Targets

Easy Targets puzzles

Easy targets can be made in two or three steps, in dozens of different ways, and never need a division.

Practice gives you puzzles you haven't solved yet, as many as you like, and keeps your best time without hints. Every target is checked by a computer, and its par is the fewest steps that make it.

How to play Targets

1. You get six numbers and a target between 101 and 999.
2. Combine two numbers at a time with +, −, × or ÷. They're replaced by what they make, and you can use that in the next step.
3. Every result has to be a whole number above zero: no fractions, no zero, nothing below it.
4. You don't have to use every number. Make the target exactly to win.

Tap a number, then an operation, then another number. The first flies into the second, and the result takes its place, ready for the next step. You can also press 1 to 6 for the numbers and + - * / for the operations. Undo has no limit, and Ctrl+Z takes a step back. Every target can be made.

Each puzzle has a par: the fewest steps that make the target, worked out by a computer. Your time is what counts on the leaderboard. If you're truly stuck, you can give up and see a way to make it, but on the daily puzzle that counts as a loss.

Solving tips

• Get close first. Multiply a big number to land near the target, then fix what's left with the small ones: for 512, 5 × 100 is 500, and 12 is easy to make.
• Work backwards. Ask what the target is a multiple of, or what it's one step from. 512 is 8 × 64, and 64 might be 75 − 11.
• Keep the small numbers. They're the ones that fix a near miss at the end, so don't spend them too early.
• Stuck? A hint shows the next step of a short way there, and when the target can't be made from the numbers left anymore, it tells you how many steps to take back.