How to print free sudoku puzzles
- Pick a level. The sheet opens on Mixed: the puzzles run from easy to hard, so you can warm up first. Choose Easy, Medium or Hard for a whole sheet at one level. The daily puzzle changes level through the week.
- Choose a layout: one, two, four or six puzzles per page, on A4 or Letter paper. One per page gives you large print with cells two centimetres wide.
- Press Print to send the sheet straight to your printer, or Download PDF to keep a copy. The answer key is always the last page, so you can leave it in the tray or hand it out later.
There is no account to create and no email address to hand over. Under each puzzle you will find only its number and ID, plus its level on a Mixed sheet; the site name and the date sit in the header and footer of the sheet, in small type.
What you are printing
These are standard 9x9 sudoku. Fill every row, every column and every 3x3 box with the digits 1 to 9, using each digit once. Some squares are given at the start. The rest are yours.
Every puzzle on this site has exactly one solution. Before a puzzle reaches the page, two separate solvers check it: one counts solutions and must find precisely one, the other solves it the way a person would and records which techniques it needed. If the two disagree, the puzzle is thrown away.
How we grade difficulty
Most printable sudoku sites grade by the number of given digits. That is a poor guide. A grid with thirty clues can be a walk in the park while another with thirty-two is a fight. We grade by the hardest technique the puzzle requires:
- Easy puzzles can be finished using only naked singles. At every step there is at least one square with a single possible digit.
- Medium puzzles need a hidden single, a pair or a box-line elimination somewhere along the way.
- Hard puzzles need at least one advanced pattern such as an X-Wing, a Swordfish, a triple or an XY-Wing. They never need guessing.
Each level also has its own page: easy sudoku, medium sudoku and hard sudoku. They print a different set every day, and the New puzzles button gives you another set whenever you like.
Solving your first sudoku
Start with an easy puzzle: the first grid on a Mixed sheet with two or more puzzles per page, or any grid on a sheet set to Easy. Then take it one square at a time.
- Choose an empty square in a crowded part of the grid, where its row, column and box already hold several digits.
- Rule out every digit that already appears in that row, that column or that 3x3 box.
- If only one digit is left, write it in. If two or more are left, move on and come back to the square later.
That is all an easy puzzle asks of you. Every easy grid here can be finished with that one move: at every stage at least one square has a single possible digit, so if you get stuck, scan the grid again.
Medium puzzles add a second way of looking. Pick a digit, say 7, and a box that does not have one yet. Check each empty square in that box. If only one of them can take a 7, the 7 goes there, even when that square could hold other digits too.
Use a pencil. Many solvers write the possible digits small in the corner of each square and rub them out as the grid fills up. You never need to guess, at any level: every puzzle on this site can be solved by logic alone. When you finish, check your grid against the answer key on the last page.
Printable sudoku layouts: 1, 2, 4 or 6 per page
One per page is the large print option. The cells are two centimetres across and the digits are bold, which suits seniors, anyone with low vision, and solvers who like to write small candidate numbers. Two per page leaves room for pencil marks on harder puzzles. Four per page is the everyday choice and the default here. Six per page squeezes a week’s worth of puzzles onto one sheet for travel or the classroom.
Every layout fits both A4 and Letter without cropping, so the paper setting only tells your browser which page size to use.
Printable sudoku for seniors, students and classrooms
Large print only stays large if the browser prints at full size. In the print dialog, leave the scale at 100% or Default; shrinking the page to fit makes every square smaller. The large print sudoku page prints one puzzle per page at any level, and its answer key is large too, two grids to a page.
For a class, the sudoku worksheets page adds Name and Date lines and prints up to 40 worksheets in one go, each with different puzzles. The answer key comes last, so you can print the puzzle pages for the class and keep the key for yourself. Younger children can start with 4x4 sudoku, which uses only the digits 1 to 4, and move up to 6x6 sudoku before the full 9x9 grid.
Ordinary copy paper is fine. A soft pencil and a good eraser matter more than the paper.
The daily puzzle
If you prefer one puzzle a day, the daily sudoku page publishes a new one every morning at the same address. It is easy at the start of the week and hard by the weekend.