Hexwalls

What the game is

A board of hexagons is cut into regions of different sizes, and a few cells are given to you. Your job is to work out where every other region goes. Each day is one puzzle, released at midnight your local time, and everyone gets the same one.

A puzzle carries a difficulty rating out of ten. The free daily runs 1 to 7, ramping into the weekend; the PRO boards described below are rated 8 and 9. It is a property of the day, not something you pick — you are told what today's is rated.

The rules

• Every region is the size of its number. A region marked 4 covers exactly four cells.
• A region is one connected piece. No region is split into two parts that only touch at a corner.
• Walls are not crossed. The heavy black lines between cells are the edges of regions; a region never has one running through the middle of it.
• Two neighbours at most. A region may sit against at most two other regions.

Every puzzle has exactly one answer, and it can always be reached by reasoning. Nothing needs to be guessed.

Assist and hints

Assist is on by default. It watches your own marks and tells you which of the rules each region currently satisfies — it never tells you the answer, only whether what you have written breaks something.

A hint points at a real mistake if you have made one, and otherwise at a cell you have enough information to place. Hints are counted and shown beside your time, because the leaderboard lets you filter to the people who took none.

Neither is cheating. Most people will finish a hard rating with help, and the game is built on the assumption that they will.

Times and friends

Finishing records your time. There is a board for each puzzle — a day is a puzzle, so a time only means something against the same one — and you can see everybody, or just your Game Center friends. Times are self-reported by each player's own app, which is worth remembering before anyone treats them as a ranking.

Your friends list comes from Game Center and needs your permission the first time. A friend only appears if they have also allowed their own list to be shared, so a short list is usually that rather than a fault.

Streaks

A streak is a run of days finished on the day they came out. Playing an old puzzle later does not add to it — and does not break it either.

Once you have managed seven in a row, two missed days a month are forgiven from then on. A holiday or a bad week will not wipe out a year. The forgiven days do not count toward the number: a streak of thirty is thirty puzzles finished, not thirty days on the calendar.

You cannot buy this, earn extra, or save it up, and it never runs out at an awkward moment. It is two a month, granted by the calendar, whether you need them or not.

The archive, and PRO

Today's puzzle is free, always, on the phone and here, and every weekday puzzle that was ever free stays free. What is paid for is going back and going harder, and there are two ways to do it:

• The archive is a single purchase that opens every past day for good. One payment, restorable, never taken back.
• PRO is a small annual subscription that opens extra, bigger boards — rated 8 and 9, drawn beside the weekend and on holidays — and includes the archive outright. Having ever subscribed keeps the archive open for good, even if you do not renew: a lapse only stops the new PRO boards.

Nothing already bought is ever taken away, a board you finished stays yours, and there are no adverts anywhere in the game. PRO boards never touch your streak, in either direction — the free daily is the whole of it.

Both are bought and played in the iPhone app, and only there. Neither unlocks this website: a browser plays today's puzzle, whether or not you own anything. The purchases follow your Apple Account across your own devices — iPhone and iPad — not across browsers.

There is one exception, and it is a small one: a result link somebody shares with you opens the board it names in your browser — archive day or PRO board — once a calendar month. A taste, not a way in.

Common questions

I bought the archive but the website still locks old days.

That is expected. The archive is playable in the iPhone app only — the website plays today's puzzle, for everybody. The one exception is a shared result link, which opens the single board it names, once a month.

I bought the archive and it is asking me to buy it again.

Tap Restore purchases on the locked screen. Purchases follow your Apple Account, so this works on a new phone and after a reinstall, as long as you are signed in with the same one.

My PRO subscription lapsed. Have I lost the archive?

No. Having ever held PRO opens the archive for good, exactly as buying it does. A lapse only stops the new PRO boards — and the PRO boards you already finished stay in your history and on their leaderboards.

I missed a day. Have I lost my streak?

Probably not. Once you have had a run of seven, two missed days a month are forgiven automatically — nothing to buy and nothing to remember. A third miss in the same month does end it.

When does the new puzzle arrive?

Midnight, by your device's own clock. If you leave the app open across midnight it rolls over on its own.

My time did not appear on the board.

Times upload when the device next has a connection, so a solve on a plane posts itself later. If it is still missing after that, reopening the app makes it try again.

Can I start a puzzle over?

Yes. Pause, then Reset puzzle. The board clears and the clock does not — a fresh run at the grid, not a fresh time.

Does it work offline?

Yes. Puzzles are downloaded ahead of time and your progress is kept on the device. Only the leaderboard needs a connection.

How do I delete my data?

Deleting the app removes everything held on the device. Your times and history live in your own iCloud account; write to us and we will remove the times published under your name.

Contact

Something wrong, or something to say about a particular day? Write to support@hexwalls.xyz and mention the date of the puzzle — every day is a different board, and knowing which one saves a round trip.