Friday brings a fresh set of NYT Pips puzzles that lean moderate across the board, with the Hard puzzle demanding careful attention to overlapping zone conditions. We've got hints, step-by-step walkthroughs, and full solutions for Easy, Medium, and Hard difficulty levels.
How to Play Pips
Pips is a domino placement puzzle where you fill a grid of color-coded zones. Each zone has a condition you must satisfy using the pip values on your dominoes. The twist: you must use every domino and meet every condition to win.
Zone Conditions:
- = All pips in this zone must equal the same number
- Not Equal All pips must be different numbers
- > Pips must be greater than the listed number
- < Pips must be less than the listed number
- Exact Number Pips must total that exact value
- No Color Free space, any domino value works
Click or tap dominoes to rotate them. Each puzzle has one or more valid solutions.
Today's Easy Pips
Today's Medium Pips
Today's Hard Pips
Quick Hints (No Spoilers)
Starting Point: The teal zone with greater-than-10 is your hardest constraint. Only a few domino combinations sum above 10, so identify them early.
Key Insight: Multiple purple zones with exact-value conditions (7, 8, 10) create a cascade. Solving one purple zone often determines the placements for several adjacent zones.
Watch Out For: The pink (less-than-3) and orange (less-than-3 and less-than-5) zones are easy to overlook. Double-check that every pip in these zones stays strictly below the threshold. A single 3 or 4 pip in the wrong zone breaks the puzzle.
Step-by-Step Walkthrough
- 1.Anchor the puzzle by placing the 6/5 vertically in the teal (>10) zone. With 11 pips, this is one of the few combinations that clears the greater-than-10 bar. This placement also removes two high-value pips from contention, simplifying the rest of the grid.
- 2.Move to the navy (0) zone. Place the 3/0 horizontally across the orange (9) and navy (0) zones. The 0 side satisfies the exact-zero condition. Then place the 0/0 vertically in the navy (0) zone to lock in the zero requirement completely.
- 3.Tackle the purple (8) and orange (9) zones simultaneously. Place the 6/6 vertically so it spans both. The 6/6 contributes 6 pips to the purple (8) zone and 6 to the orange (9) zone, leaving manageable gaps to fill with adjacent placements.
- 4.Place the 2/2 horizontally across the purple (8) and pink (<3) zones. This adds 2 pips to the purple zone (now at 8 total) and keeps the pink zone safely under 3.
- 5.Place the 2/4 horizontally in the green (6) zone. Exactly 6 pips. No room for error here, so this placement is fixed.
- 6.Place the 1/6 horizontally in the purple (7) zone. The sum of 7 matches the exact condition. This is a tight placement that leaves no alternative.
- 7.Handle the restrictive orange (<3) and pink (2) zones. Place the 2/0 vertically across both. The 2 stays under 3 for the orange zone, and the 0 contributes to the pink (2) sum. Then place the 1/1 vertically in the pink (2) zone to reach exactly 2.
- 8.Place the 1/5 horizontally across the navy (1) and green (>4) zones. The 5 clears the greater-than-4 condition, and the 1 satisfies the navy exact-1 condition.
- 9.Place the 4/1 horizontally across the orange (<5) and navy (1) zones. Both values are within their strict thresholds.
- 10.Place the 3/1 horizontally in the pink (3) zone and the uncolored zone. The pink side sums to exactly 3.
- 11.Address the teal (3) and purple (10) zones. Place the 3/4 vertically across both. Then place the 3/6 horizontally across the same two zones. These two placements together satisfy both exact-value conditions.
- 12.Place the 0/5 vertically in the uncolored and purple (10) zones. This adds 5 to the purple total.
- 13.Finish with the 4/5 horizontally across the green (>3) and purple (10) zones. The 5 clears the green condition, and the purple (10) zone reaches its exact total.
Hard Pips Solution
Last chance to solve independently
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- 1.Place the 6/5 domino vertically in the teal (>10) zone
- 2.Place the 6/6 domino vertically in the purple (8) zone and orange (9) zone
- 3.Place the 2/2 domino horizontally in the purple (8) zone and pink (<3) zone
- 4.Place the 3/0 domino horizontally in the orange (9) zone and navy (0) zone
- 5.Place the 0/0 domino vertically in the navy (0) zone
- 6.Place the 2/4 domino horizontally in the green (6) zone
- 7.Place the 1/6 domino horizontally in the purple (7) zone
- 8.Place the 2/0 domino vertically in the orange (<3) zone and pink (2) zone
- 9.Place the 1/1 domino vertically in the pink (2) zone
- 10.Place the 1/5 domino horizontally in the navy (1) zone and green (>4) zone
- 11.Place the 4/1 domino horizontally in the orange (<5) zone and navy (1) zone
- 12.Place the 3/1 domino horizontally in the pink (3) zone and uncolored (no condition) zone
- 13.Place the 3/4 domino vertically in the teal (3) zone and purple (10) zone
- 14.Place the 3/6 domino horizontally in the teal (3) zone and purple (10) zone
- 15.Place the 0/5 domino vertically in the uncolored (no condition) zone and purple (10) zone
- 16.Place the 4/5 domino horizontally in the green (>3) zone and purple (10) zone
Puzzle Debrief
Overall Difficulty: Moderate challenge. The exact-value and inequality conditions create a tight grid that rewards methodical deduction over brute force.
Trickiest Puzzle: Hard - The cluster of purple zones with exact-value requirements (7, 8, and 10) forces precise domino placement across multiple boundaries. One wrong pip cascades errors through the entire grid.
Our Take: This Friday set leans toward constraint-heavy layouts, with the greater-than and less-than conditions doing most of the heavy lifting. The navy zero zones are a nice touch, giving solvers a clean anchor point. If you cleared the Hard puzzle on your first pass, you earned it.
Tomorrow's Pips drops at midnight. See you then.
