Sudoku - Classic Sudoku Puzzle

Review by eFreeware

If you already know how sudoku works and you want a steady supply of grids on your phone, this is the sort of app that fits. Oakever Games has built a straightforward number puzzle around the familiar 9x9 board, and it has been installed more than 100 million times with a 4.7 average from over three million ratings. That kind of reach suggests a lot of people treat it as a daily habit rather than a novelty.

What you get is a large catalog of puzzles across four difficulty levels, a 16x16 grid for solvers who want something bigger, and a fresh batch of 100 puzzles added each week. The developer also promises no interruptions while you solve. For someone who wants to fill a quiet half hour with logic rather than scrolling, that combination is the appeal.

It is free to install, supported by ads, and offers in-app purchases. The app was released in July 2018 and last updated in September 2026, so it is an established app rather than a new experiment. I'll go through what it actually offers, where the limits sit, and who I'd expect to get the most from it.

A large, regularly refreshed puzzle catalog

The core promise here is volume. The developer says there are more than 10,000 challenging puzzles available every day, and that 100 new ones are added each week. That matters for a puzzle app, because the main reason people abandon one is running out of grids they haven't seen. A weekly drop of a hundred puzzles is enough to keep a daily solver busy without repeating boards.

Each puzzle has a single solution, which is the standard guarantee for a well-formed sudoku and the thing that makes logical deduction reliable rather than guesswork. The app covers four difficulty levels, from easy through expert, so the same catalog can serve someone learning the rules and someone who wants a board that takes real effort.

The 16x16 grid is the more interesting inclusion. Standard sudoku uses digits 1 to 9 in a 9x9 board, and expanding to a larger grid changes the scale of the deduction considerably. It's the kind of option that gives an experienced solver a reason to keep the app installed after the 9x9 puzzles start to feel routine.

How the solving works

The rules are the classic ones: place the digits 1 through 9 so that each number appears only once in every row, every column and every mini-grid. There's nothing to learn beyond that if you've solved sudoku before, and for anyone who hasn't, a guide tour runs when you first open the app and walks through how to play.

Around the board itself, the app provides support tools and customizable gameplay. Highlight options and sound effects are part of that setup, and there's a timer if you want to track how long a puzzle takes you or compete against your own past times. These are the details that separate a usable sudoku app from a bare grid, because they let you tune how much help and feedback you want while solving.

The developer describes the interface as intuitive with a clear layout, and the difficulty curve as balanced for both beginners and advanced players. Whether that holds for you will depend on how you like your boards presented, but the combination of a guided introduction, adjustable support and four levels is a sensible structure for a puzzle that people approach at very different skill levels.

Daily challenges and offline play

Daily challenges give the app a reason to be opened on a schedule rather than only when you feel like it. A new puzzle each day turns sudoku into a small routine, and for people who like that structure it's a better fit than browsing a static list of boards.

Offline play is the other practical feature. A puzzle is available on a flight, in a waiting room with poor signal, or anywhere else you'd rather not depend on a network. For a game built around quiet concentration, that's the right design choice.

Weekly updates keep the challenge pool from going stale, and the app is positioned as brain training that supports logical thinking and memory. I'd treat the cognitive claims as marketing rather than a measurable promise, but the underlying activity is genuine deduction, and that's a reasonable way to spend time.

Sharing and the social side

There isn't much of a social layer here, and that's fine for a solo logic puzzle. The one feature in that direction is sharing, which lets you send puzzles or results to friends through services like Google+, Facebook and Twitter. It's a small addition rather than a competitive or community system.

If you want leaderboards, head-to-head solving or a sense of playing against other people, this app isn't built around that. The timer is the closest thing to competition, and it's aimed at your own times. For most sudoku players that's exactly the right scope, since the appeal of the puzzle is the private work of working out what goes where.

Comfort features for long sessions

Dark mode is a welcome inclusion for anyone who solves in the evening or in low light, and it's the kind of feature that matters more than it sounds once a puzzle habit becomes daily. Combined with the highlight options, it gives you some control over how the board looks and feels during a long solve.

The app is described as offering an experience without ad interruptions. How that balance works in practice is something you'll judge for yourself.

Who this suits

This is a good fit for someone who already enjoys sudoku and wants a dependable daily source of puzzles without paying upfront. The four difficulty levels mean you can start where you're comfortable, and the weekly additions mean the supply doesn't run dry. The offline mode and dark mode make it practical for regular use rather than occasional play.

It also works for a solver who has grown bored with standard 9x9 boards and wants the 16x16 option as a step up. That grid asks more of your deduction and takes longer to finish, which is a meaningful change of pace if the usual puzzles have become too quick.

If you're new to the genre, the guide tour and easy level give you a way in. The app doesn't assume prior knowledge, and the support tools are there if you want help rather than a pure test. For a puzzle this old and this widely used, that accessibility is part of why it has lasted.

A dependable daily sudoku companion

I'd recommend this to anyone who wants a classic sudoku app with a deep puzzle pool, sensible difficulty options and the ability to play without a connection. The 16x16 grid and the weekly batch of new puzzles give it more staying power than a fixed set of boards, and the comfort features make long sessions easier on the eyes.

The caveats are straightforward. It's free with in-app purchases, so it isn't a completely unmonetized experience, and the social side is limited to sharing rather than competition. If you want a sudoku app to be purely a solo logic exercise, that's what you're getting here.

For a daily solver, a lapsed player looking for a reason to return, or someone curious about larger grids, this is an easy install to justify. It does one thing, does it with a lot of puzzles, and doesn't ask for much in return.