NYT Pips Answers Today (November 4, 2026)

How to read the solved boards

Cells are named by row and column from the top-left, so R1C1 is the top-left cell and R3C4 is the third row, fourth column. A domino written 3–6 has its 3 on the first cell listed and its 6 on the second, the same orientation the Times' data uses. Region badges are drawn at each region's lower-right corner, and regions without a badge have no condition.

The list under each board follows the Times' own solution order. That is not the order a person would solve in. It is just the order the data stores the dominoes. For a reasoned order, see the walkthrough on the Pips guide.

Checking just one region

If you are stuck on one region and do not want the whole board spoiled, go straight to "Every region, checked" for your difficulty. Each line names the cells, repeats the condition and shows the numbers that satisfy it, for example R3C3, R3C4 (must total 10): 4 + 6 = 10. You can read one line and leave the rest.

For a gentler nudge, the hints page offers one starting domino per board before showing anything else.

What a badge tells you before you place anything

Some badges fix the numbers outright, and it is worth knowing them by sight. A domino half holds 0 to 6, so the extremes are forced. Every line in this table is plain arithmetic on those limits, true on any board.

Why your solution may differ from ours

Some boards have more than one valid arrangement. In our solver's run over 27 September to 29 October 2026, a second valid arrangement existed on 9 of 33 easy, 26 of 33 medium and 23 of 32 hard boards. Most often the only difference was a domino reversed inside a region where both orders satisfy the condition.

So if your board differs from ours in one or two cells, check the regions involved before assuming you went wrong. If every condition holds for your numbers, your arrangement satisfies the rules as the game states them. We cannot say whether the game accepts it, because the Times' help text does not address alternative solutions.

Three ways a finished board can still be wrong

Most "wrong" boards fail in one of three ways. The first is orientation: the right domino in the right cells but turned round, which only matters when its two cells belong to different regions. The second is counting rows or columns from the wrong corner. Our labels always start from the top-left, R1C1, and count down and then across. The third is assuming an empty region needs a particular number. Empty regions accept anything, so if your board differs from ours only in empty cells, look first at the neighbouring regions those dominoes also touch.

If the game says a domino is in the wrong spot and you cannot find it, check every non-empty region's total against the list above. The region whose line does not match is where the error is.

Why the boards are drawn, not photographed

Each board on this page is a diagram HintSheet draws from the Times' puzzle data: the cells, the region outlines, the badges and the dots on every domino. Nothing is copied from the game's artwork. Drawing from data has two practical benefits. The diagram cannot drift from the published solution, because it is the published solution, rendered. And it stays sharp on any screen size, because it is vector art and not an image file.

Every diagram also carries a text title, and the domino list and region check under it say in words what the picture shows, so the answer can be read without seeing the board at all. If the two ever seemed to disagree, the text list is the one to trust. It is printed straight from the data, with no layout in between.

What changes between easy, medium and hard

Size changes most. In the latest 33 days, easy boards held 4 or 5 dominoes, medium 7 or 8, and hard 10 to 16. The kind of condition shifts too. Hard boards lean heavily on one-cell sums, each of which fixes a single half outright, while easy and medium boards use more equal and empty regions, which leave more room to choose.

Solving tomorrow's faster

Three habits make the biggest difference. First, fill every one-cell region whose number is fixed, such as a sum, a "less than 1" (always a blank) or a "more than 5" (always a 6). Each of these places half a domino for certain. Second, count the tray. No board so far has repeated a domino, so a value that appears on only one tile has only one possible home. Third, look at where a domino can physically lie. A cell with only one free neighbour decides which way its domino points.

Leave empty regions until last. They accept anything, so they end up holding whatever is left over.

• One-cell exact regions first.
• Count each value in the tray.
• Cells with one free neighbour fix a domino's direction.
• Equal regions: one value fills every cell, so look for doubles.
• Empty regions last.

If the boards above are yesterday's

A notice appears above the answers if today's boards are not up yet. HintSheet publishes each date's Pips at midnight Eastern, and the page updates within minutes of that. Until then it shows the most recent date it has, clearly labelled with that date. Every earlier date stays in the Pips archive.

More from the Times on HintSheet

If you play Pips as part of a daily set, the same pages exist for the others: Connections, Wordle, Strands, Spelling Bee and the Mini Crossword. The NYT games hub collects them all.

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Every past puzzle is in the Pips archive. New here? Start with the Pips guide.