Mini Sudoku is LinkedIn's compact number puzzle: a 6×6 grid where you fill the digits 1–6 so that every row, every column, and every 2×3 box contains each digit exactly once. It keeps all the deduction of classic sudoku and finishes in a fraction of the time — which makes it the perfect daily warm-up, and the ideal on-ramp if full 9×9 sudoku feels like a commitment.
The rules
- Fill every cell with a digit from 1 to 6.
- Each row contains 1–6 exactly once.
- Each column contains 1–6 exactly once.
- Each 2×3 box contains 1–6 exactly once.
Note the box shape: two rows by three columns, not the 3×3 boxes of classic sudoku. Forgetting the box layout is the most common beginner mistake.
Technique 1: Scan digit by digit, not cell by cell
Pick a digit — say 3 — and look across the grid: which boxes already contain a 3? In every box without one, the 3 must sit in the rows and columns that do not yet hold a 3. Usually one box has exactly one legal cell for the digit. Place it, move to the next digit. One full pass through 1–6 solves several cells on almost every puzzle.
Technique 2: Naked singles
When a cell's row, column, and box together already contain five different digits, the cell's value is whatever is left. Late in the puzzle, naked singles chain: each placement creates the next one. If you stall, recount rows and columns that are one cell short of full.
Technique 3: Box-line interaction
If a digit's remaining candidates inside a box all sit in a single row (or column), that digit cannot appear elsewhere in the same row outside the box. On a 6×6 grid this eliminates candidates quickly because rows are short — a row of six cells fills fast, and every elimination is meaningful.
Technique 4: The two-row box trick
Because boxes are two rows tall, digits often lock into pairs: if a box needs digits 4 and 5 and both must sit in its two open cells, those two cells are decided even before you know which is which. That knowledge eliminates 4 and 5 from the rest of those cells' columns — which is often enough to cascade.
Technique 5: Count before you guess
Mini Sudoku always has a unique solution. If you feel forced to guess, something is uncounted: a row missing one digit, a box with a single open cell, or a column where five digits already appear. Recounting is nearly always faster than guessing — and guessing is how unique-solution puzzles punish you three moves later.
A good solving order
- One full digit-scan pass (1 through 6).
- Fill any row, column, or box with a single gap.
- Repeat the digit scan with the new placements.
- Use box-line interaction for whatever remains.
- Finish with naked singles.
Most daily puzzles surrender within those five steps.
Practice
Mini Sudoku publishes one new grid every day. If you want to see a clean solving pattern, our daily Mini Sudoku answer page shows the completed grid with an explanation of how it can be derived, and the archives hold every past puzzle — ideal for drilling the digit-scan until it becomes automatic.
Six rows, six columns, six digits — and five focused minutes.