dankpuzzles

split the grid into boxes, one number in each

Quoin, the rectangles puzzle

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– Drag boxes so each holds one number: its count of squares.

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Keyboard: arrows move the cursor, Space starts and ends a box, Delete lifts the box under the cursor, Escape cancels.

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Stars on the day: ★★★ 0 · ★★ 0

The streak counts box puzzles solved on their own day, one after another. A past puzzle keeps its stars but never changes the streak.

Past puzzles

Every earlier box puzzle, newest first; tap one to play it here with its own saved board. Past puzzles keep their stars but never change the streak.

    Quoin (say “coin”) is the dankpuzzles rectangles puzzle, named after the wedge a printer drives in to lock the type tight in its frame. A new grid every midnight UTC, the same for everyone: 7 by 7 on Monday and Tuesday, 8 by 8 on Wednesday and Thursday, 9 by 9 on Friday and Saturday, and on Sunday the week’s hardest 9 by 9, with the fewest numbers.

    Stars: ★★★ for a solve without Hint or Check, ★★ with either. Hint outlines one box the board already forces; Check says how many of your boxes are wrong, not which. Undo and Restart are free. A box that does not add up (no number, two numbers, or the wrong size) is drawn hatched as you go. Your progress stays in this browser only.

    Want something else? Today’s Typeslide is a sliding grid of letter tiles, the word ladder changes one letter at a time and the nonogram draws a picture from numbers. Or stay with boxes: More boxes makes practice boards in the size and level you pick.

    We count visits and plays anonymously. No cookies, no personal data.

    What we count

    Each visit adds one to a count for the page’s address, nothing more. The box puzzle adds six tallies, and today’s puzzles two more, each a fixed name with no puzzle number, no cookie and nothing about you or your grid. One tally goes up by one when:

    • box-start you set your first box on today’s puzzle (once a day per browser)
    • box-solve you finish today’s box puzzle (once a day per browser)
    • box-share you tap Share result after solving today’s puzzle
    • box-arrive you open the page from a shared result’s link (once per link per browser)
    • box-archive-solve you solve a past puzzle for the first time (once per puzzle per browser)
    • box-quick-solve you solve a practice board from More boxes (once per practice board)
    • set-done you have finished the last of today’s six puzzles (Typeslide, word ladder, nonogram, this box puzzle and, from 24 October 2026, the Ligature bridges puzzle and the Lampblack lamps puzzle) and this is the first page to notice it (once a day per browser)
    • reminder-add you tap Remind me every day under “All six done” and the calendar file is made (the time you picked is not sent)

    How to play the rectangles puzzle

    A rectangles puzzle is a square grid with some numbers in it. You split the whole grid into rectangles, which this page calls boxes. Quoin is this site’s daily one, the same for everyone and new at midnight UTC.

    The rules

    1. One number in every box. Each box holds exactly one number: no box without a number, no box with two.
    2. The number is the box’s size. A 2 is a domino, a 4 is a 2 × 2 square or a 1 × 4 strip, a 6 is 2 × 3, 3 × 2, 1 × 6 or 6 × 1. A 5 or a 7 can only be a straight strip.
    3. Every square belongs to one box. Boxes never overlap and none is left over. When the grid is covered and every box adds up, the forme locks up.
    4. Setting a box. Drag from one corner of the box to the opposite corner; it snaps to the squares and shows its size as you drag. Tap a box to lift it again. A new box laid over old ones replaces them. On a computer: arrow keys move the cursor, Space starts a box and Space again sets it.
    5. You never have to guess. Every grid was checked by this site’s solver to have exactly one answer that reasoning alone reaches. Hint outlines a box the board forces; Check counts your wrong boxes without naming them. Either one caps the day at two stars.

    Ways in

    • Hemmed-in numbers. Count the shapes a number could take. A 3 in a corner with another number two squares to its right can only run down.
    • Lonely squares. A blank square that only one number can reach belongs to that number, even before you know the box’s exact shape.
    • Shared squares. If every shape left for a 9 covers the same middle squares, those squares are its.
    • Sunday’s fights. Two numbers compete for a gap: try one box for the first, and if the second is left with no room at all, that box was wrong.

    Worked example: a 7 by 7

    3 6 6 4 2 3 4 4 4 6 2 2 3
    1. The 3 in the top-left corner cannot run right (the 6 is two squares away) and a 3 × 1 strip down the left edge is its only shape: rows 1 to 3.
    2. The 6 in column 5: every 2 × 3, 3 × 2 or 1 × 6 around it takes in another number, so it is the strip down column 5, rows 1 to 6. The same kind of count settles the 4 in row 4 (a strip down column 4), the 6 in row 5 (3 × 2 at the right edge) and the 4 in row 2 (2 × 2 in the top-right corner).
    3. The bottom-right 3 must run left along row 7, and that leaves the 2 in row 6 only the domino beside it, columns 6 and 7.
    4. Now the top row’s second and fourth squares can be reached by one number only, the 6 in column 3: its box is 2 × 3, rows 1 and 2, columns 2 to 4.
    5. The rest falls into place one number at a time: the 2 in row 3 pairs with the square to its left, the 4s in row 5 run down columns 2 and 3, the 3 in row 4 runs down the left edge, and the 2 in the bottom row lies flat. Fifteen steps, no guess.

    This example was made for this guide and is never a daily puzzle. The dailies use the same moves; the 9 × 9 boards of Friday to Sunday also need the shared-squares and Sunday’s-fights ideas above.

    Where the puzzles come from

    Every grid is made and checked by this site’s own code, a year ahead. A generator cuts a random square grid into boxes of 2 to 9 squares and puts each box’s number in one of its squares. Then the site’s solver tries to finish it the way a person would, using only four kinds of reasoning (a number with one shape left; a square only one number reaches; squares every shape of a number covers; and one-step “if this, then nothing fits” for Sundays). A grid is kept only if the solver finishes it and a separate exhaustive count finds exactly one answer.

    The year from 23 October 2026 holds 365 grids: 105 easy 7 × 7, 104 middle 8 × 8, 104 hard 9 × 9 and 52 Sunday 9 × 9, none the same as another even turned or mirrored. Easy grids average 12.8 numbers and usually take a minute or two; Sunday grids average 16 numbers on 81 squares and every one needs the Sunday strike-out. Honest limits: the solver knows four rules and no deeper look-ahead, so the difficulty labels are its view, not a tester’s, and in this year no Wednesday or Thursday grid needs more than the lonely-squares rule, so midweek is a step up in size rather than in trickiness.

    Made with AI tools.