DJMax

The main gameplay is formed around the idea that the player must press various buttons at the correct moment. This is indicated by the music and the notes which scroll down in a tune of the music track visualized on screen. Hitting the correct notes fills in the missing instrument sounds from the melody and gives player points. The objective of the game is to hit all notes with 100% accuracy, gaining full Combo and activating DJ Fever as many times as it is possible to during the song to maximize Combo points which are used to maximize points from the song.

The player receives percentage per note which tells how close they were from hitting the note exactly right moment. It ranges from 1–100% and player receives points from the notes accordingly to their accuracy. The gameplay also opens new game modes, songs, styles, additional content like music videos or backgrounds for player as player progresses and gains experience points and levels.

If the player keeps hitting notes at correct moments, player also receives Combo points which leads to DJ Fever gauge gradually filling up. Combo points are an additional multiplier used to get maximum score from the song. Fever boost is used to maximize Combo points. If the player misses even one note during a Combo, this counter is the reduced to zero and counting begins again from first correct note. It is possible for the player can gain additional Combo points by activating DJ Fever. It speeds up the game and makes it harder to hit the correct notes but it also allows player to reach much higher Combo values.

There are various types of difficulty settings in DJMAX, and specifics differ from game to game. Usually there are at least Arcade, Mission and Freestyle game modes available. During Arcade and Freestyle, the player has the option of choosing which button layout to follow. Button layouts scale from just two buttons up to a maximum of eight buttons. Which button layouts are available for the player depends on game release.

Button layouts offer first selection of difficulty level for the player. 4B being the easy mode and 8B commonly being the hardest mode by virtue of having more physical buttons that need to be hit. Every song in the series has a rating which indicates the difficulty of the song based on number of notes the player must hit correctly in that song. Some songs are only available in more higher difficulty formats which is the second tier of difficulty selection. These are marked usually with HD (Hard), MX (Maximum) or SC (Super Crazy) as opposed to usual NM (Normal).

In Arcade mode, the player has to pass four stages with increasing difficulty rating. Stages consist usually of a randomised selections of songs available in each release. When the player passes the stage, the player receives a grade ranging from F to A+ in most games. When the player has passed all the stages, scores from the stages are combined and presented to the player with statistics about the player's success. After passing the Arcade mode, the player usually sees a small "Thanks for playing DJMAX" video clip. The objective of this mode is to plainly get the highest score. In some games the players can compete against others by submitting their scores to an online ranking system.

Freestyle is a mode where any unlocked song can be played individually. Additionally, the combo counter is persistent throughout all song plays meaning the player can get an near 'infinite" combo. Limit is determined by each game release.

Mission game mode, which is also known as XC (Extreme Challenge) mode in some DJMax games, features pre-selected sets of songs with certain challenges. These are explained in a mission briefing when selecting a mission. These challenges can be for example achieving a certain number of points, a certain score multiplier, a certain accuracy, not breaking the combo more than what is allowed, or achieving a certain combo.

Often challenges can be combined within missions. For example, in DJMax Portable 2 there is a challenge called "Rock n' Night", which states that player has to use DJ Fever at least once, two times in a row, on every pre-selected stage of the mission and that player also has to exceed combo of 2000 notes. If the player is able to pass the mission, then the game rewards player with additional items like new characters and new gear & note styles.

The DJMax Portable 3 introduced a game mode known as REMIX SYSTEM. It features game modes 3.2T, 4.2T and 6.2T which add two additional tracks for players to follow. The player uses the PSP's analog stick to move active track to be either left or right, default position being center. These additional tracks only feature three lines so player only has to press the square, triangle and circle buttons while moving the analog stick correspondingly to hit the notes. The trick is that player has to follow the active track and changes can come fast. Variation of this mode is featured in most songs from DJMax Respect where the remix lanes are implemented within the main lanes.

In this arcade series (which also has one entry for the PlayStation Vita and mobile platforms), players have to tap the screen at the moment when a moving slider crosses the symbols. Tapping the correct symbols produce sounds which fills in the missing sounds from the song and gives players points. There are different kinds of hand gestures or motions player needs to perform at times.[8]