The fastest way to get better at Binairo is to do the certain work first: sweep the grid for pairs and gaps, look straight at the row and column of every square you fill, and count each line again as it fills up. We measured these tips on all 150 of the game’s levels, and the numbers below come from those tests.
These build on how to solve Binairo. If you haven’t played before, start with the rules.
Solving tips
1. Sweep for pairs and gaps first
Before you think about anything else, go along every row and column looking for two alike side by side, and two alike with one square between them. Every one of the game’s levels has at least one, and on Easy levels they’re all you need with the full count: those three quick techniques finish every Easy level on their own.
2. Look at the lines you just changed
Every square you fill sits in a row and a column, and either can now have a new pair, gap or full count. On the game’s levels, the next move is on a line through a square you just filled 60% of the time on Easy and 57% on Medium and Hard. Check those two lines before searching the rest of the grid.
3. Keep counting as the grid fills
The full count (a line with half of one colour fills the rest with the other) is easy to forget once you’re busy with pairs. But it comes into its own late: 72 to 79% of the full counts in a solve happen in its second half, depending on the size. When the grid is filling up, count every line again.
4. Know when the quick moves stop
On Medium and Hard, the quick techniques get you a good way, but not to the end: they settle about a third of the empty squares (32% on Medium, 38% on Hard) before the first harder step is needed. When nothing quick is left anywhere, that’s your cue for the two slower techniques below, not a sign you’ve gone wrong.
5. Compare nearly finished lines with finished ones
A line with two squares left, one of each colour, can be settled by a finished line it mustn’t copy. Look for a complete row (or column) that matches it everywhere else: the two squares go the other way round from it. On the game’s levels, 41 of the 50 Medium puzzles and 38 of the 50 Hard ones need this at least once. See no repeats.
6. List the arrangements on a short gap
When a line has only three or four squares left, there are only a few ways to fill them. Try each one, keeping the rules (including not copying a finished line), and fill in any square they all agree on. It’s slower, but it finds everything the line can tell you. See every arrangement.
Tips for playing on PeerPuzzles
7. Tap to cycle, right-click to go back
A tap cycles a square from empty to yellow to teal and back to empty. On a computer, right-click cycles the other way, so teal is one click from empty.
8. Let the red marks and Stuck? help
A row or column that breaks a rule gets a red mark beside it the moment it does: three alike, too many of one colour, or a copy of another line. Undo (or Ctrl/Cmd + Z) takes back a move. And if you’re stuck, Stuck? (or H) names a line and the technique to try on it, without giving the squares away. If one of your squares is wrong, it rings that square first.