How to Create Number Block Fill Puzzles in Puzzle Maker Pro

Summary: Number Block Fill puzzles are created in Puzzle Maker Pro by choosing the block size, how many blocks make the grid, and a few anchor digits, then generating. There is no word list — the grid is digits, so it builds instantly and offline, you set the challenge with the anchor count, and on Creative you can swap the digits for letters, colours or pictures.

Overview

A Number Block Fill puzzle is a filled digit grid sliced into square blocks that the solver reassembles by shape and anchor digit. Puzzle Maker Pro does the hard part: it lays digits onto a black-and-white skeleton, cuts it into blocks, checks that every block is unique, scatters the anchor digits across the empty grid as fixed hints, and renders the page with its solution. New to the puzzle itself? Read How Number Block Fill Puzzles Work first.

Required Modules

Puzzle Maker Pro – Number Block Fill — product page: [/product/number-block-fill-generator/ - confirm]. Its word sibling, Block Fill, works the same way with letters and crossing words and is sold separately. What each edition makes:

Number Block Fill (the Standard tier) builds digit puzzles at every block size and grid, exports JPG, PNG, SVG and PDF, and includes Instant Puzzle Books.
Number Block Fill Creative adds content variation on the Content tab — the digits restyled as letters, coloured shapes or pictures, on the grid, in the bank and on the Puzzle Slides tiles — plus Puzzle Slides (a PowerPoint with a movable tile for every block) and Puzzle Book Studio Creative for full book editing of one collection.
Number Block Fill Productivity adds Time Saver for batch runs, Puzzle Book Studio Productivity for books built from several collections, and JSON export.
Number Block Fill Creative + Interactive and Number Block Fill Productivity + Interactive add online play for the digit puzzles: the exported HTML and the ZIP for the free Puzzle Maker Pro Online WordPress plugin, where solvers drag the blocks into place.

You can move up to any higher edition after you buy — up the ladder, and Interactive on top of Creative or Productivity — so start with the one that fits what you are making today. See Puzzle Maker Pro Editions Explained.

Commercial rights: Number Block Fill and Number Block Fill Creative both let you sell the finished books, worksheets and packs you make to your own readers and customers, including KDP, Etsy and Teachers Pay Teachers. Number Block Fill Productivity includes that, plus selling or supplying the generated puzzles to other publishers and sellers. The tiers differ in what you can make, not in permission to sell.

A free demo is available, so you can make a Number Block Fill before you buy: try the free demo. Demo output is a watermarked image.

Preparation

Nothing to set up: Number Block Fill fills with digits, so it generates offline and instantly. Open Puzzle Maker Pro, choose Number Block Fill in the Select a puzzle gallery, and the Creator opens on its Main tab. A 4 across × 5 down grid of 3×3 blocks (a 12 × 15 board) with six anchors is the default and a good starting point. Every puzzle is generated with its matching solution at once.

Choose the Block Shape

On the Main tab, set the grid’s shape:

Block size — cells per block edge, 2 to 5 (default 3); 3×3 is the classic look.
Blocks across / Blocks down — how many blocks make the grid, each 2 to 10 (default 4 × 5). The grid comes out Blocks across × Block size wide and Blocks down × Block size tall, and each side must land between 5 and 21 cells: if block size × block count climbs over 21, drop one of them; if it dips under 5 (say two 2-cell blocks), raise one. The default is a 12 × 15 grid of twenty 3×3 blocks.

Set the Difficulty — with Anchors

On top of the grid size, the challenge is set by two dials:

Anchor hints — how many digits are pre-printed on the grid, 0 to 40 (default 6). Because the digits are random, anchors do most of the positioning work in this puzzle: more anchors make an easier, less ambiguous board; fewer make a stiffer shape-matching challenge.
Decoy blocks — spare blocks that belong nowhere, 0 to 20 (default 0). A few extra decoys make the bank harder to sort; each is drawn distinct from the real blocks.

Restyle the Digits (Number Block Fill Creative)

Open the Content tab to swap the digits for something else: Letters, Colors (drawn as coloured shapes, so the tint never competes with the black squares), Images from the built-in picture packs, or your own Image List. Whatever you choose replaces the ten digits everywhere — on the printed grid, in the block bank and on the Puzzle Slides tiles — so a picture Number Block Fill is solved exactly like the digit version, by block shape and anchor. Give the picker at least ten distinct items (ten digits need ten markers) and choose Use First x Values or Draw x Random Values to decide whether each puzzle takes the next ten in order or a random ten. The mechanism is shared across modules — see How to Use Content Variation in Puzzle Maker Pro.

