Printable kakuro
38 cross sum puzzles on A4. Each sheet says what kind of reasoning it needs, from sums alone on the easy 8x8 grids to look ahead on the expert ones, and every grid has exactly one solution.
38 printable sheets ·
Checked and published by 
Nora Quill
Easy kakuro, 8x8
Eight grids with 28 to 33 white squares. Every one comes out from the sums alone: list the digits that can make each total, cross the two runs, and the square settles. Squares are 20 mm, with room for pencil marks.
Medium kakuro, 10x10
Eight grids with 45 to 56 white squares and runs of up to six. Sums alone stop part of the way, after 12 to 42 squares depending on the grid, and from there you have to place digits inside the runs.
Hard kakuro, 12x12
Six grids with 77 to 84 white squares and up to 62 sums, the largest on the page. The reasoning is the same as on the medium grids, over half as many squares again and with runs of up to seven.
Expert kakuro
Six 10x10 grids where sums and placing both run out. To finish, you pencil in a digit, follow it through the crossing runs and strike it when a total becomes impossible. Each grid still has exactly one solution.
Large print kakuro
Six 8x8 grids at 23.5 mm a square, with heavier lines and bigger clue numbers. Three solve from the sums alone and three need digits placed inside their runs; the level is printed under each title.
Kakuro with the solution on the same sheet
Four 8x8 grids that carry their own answer: a small solved grid at the foot of the page, under a dotted line you fold back before starting. Two are sums only and two need placing.
How kakuro works
A kakuro grid is a crossword made of numbers. The white squares take digits from 1 to 9. The shaded squares carry the clues: the number above the diagonal is the total of the white squares running to its right, and the number below the diagonal is the total of the white squares running down from it. Inside one run no digit appears twice, so a 4 over two squares can only be 1 and 3, never 2 and 2.
What is the difference between easy, medium, hard and expert kakuro?
Here it is the reasoning a grid needs, as well as its size. Easy grids are 8x8 and come out from the sums alone. Medium 10x10 and hard 12x12 grids also make you work out which square inside a run each digit takes. Expert grids add a step where you try a digit and follow it until a run breaks.
Three levels of reasoning, measured on every grid
Before a grid is published it is solved three ways. The first way only knows sums: which sets of digits can make a total in that many squares, and what is left once the crossing run is taken into account. The second also tries every way of seating those digits in the run. The third pencils a digit in, follows the consequences and strikes the digit if a run can no longer reach its total. The level printed under the title is the lowest one that finishes the grid, and the levels below it are confirmed to get stuck.
Some sums do a lot of work. A 3 or a 4 in two squares, a 6 or a 7 in three, a 16 or a 17 in two: each can be made in only one way, so you know the digits before you know their order. Every card says how many of its sums are of that kind, or how many squares the sums alone settle.
Grid sizes
The sizes count the whole grid, including the shaded top row and left column that hold the first clues. An 8x8 grid has 28 to 33 white squares, a 10x10 has 45 to 56 and a 12x12 has 77 to 84. Squares print at 20 mm on the standard 8x8 sheets, 17.5 mm on the 10x10 and 15 mm on the 12x12. The patterns look the same turned upside down, no run is longer than seven squares, and none is a single square.
Large print and fold-under answers
Six sheets print an 8x8 grid at 23.5 mm a square, with heavier lines and larger clue numbers. Four more carry their answer at the foot of the same page, under a dotted line you fold back before you start, so there is a single page to print. Every other PDF has the solved grid as its last page.
Printing
Print at 100 percent or actual size, in black and white. The shaded squares are a light tint, not solid black, so the clues stay readable in draft mode and the sheet uses little ink. Use a pencil: small candidate digits in the corner of a square are part of the method.
If you like totals in a grid, battleship puzzles use row and column counts in a different way, and the sudoku pages work with the same nine digits and no arithmetic. Killer sudoku sits between the two: a sudoku grid where dashed cages carry totals.
How to use these sheets
- Pick a sheet and press Print. The file is a PDF sized for A4 and Letter paper.
- Print it in black and white at normal quality. None of these sheets need colour ink except the colour by number pages.
- Keep the answer page for yourself, or print it too if you want to check the work later.