Practice by difficulty

Hard Queens Puzzles

Challenge your elimination skills with selected hard Queens puzzles. Expect to compare candidate groups and connect deductions across regions.

20 published puzzles across several sizes. Difficulty comes from the puzzle label, not the width of its board; labels are algorithmic estimates, and solving times vary.

Choose your board

How to approach a harder board

1. Check each row, column and region for the only remaining candidate.
2. Look for a region whose candidates share one line: use line locks to exclude outside cells.
3. Queens cannot touch, including corner to corner; they do not attack along a full chess diagonal.

New to the rules? See legal and illegal placements. Working on your own board? Open the Queens Solver.