4x4 Sudoku
4 × 4 · Easy
Write 1 to 4 once in every row, every column and every 2 by 2 box.
Created for free at puzzleandprint.com
4x4 sudoku
The first sudoku: four squares a side, four or six to a page.
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4x4 Sudoku, Answer Key
4 × 4 · Easy
Created for free at puzzleandprint.com
Or take one that is already made
Four sheets, each a two-page PDF: the puzzles, then the answer key on its own page.
4x4 sudoku, first puzzles4 × 4 · Easy · 4 puzzlesDownload PDF ↓
4x4 sudoku, everyday4 × 4 · Medium · 6 puzzlesDownload PDF ↓
4x4 sudoku, letters A to D4 × 4 · Medium · letters · 6 puzzlesDownload PDF ↓
4x4 sudoku, fewest clues4 × 4 · Hard · 6 puzzlesDownload PDF ↓Every sheet here is free to print as often as you like. If one saved you time, the tip jar is on Ko-fi.
A 4x4 sudoku has sixteen squares, four boxes of two by two, and only the numbers 1 to 4, which makes it the size to start a young child on. Nothing about the rule is simplified: every row, every column and every box holds each number exactly once. Learned on a grid this small, the 9x9 later is the same game played bigger rather than a new one.
Every puzzle on this page can be solved one square at a time by finding a square where only one number is still possible. All twenty-two grids across the four sheets were checked for it, and none needs anything cleverer. That is deliberate. At this size the job is learning the rule and the habit of looking along a row, down a column and around a box before writing, not being stuck.
The sheets differ in how much of the grid starts filled. The first prints four puzzles with ten of the sixteen squares given, the everyday sheet six puzzles with eight, and the fewest clues sheet six with only six. The letters sheet swaps the numbers for A, B, C and D across six grids with eight letters given in each, for a child who reads numbers as sums.
For a first attempt, print the first sheet and solve one grid together out loud: this row already has a 1, a 2 and a 4, so the empty square must be 3. After that the sheet tends to run itself. Keep the everyday sheet for quiet minutes, and save the fewest clues sheet for when eight given numbers start to feel like too much help.
Where to start on a 4x4 sudoku
Before anything is written, some squares on a 4x4 already have only one possible number, and those are the places to begin. On the first sheet, with ten of the sixteen squares given, each puzzle offers between four and six of them. Fewer clues does not always mean fewer ways in: on the fewest clues sheet, with six given, the third puzzle offers only two starting squares while the sixth offers seven.
Once one square is filled the next usually follows, because every number written removes that number from a row, a column and a box at the same time. That chain is the whole skill at this size and the reason a 4x4 rarely stalls for long. There are only six squares to work out on a puzzle from the first sheet, and ten on one from the fewest clues sheet.
Teaching the 4x4 rule with letters A to D
The letters sheet prints six 4x4 grids with eight letters given in each, the same amount of help as the everyday sheet, using A, B, C and D where the numbers would be. Solving does not change at all. Each row, column and two by two box needs every letter once, and the answer key on the second page shows the given letters in bold and the rest in gray.
Letters remove any hint of arithmetic, which helps a child who sees a 3 and starts adding, and they make a good second pass for one who has finished the number sheets: the same puzzle in a different alphabet is a quick check that the rule was learned rather than the answers remembered. The maker on this page can switch any of its grids to letters with one setting.
Common questions
When is a child ready for a 4x4 sudoku?
There is no set age. The practical test is whether they can recognize the numbers 1 to 4 and follow a row and a column with a finger. The first sheet suits that stage: ten of sixteen squares are filled, and every puzzle on it has at least four squares that can be filled straight away.
What is the fewest clues a 4x4 sudoku can have?
Four. Checking all 288 completed 4x4 grids finds no three-clue puzzle with a single solution and 25,728 four-clue puzzles that do have one. The fewest clues sheet here gives six, which still leaves at least two squares in every grid that can be filled before anything else.
Want to know when new printables go up?
New printables when they go up, mostly seasonal, a few times a year.