Pips January 15, 2026

Hints and answers for January 15, 2026

Stuck? Take it in stages. A nudge costs less than the full answer, and the answer is here if you want it — each diagram below is the verified solution our generator built this board from, using tiles drawn from the standard double-six domino set. On the looser boards other valid arrangements can exist too; any filling that covers every square and satisfies every region counts as solved.

Where people get stuck

The all-different region is the one to watch. With 6 squares in the widest region on this board, an all-different rule quietly forbids far more arrangements than it looks like it does.

The all-different region is the one to watch. With 3 squares in the widest region on this board, an all-different rule quietly forbids far more arrangements than it looks like it does.

If you have genuinely stalled, undo back to the last tile you were confident about rather than reshuffling everything. Most dead ends on a board this size trace to one early placement made on a guess, and everything after it inherits the mistake.

Where this puzzle comes from

This board was not hand-designed and it was not copied from anywhere. The generator laid down a valid arrangement of 10 dominoes first, then divided the 20 squares into 6 regions and derived each region's rule from the values that had already landed in it. Because the solution existed before the constraints did, this board provably has one.

It was then loosened: rules were swapped for weaker ones, one at a time, keeping each swap only while the number of valid arrangements stayed inside the bound for this difficulty. That is why 4 of the hard board's 6 regions carry something other than an exact total.

Generation is seeded from the date, so January 15, 2026 produces this exact board on every device, permanently. Sharing this link always shows the same puzzle. More on the process in our editorial policy.

How much the regions overlap

6 pairs of regions share a boundary, so a fair number of tiles will straddle. Whenever you satisfy a region, check the one next to it immediately rather than at the end.

A domino can straddle two regions, and each half only has to satisfy the region it lands in. That is the single most common misreading of the format — people assume a tile must sit inside one region, which makes perfectly solvable boards look impossible. The rules page works through it with examples.

Board by board

Reading the tray first

The tray holds 2 doubles (3-3, 4-4), and the board has 1 region governed by an equality rule. A double can never sit entirely inside an all-different region, so those tiles have to straddle a boundary — which usually pins them down before anything else on the board.

The heaviest tile on the hard board is the 4-4 and the lightest is the 0-2. Those two are worth locating first: the heavy tile can only go where a sum has room, and the light one is often the only thing that fits a tight region.

The arithmetic check

Your tray carries 55 pips in total, and the exact-sum regions between them demand 31 across 9 squares. That leaves 24 pips to absorb elsewhere. Running that subtraction before you place anything tells you whether the unconstrained squares are going to be a dumping ground or a tight squeeze.

The same check on the medium board: your tray carries 33 pips in total, and the exact-sum regions between them demand 10 across 7 squares. That leaves 23 pips to absorb elsewhere. Running that subtraction before you place anything tells you whether the unconstrained squares are going to be a dumping ground or a tight squeeze.

How the three boards differ

These are three separate boards, not one board with hints removed, so playing all three on January 15, 2026 gives you three genuine attempts rather than three views of the same solution.

easy

8 squares, 4 dominoes, 4 regions, 3 region boundaries. 50% of its regions carry something other than an exact total, and the widest region spans 3 squares.

medium

14 squares, 7 dominoes, 6 regions, 5 region boundaries. 50% of its regions carry something other than an exact total, and the widest region spans 3 squares.

hard

20 squares, 10 dominoes, 6 regions, 6 region boundaries. 67% of its regions carry something other than an exact total, and the widest region spans 6 squares.

The shape of the grid

This is a distinctly irregular outline, filling only 67% of its 5×6 bounding box. Narrow arms are the danger: a square at the end of a one-wide corridor has exactly one possible partner, so if that partner gets covered the board becomes unsolvable regardless of what else you do.

What each rule demands here

The hard board uses 4 of the six possible region rules. What each one is actually demanding here:

> 3

Requires every value above 3, leaving only 3 of the seven pip values legal in those 2 squares.

= 10

Spreads exactly 10 pips over 3 squares, an average of 3.3 each. Anything that pushes the running total past 10 is already lost, so this is the region to count before you commit.

≠

Forbids any repeat across its 3 squares. Note that this constrains values, not tiles — two different dominoes both contributing a 4 still breaks it.

< 4

Caps every individual value below 4, which rules out roughly 43% of the pip values outright. It says nothing about the total.

The full badge vocabulary, including the ones this board happens not to use, is on the pips rules page.