NYT Pips hints, answers for August 2, 2026
Find hints, walkthroughs, and solutions for the daily NYT Pips puzzle, including the milestone 350th hard tier grid.
Players tackling the daily tile-placement puzzle on Sunday, 2 August 2026, can access specialized walkthroughs as Mashable and Forbes publish comprehensive hints and solutions. Released in August 2025, Pips puts a unique spin on dominoes, creating a fun single-player experience that could become your next daily gaming habit.
The daily puzzle mechanics require participants to rotate and place tiles either vertically or horizontally. Uncoded spaces carry no restrictions, but color-coded areas demand strict adherence to mathematical conditions. According to Mashable, these rules include summing pips to a specific number, ensuring every domino half equals a set number, ensuring halves differ via a not-equal condition, or meeting greater-than and less-than thresholds. Forbes notes that winning requires spending every provided domino to fill the grid, with solutions occasionally offering multiple valid pathways.
Media additions
Milestone Puzzles and Walkthroughs
Sunday’s Hard tier carries special significance. As Forbes reports, the Hard Pips is the number 350, because today is the 350th Pips puzzle since this game kicked off at the NYT Games App. To navigate the commemorative grid, players can follow a step-by-step placement guide.
- Step one involves placing the 4/1 domino from Blue < 5 into Orange = and the 1/2 domino from Orange = up into Dark Blue =. The 1/1 domino goes in the remaining Orange = tiles and the 6/2 domino goes from Blue > 5 into Dark Blue =.
- Step two shifts the 2/5 domino from Dark Blue = up into Blue 5 and then hop over to the right side of the “350”. Place the 3/5 domino from Dark Blue 3 into Green 5 and the 6/4 domino from Orange = into Purple > 3. The 6/3 domino goes from Orange = up into Green 3.
- Step three incorporates free tiles, placing the 0/1 domino from Purple 0 into Pink = and the 1/3 domino from Pink = into Green 3. Then place the 0/5 domino from Dark Blue < 3 up into Purple 5. Hop over to the top of the “5” and place the 0/0 domino from Orange 0 into Purple < 3.
- Step four completes the grid from left to right: Place the 3/3 domino from the first free tile into Pink 3 and the 1/6 domino from Purple < 3 into the second free tile. The 2/3 domino goes from Dark Blue = into the third free tile and the 0/2 domino finishes up this monster of a Hard Pips from Pink 0 into the fourth free tile.
Currently, if you're stuck, the game only offers to reveal the entire puzzle, forcing you to move on to the next difficulty level and start over. However, we have you covered! Below are piecemeal answers that will serve as hints so that you can find your way through each difficulty level.
Common Pips Conditions
| Condition | Rule |
|---|---|
| Number | All the pips in this space must add up to the number. |
| Equal | Every domino half in this space must be the same number of pips. |
| Not Equal | Every domino half in this space must have a completely different number of pips. |
| Less than | Every domino half in this space must add up to less than the number. |
| Greater than | Every domino half in this space must add up to more than the number. |
Additional Walkthrough Elements
While the Hard tier presents a complex puzzle to celebrate the multi-hundred puzzle milestone, other difficulty levels also require careful management of tile rotations and grid spaces. Forbes outlines strategies for the daily trio of Pips puzzles, while Mashable details individual placements for a variety of conditions, including specific number sums, equality checks, and inequality constraints across multiple colored regions.
If you've ever played dominoes, you'll have a passing familiarity with how Pips is played. As we've shared in our previous hints stories for Pips, the tiles, like dominoes, are placed vertically or horizontally and connect with each other. The main difference between a traditional game of dominoes and Pips is the color-coded conditions you have to address. The touching tiles don't necessarily have to match.
What to Watch Next
Daily players can expect fresh Pips puzzles to release continuously through the NYT Games App, with columnists and gaming hubs providing ongoing daily walkthroughs and hints for subsequent difficulty tiers.
