Sudoku solution – New York Times 31 May 2026 Hard level sudoku

Added: 2026-06-01

[00:00:03][music] [music] >> Hello fellow Sudokens. Welcome to Zen in the arts of the Guardian Sudoku puzzle.

[00:00:14]It's Sunday the 31st of May, 2026. I hope you are keeping well, enjoying your weekend, having a lovely time, and doing whatever you like doing.

[00:00:25]Uh I'm just back from a I'm I'm late today uh cuz I'm just back from a hospital visit uh where they stuffed a video camera up my nose and down my throat >> [panting] >> and made me watch the action replay as well.

[00:00:39]>> [laughter] >> Uh I can be quite squeamish about myself, but actually I managed to watch it okay without feeling too bad.

[00:00:47]Uh they didn't find anything, uh which is good and bad.

[00:00:52]Um Um good cuz it's apparently it's probably nothing dangerous going on.

[00:00:58]Bad because they don't know what the problem is. So, I should continue to suffer uh at least for a while anyway until uh they can get more things together.

[00:01:08]Uh Donald Trump is apparently uh given his okay despite the bruising on his hand and his cankles and stuff like that.

[00:01:17]So, that's good news because hopefully he'll be he'll live long enough to see the inside of a prison cell. Let's get on with our New York's Times Sudoku puzzle cuz I am late and I do want to get this game out of the way.

[00:01:33]>> [clears throat] >> Three blocking down here, down here, down here.

[00:01:37]And when we take it in that direction up there, so three in one of those squares blocking down there.

[00:01:42]So, that's a three.

[00:02:00]>> Four across there, four up there, four in one of those two squares blocking across.

[00:02:05]Four up there and there's a four.

[00:02:20]>> [snorts] [sighs] [snorts] >> Six in one of these two squares blocking back that way, six down.

[00:03:14]>> [snorts] >> Uh I think we're looking for 1 2 4 7 over here, right? In this row, 1 2 4 7.

[00:03:52]Seven blocking there, seven blocking there, seven blocking there. There's a seven.

[00:03:58]Okay, and four blocking here and here.

[00:04:02]There's a four.

[00:04:04]And two blocking here, so that'll be the two, and then this will be a one.

[00:04:17]Two blocking here, two blocking those two squares there, and two blocking that one.

[00:04:27]Two blocking those squares, two blocking down here. There's a two.

[00:04:31]Gradually filling up this bottom row here.

[00:04:34]Uh 1 5 9 And seven up here, there's a seven, and seven across there, there's a seven.

[00:05:15]This is five and eight. So, in these squares we have 3 4 9 So, three's down here.

[00:05:45]Uh looking at the nines, we got nine blocking up here, nine across there, so nine in one of these two squares blocking this square down here, and nine blocking down there.

[00:06:00]And in fact, we can do a bit more than that, can't we, cuz we got the nines like this. So, when I said nines in those squares, actually, nine is one of these two squares, so that can't be a nine. That's got to be the nine.

[00:06:25]>> [sighs] >> Uh, one is in Oh, no.

[00:07:34]No, don't need that. That's Forget that.

[00:07:39]>> [clears throat] >> I think I'm going to walk wander around the the uh numbering scheme.

[00:08:25]Uh so we got two I think we're missing 2758 here. 2758 and we've got two and seven blocking this square.

[00:08:35]Two and seven blocking this square.

[00:08:38]So this square and this square must be two and seven.

[00:08:43]Right. So seven obviously blocks that square, so that's going to be the two.

[00:08:49]>> [clears throat] >> Excuse me, that's a seven.

[00:08:58]And that's the last seven as well.

[00:09:01]Um and uh what is left in this row? Five and eight again. Yes.

[00:09:11]And that's a five eight, isn't it?

[00:09:13]Cuz we have one blocking across. This is one five eight.

[00:09:17]Yeah.

[00:09:20]And we've got one blocking across there.

[00:09:23]So that's a pair of five and eight, so these squares Oh, it's starting to rain. I got back just in time.

[00:09:31]Uh I'm not five or eight. They must be one six um nine. Oh, we got nines. Oh, I can see the nines like this anyway.

[00:09:50]And uh six blocking six blocking six blocking both of those squares there. Six blocking that square there is our six. There we go.

[00:10:00]And uh what did I say What's the other thing I said? One, wasn't it? Now, we got one blocking this square here. We got one blocking that square there.

[00:10:06]There's our one.

[00:10:09]>> [clears throat] >> And then we have five eight in those squares.

[00:10:12]Uh we got the eight blocking up there, so that's the eight.

[00:10:15]That's the five.

[00:10:17]That's the five. And that's the eight.

[00:10:21]Eight blocking here.

[00:10:23]And another five to go there.

[00:10:30]>> [sighs] >> Six blocking up here, up there, across there.

[00:11:13]And one five in those squares. Also one five there.

[00:11:34]Mhm.

[00:11:46]>> Uh five blocking this square, five in one of those squares blocking across, so that'll be our five. So, now we know that's the one and that's the five down there.

[00:11:55]>> [clears throat] >> Last digit here is eight.

[00:12:02]And last digit here is one.

[00:12:11]So nice to hear the sound of rain in the background. It means we should be able to cool down a little bit with a bit of luck.

[00:12:23]Uh last number for this column, five I think.

[00:12:30]I've got to put the one in there.

[00:12:52]Sixes that.

[00:12:58]Four blocking like this.

[00:13:03]Uh okay, we got a few completed digits already. So, let's click on the numbers that we still need. We still need three.

[00:13:14]We don't need any more threes though.

[00:13:16]This is an eight.

[00:13:19]We don't need any more eights.

[00:13:22]What do we need? We need a four.

[00:13:29]Okay, we need a five.

[00:13:32]>> [clears throat] >> And we need a nine.

[00:13:39]A very easy game there from the New York Times. Nothing's nothing to make us struggle at Oh, really there? Thanks for joining me. I'll see you another time.

[00:13:47]Take care. Bye-bye.