The Best Logic Puzzles for Beginners, and Which to Try First
Six logic puzzles ranked by how quickly a beginner can solve one, with honest pros and cons, plus nonograms, logic grids, KenKen, Kakuro and a first week.
The best logic puzzles for beginners have few rules, a small grid and exactly one solution, so every step can be worked out without guessing. A good first choice is an arrow puzzle or a small 6x6 sudoku, then a path puzzle or Star Battle. Battleship solitaire and Hashi (Bridges) reward a little more patience. Outside those six, nonograms, logic grid puzzles, KenKen and Kakuro are all friendly places to start.
This guide is for complete beginners: adults who would like a calm puzzle habit but are not sure where to begin. It ranks six puzzle types by how quickly you can finish your first one, gives honest pros and cons for each, and suggests a first week.
What makes a logic puzzle good for a beginner
A logic puzzle is beginner-friendly when you can learn the rules in a minute and find a first move without help. Four things decide that.
- Few rules. Every rule is one more thing to keep in mind while you look at the grid. One or two rules is ideal; five takes some getting used to.
- A small grid. A 6x6 grid has 36 squares to think about. A 9x9 grid has 81. Small grids let you see the whole puzzle at once.
- Exactly one solution. In a well-made puzzle there is always a next step you can prove. You never need to guess, and a wrong guess never ruins twenty minutes of work.
- Quick feedback. Some puzzles show you straight away when a move breaks a rule. That helps you learn the rules by playing.
Every puzzle in this post meets the third condition when it is well made. The other three vary, and that is what the ranking below is based on.
The six puzzles, from gentlest to steepest
Here are the six puzzles in Puzzle Picnic, ranked by how much you have to learn before your first solve. The ranking is a judgement, not a measurement: some people find a path puzzle easier than sudoku, and that is fine.
| Rank | Puzzle | What you do | Rules to learn | Easy size in the app |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Lines (arrow puzzle) | Tap lines out of a shape | 1 | Shape 11 squares across |
| 2 | Sudoku (6x6) | Fill digits 1 to 6 | 3 | 6x6 |
| 3 | Trail (path puzzle) | Draw one line through every square | 4 | 5x5 |
| 4 | Stars (Star Battle) | Place stars | 4 | 6x6 |
| 5 | Ships (Battleship solitaire) | Find a hidden fleet | 4 | 6x6, 6 ships |
| 6 | Bridges (Hashi) | Join islands with bridges | 5 | 7x7 |
1. Lines: one rule and nothing to write down
In an arrow puzzle, every line has an arrow. Tap a line and it slides out of the shape, head first, the way its arrow points, but only when nothing stands in front of the arrow all the way to the edge. That is the only rule, and the goal is to clear the shape. See how to play Lines for a first puzzle.
- Pros: One rule. No numbers. Lines only ever leave, so you can never make the board worse, and you never need notes.
- Cons: It is more about careful looking than deduction, so some players find it less of a "thinking" puzzle. Big boards on the higher levels become a long scanning job.
2. Sudoku: famous, and gentle on a 6x6 grid
Sudoku asks you to fill the grid so every row, column and box holds each digit exactly once. Starting on a 6x6 grid (digits 1 to 6, boxes of 2 by 3) makes it far less daunting than the 9x9 newspaper version. In the app, Easy and Medium sudoku are 6x6 and need only the simplest technique, singles. 6x6 sudoku explains the small grid.
- Pros: You probably know the rules already. The first moves ("this row is missing only a 3") are easy to spot. There is a huge amount of help available once you want to go further.
- Cons: The jump to 9x9 is real. Harder grids need notes (pencil marks) and named techniques, which take time to learn.
3. Trail: draw one line and follow the numbers
In a path puzzle like Trail, you draw one line from 1 through every square, ending on the highest number. The line passes the numbers in order, moves up, down, left or right, and never crosses itself. On harder levels, thick walls block some moves. How to play Trail walks through it.
- Pros: It feels natural: you are drawing a route. The Easy grid is only 5x5, so it is quick.
- Cons: It is easy to paint yourself into a corner and leave a square you can no longer reach. You then step back along the line, which can feel like a setback until you learn to spot dead ends early.
4. Stars: no numbers, one firm rule about touching
Star Battle asks you to place one star in every row, every column and every coloured region, and stars never touch, not even at a corner. How to play Star Battle has a first puzzle.
- Pros: No numbers. The rules fit in one sentence. Marking squares that cannot hold a star makes progress visible.
- Cons: The "not even at a corner" part trips up most beginners at least once. The first move can be harder to see than in sudoku, and the hardest grids need you to reason about groups of regions at once.
5. Ships: a hidden fleet and counts at the edges
In Battleship solitaire you find a hidden fleet. Numbers beside the rows and columns say how many ship squares are in that line, and ships never touch, not even diagonally. A legend shows every ship to find, and a few squares may be revealed to start. How to play Battleship solitaire explains the first deductions.
- Pros: Satisfying "aha" moments, such as a row with 0 that turns all to water. Fans of the two-player Battleship game feel at home.
- Cons: You track three things at once: the row and column counts, the no-touching rule and which ships are still missing. That is a lot for a first puzzle.
6. Bridges: five rules, then very elegant
In Hashi, or Bridges, you join the islands with straight bridges. The number on an island says how many bridges touch it. Bridges run horizontally or vertically, never cross, at most two join the same pair of islands, and every island must end up connected in one group. How to play Hashi starts with a small puzzle.
- Pros: Once the rules click, the deductions are some of the most satisfying of the six.
