Saturday brings a fresh set of NYT Pips puzzles. Today's set features consistent zone patterns across all difficulty levels, testing your domino placement skills with exact number requirements and inequality constraints. 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: Attack the exact number zones first - purple (5), pink (1), and teal (10) provide non-negotiable constraints.
Key Insight: The orange zones create a critical constraint - any domino spanning orange (>5) and orange (<5) must have values that satisfy both inequalities simultaneously.
Watch Out For: The navy zones have conflicting requirements - navy (<5) needs values less than 5, while navy (5) needs exactly 5 total pips. Dominoes touching both must be carefully chosen.
Hard Pips Solution
Last chance to solve independently
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- 1.Place the 2/1 domino horizontally in the purple (5) zone and pink (1) zone
- 2.Place the 0/5 domino horizontally in the pink (1) zone and teal (10) zone
- 3.Place the 3/6 domino vertically in the purple (5) zone and orange (>5) zone
- 4.Place the 2/2 domino vertically in the green (=) zone
- 5.Place the 2/3 domino horizontally in the green (=) zone and purple (<5) zone
- 6.Place the 5/2 domino vertically in the teal (5) zone and navy (5) zone
- 7.Place the 3/1 domino horizontally in the navy (5) zone and orange (<5) zone
- 8.Place the 1/1 domino horizontally in the orange (<5) zone
- 9.Place the 6/1 domino vertically in the pink (>5) zone and orange (<5) zone
- 10.Place the 1/4 domino vertically in the uncolored (no condition) zone
- 11.Place the 0/4 domino horizontally in the navy (<5) zone
- 12.Place the 5/4 domino vertically in the teal (10) zone
Puzzle Debrief
Overall Difficulty: Moderate challenge - while the zone patterns are consistent across difficulties, the Hard puzzle requires more strategic planning with inequality constraints.
Trickiest Puzzle: Hard - the orange zone inequality pairing and navy zone constraints create complex domino placement decisions that require careful sequencing.
Our Take: Today's puzzles demonstrate how exact number requirements create anchor points for solving. The consistent zone layout across difficulties is unusual but provides a good study in constraint satisfaction. The key lesson: exact number zones should always be solved first, as they provide the most concrete domino placement constraints.
Tomorrow's Pips drops at midnight. See you then.
