” and “Clear notebook”?

Reset lab clears the stage so you can run another trial, and keeps your notebook. Clear notebook erases your recorded trials, and asks first.

My notebook is empty again.

Notebooks are erased when the tab is closed, which keeps shared devices tidy. Print your notebook before closing the tab if you want to keep it.

Can I use a keyboard?

Yes. Tab moves between controls, and Enter or Space presses a button. In Slime Studio, focus the slime and use the arrow keys to squish, stretch, and bounce it.

The animations are too much for me.

Turn on “Reduce motion” in your device’s accessibility settings. Wonderlabs then removes nearly all animation and shows each result as a still picture. The Space Lab moon still moves, because its path is the experiment, and you can pause it at any time.

Nothing happens when I press the buttons.

The labs need JavaScript. Check that it is switched on, then reload the page. An up-to-date version of Chrome, Edge, Safari, or Firefox works best.

Should we try the real experiments?

Only with a grown-up. Each lab has its own safety note under the controls.