Sudoku Made and maintained by Brian Hamilton and Karan Hamilton.
Brian builds the playable puzzle tools, while Karan helps test clarity, difficulty feel, and the player experience.
Playable puzzles and controls are tested in the browser for rule accuracy, usability, and a clear solving experience. See how we make and test puzzles, our editorial standards, or report a problem.
Fall Sudoku: The Start of Puzzle Weather
Fall Sudoku is classic Sudoku in its natural season, played with nine autumn tiles — maple leaf, fallen leaf, acorn, pumpkin, apple, mushroom, corn, scarf, and hot drink. Show the tiles as pictures, as digits, or layered: each tile lands exactly once in every row, column, and box.
Puzzle weather
Somewhere in late September the evenings draw in, being outside stops being the default, and the indoor season begins — which is to say, fall is when puzzles come back. This board marks the turn: a 6x6 with a blanket while it rains is the whole autumn experience in miniature, and the 9x9 is built for the first genuinely dark evening of the year.
Two leaves, told apart
The set leads with its own identity test: the maple leaf and the fallen leaf are both on the beginner 4x4 board, because two kinds of leaf is simply what fall looks like. The maple is the red, pointed one; the fallen leaf is brown and curled at the edges. Most players separate them within a puzzle or two, and until then, number labels are one tap away in the display options.
The most borrowed season
No other tile set gets raided like this one. The pumpkin works our Halloween board in October and the Thanksgiving table in November; the apple and corn sit at that same dinner; the scarf and hot drink come back for Winter. What stays home are the forest-walk tiles — the maple leaf, the acorn, and the mushroom — and they are what make this board the outdoors version of autumn rather than the dinner or the holiday.
The mushroom never appears before 6x6, and nobody should eat a mushroom they found in a Sudoku.
Everything falls into place
One solution per puzzle, and no tile repeats in any row, column, or box — the only thing allowed to fall twice is the leaves. Curious how grading or hints work? The Themed Sudoku page has all of it raked into one pile, with the rest of the collection.
Fall Sudoku FAQ
Because two kinds of leaf is what fall looks like. The maple leaf is the red, pointed one and the fallen leaf is brown and curled — and both are on the beginner 4x4 board, so learning to tell them apart is part of the puzzle's opening lesson.
In order: the 4x4 board uses the maple leaf, fallen leaf, acorn, and pumpkin; the apple and mushroom join at 6x6; and the corn, scarf, and hot drink only appear on the full 9x9.
Fall is the walk; Thanksgiving is the meal at the end of it. This board keeps the forest tiles — maple leaf, acorn, mushroom — while the Thanksgiving board is led by the turkey, pumpkin pie, and cutlery. They share some harvest, but not a mood.