- Cons: Five rules to hold at once, and the last one (everything must connect) is the easiest to forget. It rewards a second or third puzzle more than a first.
Four well-known puzzles to try elsewhere
Four other classic puzzles are good first steps, each with a different flavour. None of them is among the six above, but all are easy to find in books, newspapers and apps.
Nonograms: logic that draws a picture
Nonograms are grids where you fill in squares according to numbers at the edge of each row and column, and the finished grid reveals a picture. A clue such as "4 8 3" means runs of four, eight and three filled squares, in that order, with at least one blank square between them. They are also known as Hanjie, Griddlers, Paint by Numbers and Picross. According to Wikipedia, Non Ishida, a Japanese graphics editor, won a competition in Tokyo in 1987 with grid pictures made from skyscraper lights, and puzzle maker Tetsuya Nishio invented the same kind of puzzle independently; The Sunday Telegraph began publishing Ishida's nonograms weekly in 1990 (Wikipedia: Nonogram).
A first nonogram trick is the overlap. If a row is 5 squares wide and its clue is 4, the run of four starts in the first or the second square. Either way, the middle three squares are filled.
Logic grid puzzles: deduction with words
Logic grid puzzles give you a short story and a list of clues ("the person who drinks tea lives next to the red house"), and you mark a grid of yes and no until every person is matched with every detail. The best-known example, the Zebra Puzzle, appeared in Life International on 17 December 1962. It is often called Einstein's Puzzle, but Wikipedia notes there is no evidence that Einstein wrote it (Wikipedia: Zebra Puzzle). They suit people who prefer words to numbers.
KenKen: sudoku with sums
KenKen fills a grid like a small sudoku (1 to 4 on a 4x4, 1 to 5 on a 5x5, and so on), with no digit repeated in a row or column. The grid is divided into outlined "cages", each with a target number and an operation: add, subtract, multiply or divide. Tetsuya Miyamoto, a Japanese maths teacher, created it to help his students build calculation skills, logical thinking and patience. It first appeared in The Times in London in March 2008 and in The New York Times in February 2009 (Wikipedia: Tetsuya Miyamoto; Wikipedia: KenKen).
A first KenKen step: on a 4x4 grid, a two-square cage marked "7+" can only hold 3 and 4, because those are the only two different digits from 1 to 4 that add up to 7.
Kakuro: a crossword made of sums
Kakuro looks like a crossword, but every entry is a run of squares that must add up to its clue, using the digits 1 to 9 with no digit repeated within an entry (Wikipedia: Kakuro). Its original English name, Cross Sums, came from Jacob E. Funk of Dell Magazines; the Japanese name Kakuro is short for "kasan kurosu", addition cross. A first Kakuro step: a two-square entry that sums to 17 must be 8 and 9, and one that sums to 3 must be 1 and 2.
Choosing by what you already enjoy
If you already know what you like, use it to pick your first puzzle. The table below matches common tastes with the puzzles in this post.
| If you enjoy | Try first | Then |
|---|---|---|
| Tidying, sorting, clearing a desk | Lines | Ships |
| Numbers and patterns | 6x6 sudoku | KenKen, Kakuro |
| Drawing and mazes | Trail | Bridges |
| Pictures and colouring | Nonograms | Stars |
| Shapes and spaces | Stars | Lines |
| Words and stories | Logic grid puzzles | Ships |
| The Battleship board game | Ships | Stars |
Your first week with logic puzzles
The surest way to find your puzzle is to try one easy puzzle of each kind on different days and notice which one you look forward to. A plan for the six puzzles above, about ten minutes a day:
- Day 1: Lines on Easy. Learn the single rule and clear a shape.
- Day 2: Sudoku on Easy. A 6x6 grid; look for rows, columns and boxes missing only one digit.
- Day 3: Trail on Easy. A 5x5 grid; watch the corners: a corner square has only two neighbours, so unless the line starts or ends there, it must use both.
- Day 4: Stars on Easy. Start with the smallest region, and mark the squares around each star as empty.
- Day 5: Ships on Easy. Turn every row and column with a 0 into water first.
- Day 6: Bridges on Easy. Start with islands that have only one neighbour.
- Day 7: Your favourite again. Play it on Easy once more, then try Medium.
After that, keep the habit small. One puzzle a day at a level that stretches you a little is plenty. How to build a daily puzzle habit has more on making that stick, and what changes at each puzzle level explains when to move up.
Frequently asked questions
What is the easiest logic puzzle for a beginner?
An arrow puzzle has the fewest rules: tap a line and it leaves if its path is clear. Among number puzzles, a 6x6 sudoku is the gentlest, because it uses only six digits and the first moves are easy to see.
Do I need to be good at maths to solve logic puzzles?
No. Sudoku, Star Battle, nonograms, path puzzles and arrow puzzles involve no sums at all; at most you count squares. KenKen and Kakuro use small sums, but the real work is the same as in sudoku: asking where something can and cannot go.
Should I guess when I am stuck?
In a well-made logic puzzle you never need to. There is exactly one solution, and there is always a next step you can prove. If you are stuck, look again at the most constrained part of the grid, such as the smallest region or the square with the fewest options, or take a hint that explains the next step.
Is sudoku a good first puzzle?
Yes, especially on a 6x6 grid. The standard 9x9 grid is a bigger first step, because harder 9x9 puzzles need notes and named techniques. Many people start with 6x6, then move to 9x9 once singles feel easy.
Where to go next
Pick the puzzle from the table that matches what you enjoy, and solve one easy puzzle today. You can play all six in the browser at Puzzle Picnic with no account. If you enjoy the first one, try the next one in the ranking tomorrow, and keep the one you look forward to most.