Set the Quantity

Quantity, in the bar above the tabs, makes several puzzles at the same settings in one run — the free demo and any preview show just one. When a book needs a mix — different block sizes, grid dimensions, anchor counts, or decoy levels for a difficulty ramp — reach for Time Saver (Number Block Fill Productivity) instead; see Export Your Puzzles.

Style It

On the Style tab, set the Entries font, the Canvas and Cell fill colours, the Cell border, and the Block colour that paints the black squares — the shared style controls used across every module. See How to Customize Puzzle Designs in Puzzle Maker Pro.

Set the Title

On the Layout tab, pick a Smart Title. Number Block Fill offers Custom (your own text, used exactly as typed) or Number Block Fill (e.g. “Number Block Fill”, the default). The same two options feed the Description (default: “Reassemble the blocks into the interlocking number grid.”). The Layout tab also holds the crop setting and the per-collection branding toggle. Smart Titles work the same in every module — see How to Create Smart Puzzle Titles in Puzzle Maker Pro.

Export Your Puzzles

Use Refresh in the Preview group to draw one puzzle and Next Preview to step through more, pick your output formats and destination folder, then click Create to run the whole quantity. Every puzzle comes out as a pair: the puzzle page — the empty grid with its anchor digits and the printed block bank — and the solution page with every cell filled. Which lanes you get depends on the edition, and for a publisher, on what you are selling:

Print & PDF — PNG, JPG, SVG and print-ready PDF of the puzzle and solution, on every edition. A print or KDP book needs nothing more than this.
Instant Puzzle Books (every edition) builds the interior straight from your current book settings — page size, margins, titles, page numbers and the answer section — as a PDF or a PowerPoint deck.
Puzzle Book Studio on Number Block Fill Creative gives you full book editing for this one collection; on Number Block Fill Productivity it combines several collections into one book.
Puzzle Slides — an interactive PowerPoint with a movable tile per block, on Number Block Fill Creative (and Productivity). Restyled digits appear on the tiles too.
JSON export — the puzzle data files for your own apps and workflows, on Number Block Fill Productivity.
Online play — for the digit puzzles, the exported HTML plus a ZIP for the free Puzzle Maker Pro Online WordPress plugin, so solvers drag the blocks into place in a browser; with Number Block Fill Creative + Interactive or Number Block Fill Productivity + Interactive. See How to Play Puzzles Online.

Batch a whole book

On Number Block Fill Productivity, Time Saver builds a book’s worth of pages in one pass. Each row is its own settings group: give it a block size, grid, anchor count and quantity, add a row for every variation the book needs (a difficulty ramp from many anchors down to few works well), and generate. Then open Puzzle Book Studio to lay the pages out into a finished book. Details: How to Batch Create Puzzles with Time Saver.

Outcome

You can now create Number Block Fill puzzles end to end — any block size from 2 to 5, up to a 21-cell grid, tuned by anchor count and decoys, titled, styled, and exported for print or the web, and on Creative wearing letters or pictures instead of digits on the page — one puzzle, or a whole book with Time Saver and Puzzle Book Studio.

FAQ

Do I need a word list?
No — Number Block Fill uses digits, so it generates instantly and offline. Block Fill is the sibling with a word list.

How do I set the difficulty?
With the anchor count (fewer = harder), the decoy count and the block count — the word version’s Difficulty control is about word commonness, which digits have none of.

Can I use pictures or letters instead of digits?
Yes, on Number Block Fill Creative and up: the Content tab restyles the ten digits as letters, coloured shapes or pictures on the grid, in the bank and on the Puzzle Slides tiles. Supply at least ten distinct items.

Which edition do I need to batch a whole book?
Number Block Fill Productivity — it adds Time Saver for batch creation and Puzzle Book Studio Productivity to combine several sets into one book.

Which edition unlocks online play and Puzzle Slides?
Puzzle Slides comes with Number Block Fill Creative (and Productivity inherits it). Online play comes with the Interactive editions — Number Block Fill Creative + Interactive or Number Block Fill Productivity + Interactive. JSON export is Number Block Fill Productivity. A print or PDF book needs no Interactive edition; add it when you publish the online version.

What output formats can I export?
PNG, JPG, SVG and PDF on every edition. Puzzle Slides from Creative. JSON export from Productivity. HTML for online play with the Interactive editions.