Nine Circles, Six Totals, Exactly One Answer
You cannot check a nine-cell arithmetic puzzle by eye. It looks like you can, which is exactly how a wrong answer key gets printed.
Ikura is nine circles in a three by three block, a total beside every row and under every column, and the digits 1 to 9 used once each. One arrangement makes all six totals come out right. And the part that matters to you is “one arrangement”, never “probably one”: every board this module publishes was checked before it reached you, and if it had two valid answers it was never printed.
If you have ever tried to build a small arithmetic puzzle by hand, you know why that matters. Grids like this are deceptively slippery. An addition board with no digits filled in has around ten different valid solutions on average. Publish one of those by accident and your reader finds an answer that is not the one in your answer key, and you hear about it.
Generate a dozen in the free demo and try to break one. You will not find a second answer, because the generator already looked.
Why Ikura Earns a Place in Your Catalog
Every puzzle book has a pacing problem. Readers who have just finished a hard logic grid or a dense word search need somewhere to land before the next big one, and a page that ends in a win is worth more than another long grind.
Ikura is built for exactly that slot. The rules fit on one line. There are no symbols to learn and no operator signs on the board, because every operation is addition, so the instruction says it once instead of the grid repeating a plus sign twelve times. A solver who has never seen one before is solving within seconds.
And it still requires real deduction. The opening move is usually a line with a single blank, which is just subtraction. After that a solver has to think in pairs: these two circles must total 15, and only 6 and 9 do that from what is left. That is a genuine reasoning step, not arithmetic drill, which is what makes the puzzle satisfying rather than merely easy.
What You Can Create
- Warm-up and cool-down pages between longer puzzles in a mixed book.
- Short pages that earn their space: the answer grid is nine circles, so a puzzle and its totals take a fraction of the page.
- A complete Ikura book, graded from five given digits down to two, for a lighter or younger audience.
- Classroom and tutoring worksheets, where no total goes past 24 and the reasoning is the point.
- Mixed math books, where Ikura is the breather page between a Cross Sum grid and the next big solve.
- Activity pages for a newsletter or a lead magnet, finishable in the time it takes to open the next email.
See the Output
The printed layout: round answer circles, boxed totals after the equals column, and the digits still to place as black discs down the side.
Every puzzle comes with its solution, generated in the same run and correctly paired.
Two givens instead of four. Same board size, a much longer solve, and the digits still to place move to two columns.
Switch the side list off for a tighter page when you are fitting more puzzles per sheet.
Why a Nine-Circle Puzzle Still Needs a Generator
The uniqueness check is not a setting you can forget to turn on. It runs on every board, every time. If the number of given digits you asked for does not pin the grid to one answer, the generator adds a digit rather than publish an ambiguous puzzle. You will never get fewer givens than you asked for, and you will never get a puzzle with two answers. That means your answer key is correct by construction, not because you checked it.
The layout is the printed one. Round answer circles, square boxed totals sized to match them, an equals column, and the digits still to place as black discs down the side. This was built against a real magazine page, down to details like the discs being seventy percent of an answer circle so the column reads as a block rather than a stack of dots.
You get Cross Sum’s years of proving, not a new puzzle’s first year of bugs. The board mathematics, the uniqueness gate and the batch de-duplication are the same code that has been generating Cross Sum puzzles for years, restricted here to addition and given its own board. That is a lot of proven machinery behind a small puzzle.
The answer key builds itself. Puzzle and solution come out of the same run, in the same formats, correctly paired. There is no second pass where a page slips out of order.
Grade a Book From Easy to Hard in One Pass
One dial, six settings: how many of the nine digits you print for the solver, from five down to zero. Five is gentle. Four is the standard magazine puzzle. Two is genuinely hard: with so little printed, a solver usually has to hunt for the tightest pair sum rather than fill a line by subtraction.
With Time Saver, in Productivity and above, you set a row per band and generate the whole book in one pass. Four rows of twenty five gives you a hundred puzzles that get harder as the reader works through them.
Make the Circles Match Your Book’s Colours
Nothing on the page should announce that it came from somewhere else. Circles, outlines, total boxes, side discs and both fonts all take your book’s colours, so an Ikura page reads as chapter four rather than as a download.
A Hundred Boards, No Two the Same (Productivity)
Time Saver batches unique sets in a single run, de-duplicated within the run, so a hundred puzzles come back as a hundred different boards rather than eighty and twenty near-twins.
Puzzle Book Studio turns those pages into a book you could hand a printer today: margins and trim size set once, page numbers, typography and contents built for you. Combine Ikura with other puzzle types in one volume, or build a book of nothing else.
Output Formats and Publishing Options
Every edition exports JPG, PNG, SVG, print PDF and PowerPoint slides, puzzle and solution. (Those are static slides for printing or projecting. The interactive deck, where the tiles actually move, is Puzzle Slides in Productivity Interactive below.)
Lite assembles books with Instant Puzzle Books: a book PDF or PPT straight from your current settings, margins, trim size and layout, every puzzle the same, with no extra book setup.
Productivity adds Time Saver and Puzzle Book Studio Productivity, which gives you full book editing across several puzzle collections combined into one volume.
