Yeah, this was a tricky one! Basically Box 8 has a pointing vector of 2 in column 6. So we can eliminate candidate value 2 in row 2 column 6. Once we do that, we are left with only one candidate value which is 6. Hope that helps.

Hello. Thanks for the question! Around 2:28, we establish the (1,6) pair in column 2. As a side effect of that, we reveal a hidden pointing vector of 3s in box 7. When we analyse box 7, we see that the candidate value 3 only appears in row 8. Thus in row 8, we can eliminate all other candidate values of 3. Consequently, we remove candidate value 3 in row 8 spot 9, and we are only left with 1 possible location for 3 in box 9. Hope that clarified it :)

@@iSolveSudokus thanks I'm gonna retry it tomorrow

Because column 1 has a (1,3,9) triplet. or you can call it a hidden (4,8) pair. Hope that makes sense :)

Hey! It was simply because there's no other space for 9 in that column. Hope that helps :)

@@iSolveSudokus oooo I see where I went wrong, not realising the 5/8 options in the middle right coloum, tyty

Hello Robert! Thanks for the comment. Feel free to use the youtube playback controls to play the video in slow motion. If you need specific help, feel free to reach out at [email protected]

Hello Robert! Feel free to reach me at [email protected]. I can help you with some tips and techniques if you would like that. Have a nice day!

I had never heard of Str8ts, but they seem challenging haha! Thanks for introducing me to it

Happy birthday to you my friend! I hope you have a great day :)

Sure! If we look at row 4 of the sudoku, we can see that the candidate value 1 is only available in cell 5 and cell 6 of the row. In other words, if we do not have 1 in cell 5 or 6 of the row, then row 4 will not have a 1 in it. This is not possible due to sudoku rules. Thus we can say that for middle box, 1 can only be put in the top row. Thus we can remove candidate value of 1 from all other cells in the middle box. When we do that, we can see that bottom-left cell in the middle box, only possible value is 9. Hence, we fill 9. Hope that helps :)

@@iSolveSudokus WOW!!! thank you soo much this explanation made perfect sense, i can go on with the rest of my day now haha

Ahaha yeah I should start doing voiceovers in the future. But until then, here’s a written version, Let’s consider Column 2 of the sudoku. We see that cells number 4, 6 and 8 of that column have possible candidate values 2,6,8. Three cells and only three candidate values combined. This means each of those cells will contain 2,6,8 in some order. We can’t know exactly the location of those values, but we can surely eliminate 2,6,8 candidate values from all other cells in that column. Hence in cell 9 of column 2, the only remaining candidate is 9. Did that make sense?

​@@iSolveSudokus Ohhh okay I see now! Is this maneuver called something? I'm trying to learn the different techniques like naked pairs and stuff like that so I would look into the technique if there's a name for it! :) thanks so much!!!

Stuck again though lol, how did you the 2 right above that 9?

Yeah this was kind of tricky but luckily I spotted it. So after we did the 9, we see that in box 4, the candidate value 6 forms a pointing pair for column 2. Hence, we can eliminate candidate value 6 from cell 8 of column 2. Thus, only possible candidate is now 2.

That's great to hear you want to learn the art of sudokus! And you're very close. It is called a naked triples or triplet, which basically extends the naked pairs principle. You can easily find many articles but let me know if I can help you further :) Happy solving!

Yeah! Honestly I don't know why I was so blind to not complete Row 5 haha

This is the first I have heard of such a format! Thanks for bringing it to my notice. I will look for an online version. Sometimes it gets tricky though because the good puzzles are often pay-walled :(

Often it's just my tunnel vision, but yeah life problems do divert my attention as well. Thanks for the kind words and support!

Ahaha! I agree it also drives me nuts when I am sitting on a square. Yeah, it's just my skill issue most of the time. It might be an obvious solve but I get tunnel vision on a particular row/column/box. But that's why I started this channel mainly - to get better at sudokus. And thanks for the idea! I can start doing voice-over coaching.