NYT Pips Hints, Answers and Walkthrough for Saturday, June 20, 2026

Saturday brings a fresh set of NYT Pips puzzles. Today's grid is a dense color-coded challenge with multiple conditional zones that demand careful domino sequencing across all three difficulty levels. 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 purple (=) zones are your foundation. Everything else builds off those equal-value constraints, so get them right first.

Key Insight: The navy zones (totals 1, 10, and 11) and green zones (7, >4, >9) create a pip-value bottleneck. Track your running totals to avoid overfilling a zone before its partner is placed.

Watch Out For: The orange zones have conflicting conditions. One requires values less than 3, another greater than 3, and a third greater than 10. Misplacing a domino across the wrong orange boundary will break the board.

Step-by-Step Walkthrough

1.Start with the purple (=) zone at the top. Place 3/2 horizontally so the 3 lands in purple. This sets the equal-value baseline that all purple cells must match.
2.Drop 3/1 vertically below, extending purple downward with another 3 and feeding a 1 into the teal (1) zone. Two purple cells locked at value 3.
3.Bridge the teal (1) zone and navy (11) zone with 0/6 horizontally. The teal zone already has its 1 from the previous step. Navy accumulates 6 toward its 11 target.
4.Place 5/4 vertically across navy (11) and pink (5). Navy hits 11 (6 + 5). Pink gets 4, leaving it 1 short of 5.
5.Add 1/4 vertically across pink (5) and navy (10). Pink reaches 5 (4 + 1). Navy (10) gets 4 toward its 10 target.
6.Place 2/6 horizontally across orange (<3) and navy (10). Navy (10) hits 10 (4 + 6). Orange gets a 2, satisfying the less-than-3 condition.
7.Fill the green (7) zone entirely with 5/2 horizontally. Exact match at 5 + 2 = 7.
8.Place 4/0 vertically across orange (>3) and purple (1). Orange gets 4, satisfying greater-than-3. Purple (1) gets 0, needing 1 more.
9.Complete purple (1) with 1/2 vertically across it and teal (<3). Purple hits 1 (0 + 1). Teal gets a 2, under its 3 ceiling.
10.Place 3/0 horizontally across pink (>2) and teal (<2). Pink gets 3 (over 2). Teal gets 0 (under 2). Both conditions satisfied.
11.Fill green (>9) with 4/6 horizontally. Total is 10, comfortably over 9.
12.Place 6/6 vertically across green (>4) and orange (>10). Green gets 6 (over 4). Orange gets 6 toward its >10 requirement.
13.Bridge orange (>10) and navy (1) with 6/1 horizontally. Orange totals 12 (6 + 6), exceeding 10. Navy (1) gets exactly 1.
14.Place 3/3 vertically in the remaining purple (=) zone. Two 3s, consistent with the equal-value rule across all purple cells.
15.Finish with 3/6 vertically across purple (=) and uncolored (no condition). Purple gets a 3, maintaining equality across all purple zones.

Hard Pips Solution

Last chance to solve independently

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1.Place the 3/2 domino horizontally in the purple (=) zone and pink (<3) zone
2.Place the 3/1 domino vertically in the purple (=) zone and teal (1) zone
3.Place the 0/6 domino horizontally in the teal (1) zone and navy (11) zone
4.Place the 5/4 domino vertically in the navy (11) zone and pink (5) zone
5.Place the 1/4 domino vertically in the pink (5) zone and navy (10) zone
6.Place the 2/6 domino horizontally in the orange (<3) zone and navy (10) zone
7.Place the 5/2 domino horizontally in the green (7) zone
8.Place the 4/0 domino vertically in the orange (>3) zone and purple (1) zone
9.Place the 1/2 domino vertically in the purple (1) zone and teal (<3) zone
10.Place the 3/0 domino horizontally in the pink (>2) zone and teal (<2) zone
11.Place the 4/6 domino horizontally in the green (>9) zone
12.Place the 6/6 domino vertically in the green (>4) zone and orange (>10) zone
13.Place the 6/1 domino horizontally in the orange (>10) zone and navy (1) zone
14.Place the 3/3 domino vertically in the purple (=) zone
15.Place the 3/6 domino vertically in the purple (=) zone and uncolored (no condition) zone

Puzzle Debrief

Overall Difficulty: Moderate challenge. The zone layout is identical across all three difficulty levels, which is unusual. The difference comes down to grid size and domino count, but the same logical path works for all three.

Trickiest Puzzle: Hard - The orange zone conditions create a tight squeeze. With three orange zones demanding values less than 3, greater than 3, and greater than 10, one misoriented domino can cascade into a full board reset.

Our Take: Today's puzzles reward players who read ahead. The navy and green zones have exacting pip totals that force a specific ordering of high-value dominoes. If you locked in the purple (=) zones first and tracked your running totals, the rest of the board fell into place. A solid Saturday session that tests fundamentals without being punishing.

Tomorrow's Pips drops at midnight. See you then.