Easy Samurai Sudoku

Five overlapping 9×9 grids share corner boxes. Solve all five simultaneously — each shared box belongs to two grids at once.

Easy Medium Hard Expert

New to Samurai Sudoku? Five overlapping 9×9 grids — solve the sub-grid with the most clues first, then use shared boxes to unlock the rest.

Score
-
Mistakes
0/3
Time
00:00
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Try Medium Samurai Sudoku →
Easy · Samurai Sudoku · 5 sub-grids 0%
How to play Samurai Sudoku
Five overlapping 9x9 Sudoku grids. Each sub-grid must independently satisfy standard Sudoku rules (1-9 in each row, column, and box). Where two sub-grids share a 3x3 corner box, that box must satisfy both grids simultaneously. Solve sub-grids with the most clues first, then use shared boxes to unlock others.
How to Play Samurai Sudoku →

What is Samurai Sudoku?

Difficulty
★★★★★
5/5
Constraint Type
5 Overlapping Grids
Typical Givens
~30 per sub-grid
Avg. Solve (Easy)
45 min

Solving Techniques for Easy Level

Technique Description Level
Sub-Grid Independence Each of the five 9×9 sub-grids satisfies standard Sudoku rules independently. Solve each one using all standard techniques. Beginner

Ready to go deeper? Try Medium Samurai Sudoku to unlock Intermediate techniques.

Techniques to Master at Easy

  • Last Free Cell technique — With 45 rows, 45 columns, and 45 boxes across five grids, some unit is always one cell from done — rotate your last-cell scan through all five grids instead of fixating on one.
  • Last Remaining Cell technique — The four shared corner boxes obey two grids at once, so digits there have their legal cells halved — check shared boxes first whenever a grid stalls.

Average Solve Time by Difficulty

Easy
45 min
Medium
90 min
Hard
150 min
Expert
240 min
Want a full walkthrough of rules, strategies, and solving steps? How to Play Samurai Sudoku →

Related Variants

Jigsaw Sudoku

A different geometry challenge in one grid — region shapes that snake instead of grids that overlap.

Chaos Construction

For solvers who enjoyed scale, chaos offers depth: deduce the hidden region borders while solving.

Hyper Sudoku

Overlapping regions condensed into a single 9×9 — four windows that share cells with the standard boxes.

Frequently Asked Questions — Easy Samurai Sudoku

What is Samurai Sudoku?
Samurai Sudoku is a Sudoku variant consisting of five overlapping 9x9 Sudoku grids arranged on a 21x21 board. Four grids occupy the corners and one grid sits in the center. Each of the five sub-grids must independently satisfy standard Sudoku rules — digits 1 through 9 exactly once per row, column, and 3x3 box.
How do the overlapping boxes in Samurai Sudoku work?
Where two corner grids meet the center grid, they share a 3x3 box. That shared box must satisfy the uniqueness rules of both grids simultaneously. Crucially, a digit placed in the shared box counts in both the corner grid's rows/columns and the center grid's rows/columns.
Where should I start solving easy Samurai Sudoku?
Start with whichever sub-grid has the most given digits — it will have the fewest open cells and resolve fastest. Once a sub-grid is mostly solved, its completed digits propagate through the shared boxes into adjacent sub-grids, giving you free placements there.
Are there 81 cells to fill in Samurai Sudoku?
No — the full Samurai board has 369 cells (the 21x21 grid minus the four dead-zone corners where no sub-grid exists). Of those, the shared overlap boxes are counted in two sub-grids simultaneously, so the total unique cells you solve is around 369.
How is Samurai Sudoku different from regular Sudoku?
Regular Sudoku is a single 9x9 grid. Samurai Sudoku is five linked grids. The sheer scale means puzzles take significantly longer to solve, but the five grids are not independent — the shared overlap boxes create cross-grid constraints that make each sub-grid easier once its neighbors are partially solved.

More questions? See the full Samurai Sudoku guide.