A free pentomino puzzle for your browser

PentoBox

Thirteen pieces, one frame. Can you fill it?

Twelve pentominoes and one small square, an 8×8 board, no gaps. A classic puzzle that's been around for over a century, now free in your browser, with 16,146 solutions to find.

Play free now→

play.pentobox.com

16,146solutions
to find

Check out some of the unlockable customizations

Pick one to see it in the game. Each changes the pieces and the board.

How to play

Easy to learn, hard to finish. The controls take a minute. Filling the board takes much longer.

A solved board: all thirteen pieces fill the 8×8 frame

01The goal

Fill the frame with all thirteen pieces.

Twelve pentominoes, each made of five squares, and one 2×2 square. The square can go anywhere. When the last piece drops in, you've found a solution.

No gaps
No overlaps
None left over

02The moves

Tap to turn

Each tap turns the piece a quarter turn clockwise.

With a mouse: click

Double-tap to flip

Flips the piece over, as if you turned a wooden piece face down. Between turns and flips, a piece can sit up to eight ways.

With a mouse: double-click

Drag to place

Drop a piece on the board and it snaps to the grid. Drag it off again to send it back to the tray.

Pieces on the board can still be turned and flipped

03Stuck? A few tips

Place the X early. The cross fits in the fewest spots, so it gets harder to place the longer you wait.
Work from the edges in. Corners and edges are the pickiest spots. The middle forgives more.
Watch for small gaps. A closed-off gap of one to three squares can never be filled. Fix it before you go on.
Use the counter. In Casual, the number above the board shows how many solutions are still possible. If it drops to zero, something has to move.

More than one puzzle

Come back for a new board every day, play it your way, and make it look like yours.

Daily challenges

A new board every day with some pieces already placed, the same for everyone. Keep your streak going.

Casual or Hard

Casual shows how many solutions are still possible as you play. Hard gives no hints.

Skins and boards

Painted wood, stone, glass, velvet, neon and more. Mix any pieces with any board.

Leaderboards and sync

Rank for solutions, streaks and dailies. Sign in with Google or email to play on any device.

A puzzle that never left the table

The puzzle is simple to set up: a square frame, twelve pieces made of five squares each, and one small square. Fitting all thirteen in with no gaps is the hard part, and there's always one more way to do it.

It started with a very old set that was solved over and over for years. Later, the gallery Atelie 42 began making the puzzle in its workshop: some sets in wood, painted by hand and sealed with a finish, others cut from coloured plastics. Same pieces, but every material made it feel like a new puzzle.

PentoBox brings that puzzle to any screen, in as many finishes as the workshop could dream up.

Made in collaboration with Atelie

Older than you'd think

PentoBox is a new way to play one of the oldest puzzles of its kind.

1907

The Broken Chessboard

Henry Dudeney prints an 8×8 board made from twelve five-square pieces and one 2×2 square. This exact puzzle.

1953

A name

Mathematician Solomon Golomb calls the pieces pentominoes.

1958

Solved by computer

Dana Scott uses an early computer to find all 65 solutions with the square in the middle.

Today

16,146 to find

With the square anywhere, there are 16,146 solutions. PentoBox counts every one you find.