How to Solve Sudoku Fast

Sudoku is a fun puzzle game.

Sudoku is a puzzle game that can be simple or challenging, depending on the Sudoku level of difficulty. Solving the puzzle is a great way to give your brain a workout. The problem that can arise with Sudoku puzzles is that they can take too long to complete the puzzle. Though speed is not always the best way to solve a puzzle, solving the Sudoku puzzles can be very quick once you know a few tricks.

Instructions

1. Eliminate boxes. Sudoku requires the elimination of as many boxes as possible to solve the puzzle. This is called crosshatching. Look at the top three boxes and determine if any of the boxes can be eliminated by looking across. For example, if there is a"2" in the middle of one box and a "2" in the top of another box, then the squares in the third box have been eliminated down to three squares rather than nine.

2. Find the easy answers first. The easy answers are those which can be easily seen in simple crosshatching. These eliminate boxes and make the remaining boxes fewer, which ultimately makes finding the next answers much easier.

3. Apply slicing and dicing to the puzzle. This is a faster way to complete the puzzle when combined with crosshatching. Instead of filling up only one box of nine squares at a time, look at the lines of three boxes as well. The lines should have numbers 1 through 9 as well.

4. Pencil in the possible numbers in the boxes. When the puzzle cannot be solved easily through crosshatching in the single box or slicing and dicing for three boxes, pencil in all of the potential numbers that can go into the boxes and then work on solving the puzzle by substitution.

Tips & Warnings

• Easy and most moderate puzzles will not need substitution or penciling in. Harder puzzles will need penciling in a few numbers to solve, especially at the beginning when there are few boxes and squares eliminated.

References

• Paul’s Pages: Random Sudoku
• Sudoku Navigation