Thank you for choosing Picture Cross! Here you'll find thousands of logic puzzles in which you must use the number clues provided to uncover the picture hidden in the grid.

 

At the start of the game, after a brief tutorial and selecting a Puzzle Pack from the menu, you'll be presented with a grid of different colored squares with padlock icons. Each square represents a Picture Cross puzzle. Touch a square to see information about that puzzle. You'll notice that puzzles vary in grid size and difficulty.

 

Once you've found a puzzle you want to play, select the ✔ button to unlock it. Unlocking puzzles costs tokens which can be earned in various ways during play.

 

If you're new to Picture Cross / nonogram puzzles, we've created a brief video guide which explains the basic techniques and walks you through solving a puzzle:

View the guide on our website

A Picture Cross puzzle begins with an empty grid of squares, with a set of clue labels running along the top and left edges.

A clue label is a list of numbers that describes how the squares on that line of the grid should be filled in. Each number corresponds to an unbroken block of filled squares. These blocks of squares must be entered into the line in the order they're listed in the clue, with at least one blank space separating each block.

However, the clue labels don't specify where each block starts on the line. The exact number of blank squares that appear before and after each block is not known at first.

Solving Picture Cross puzzles involves applying logical steps to gradually discover this missing information and correctly fill in all the squares to satisfy the clues, revealing a picture.

The best way to start a Picture Cross puzzle is to check each of the clue labels in turn to find ones that can only have one valid solution.

For example, if the puzzle grid is 10x10 squares, a clue label of "10" denotes that all the squares on that line must be filled.

Similarly, a clue label of "7 2" can be filled in straight away. The clue denotes:
 
(7 filled squares) + (at least 1 blank square) + (2 filled squares) = 10 squares in total.
 
We can deduce that there aren't any additional blank squares before, after or between the blocks as this would require more than 10 squares.

If a given square must be blank according to the known information, it can be marked with an X by selecting the "X" button below the grid.
 
(You can switch back to filling squares by selecting the FILL ⬛ button again.)
 
To erase filled squares or Xs from the grid, simply tap the square a second time with the same drawing mode selected. Touch and drag to paint or erase multiple squares in one go.

Each line that is solved (or partially solved) provides new information that can help in solving the lines perpendicular to it.

The most important rule of Picture Cross is to never guess!

All the information needed to solve the puzzle is in the clues.

For more advanced solving techniques please refer to the "Strategy Guide" section of this manual.

If you find you're stuck on a puzzle, you can spend coins to get a hint. Tap the ❓ icon in the top left corner of the puzzle grid and you'll be prompted to select a row or column. The correct squares will then be automatically filled on that line.

 

You can return to the Map View (the grid of puzzles in the current pack) at any time by tapping the gear (⚙) icon at the top right of the game screen to open the Pause Menu, then selecting the button marked "Map View 🌍". Your progress in the current puzzle will be saved.

 

You can select a different puzzle pack to browse by tapping the gear (⚙) icon at the top right of the game screen to open the Pause Menu, then selecting the button marked "Main Menu". Not all puzzle packs are unlocked at the start of the game - usually, all the puzzles in the previous pack in the menu need to be completed to unlock the next pack.

 

Puzzles that have been unlocked but not yet completed are marked with a pause (⏸) symbol. To resume from where you left off, tap on this icon and tap on the ✔ button when prompted to continue.