Productivity Interactive adds the interactive lanes: Puzzle Slides, a PowerPoint deck in which the digits still to place become number tiles the solver drags onto the board, and online play, exported HTML plus a ZIP for the free WordPress plugin so readers can play the set on your own site.
Teach It Live with Puzzle Slides (Productivity Interactive)
A set you printed becomes a lesson you can run. Puzzle Slides exports each puzzle as a slide where the digits still to place become number tiles sitting on their printed discs, drawn in the reverse colours so they stand out before anyone touches them. Drag a tile onto a circle and the board fills in on the screen: a five minute starter the class solves together, or a step a tutor walks through with one student. The deck is a standard PowerPoint file, so it opens on whatever the room already has.
Play It on the Web (Productivity Interactive)
Publish a set to your own site with the free WordPress plugin and your readers play it in the browser. They can drag a tile onto a circle, tap a tile and then a circle on a phone, or select a circle and type the digit, whichever suits them.
Two ways to present it. As a puzzle list, a dropdown your visitors pick from, which gives a returning reader a reason to come back. Or as a leveled game, where puzzles unlock in order, progress and stars save in the visitor’s browser, and a finish screen shows your own message and a button to buy the full book. For a classroom module you can rename Level to Lesson and it becomes a self paced practice course.
The free set is the taster. The completion screen is where it converts.
Which Edition Should You Choose?
- Lite if you want to make Ikura puzzles and print them, and assemble books the fast way from your current settings.
- Productivity if you build books of 25 puzzles or more, or combine Ikura with other puzzle types in one volume. It is the edition that adds batch creation and multi collection book editing.
- Productivity Interactive if you also want the puzzles to move: a PowerPoint deck for teaching, or a playable set on your own website.
| Lite | Productivity | Productivity Interactive | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Create Ikura puzzles, all difficulties | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Solutions with every puzzle | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| JPG, PNG, SVG, print PDF, PowerPoint | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Style controls (canvas, circles, boxes, discs, fonts) | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Instant Puzzle Books | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Time Saver (batch creation) | Yes | Yes | |
| Puzzle Book Studio Productivity | Yes | Yes | |
| Puzzle Slides | Yes | ||
| Play on the web, list or game | Yes | ||
| Sell the books and packs you make | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Sell or supply the generated puzzles to other publishers | Yes | Yes |
Not sure yet? The free demo runs the real generator, so you can print a few Ikura pages tonight and pick your edition afterwards.
Own Cross Sum Variations or Cross Sum Time Saver? Ikura unlocks on what you already have. Cross Sum Variations gives you Ikura at Lite. Cross Sum Time Saver gives you Ikura at Productivity, so batch creation and Puzzle Book Studio are already yours. Neither carries the interactive lanes, so Puzzle Slides and web play are the only part that needs a new purchase. Other Cross Sum purchases are not included.
Who This Is For
Puzzle book publishers on KDP, Etsy or your own store. If you have been padding mixed books with another word search because you needed a page that was quick to solve, this is the page you actually wanted, and it comes with a correct answer key every time.
Teachers and tutors. No row or column total ever goes past 24, and every operation is addition, so you can put one on the board cold, with no prep, and the room is solving inside a minute. With the interactive editions the same set becomes a whiteboard activity or a self paced online practice course.
Anyone who has been buying filler content. PLR arithmetic puzzles arrive with no guarantee that the answer key matches the grid. These are checked before they are printed.
Existing Cross Sum customers. This is the same engine with a different board and a much lighter puzzle, and you already own part of it.
Try It Before You Buy
The free demo generates real Ikura puzzles from the real generator, one at a time and watermarked, so you can print a few and see how they land with your readers before you decide anything. If they suit your books, the edition is a short decision: Lite for print, Productivity for batch books, Productivity Interactive for teaching and web play.
Licensing and Commercial Use
Lite, Productivity and Productivity Interactive all carry the licence to sell the finished puzzle products you make, meaning puzzle books, worksheets and printable packs, to your own readers and customers, on KDP, Etsy, Teachers Pay Teachers, or your own store.
Productivity and Productivity Interactive add the right to sell or supply the puzzles you generate to other publishers, businesses and sellers.
Neither scope covers reselling the software itself.
Product Details
| Product | Ikura, an addition only 3×3 cross sum |
| Editions | Lite, Productivity, Productivity Interactive |
| Platform | Windows desktop |
| Internet required | No, for creating puzzles |
| Grid | 3×3, fixed |
| Difficulty | Given digits, 5 down to 0 (4 = magazine standard, 2 = hard). The generator adds a given if the count you asked for would leave two valid answers, so a board can show more givens than requested, never fewer |
| Outputs | JPG, PNG, SVG, print PDF, PowerPoint |
| Solution pages | Yes, with every puzzle |
| Puzzle books | Instant Puzzle Books (all editions); Puzzle Book Studio (Productivity) |
| Time Saver | Productivity and above |
| Puzzle Slides | Productivity Interactive |
| Play on the web | Productivity Interactive, HTML plus WordPress plugin ZIP, and the JSON catalog behind it |
| Interactive PDF | Not available for this module |
| Commercial licence | Sell finished puzzle products to your own readers and customers (all editions); adds selling or supplying the generated puzzles to other publishers and sellers (Productivity and Productivity Interactive) |
| Free demo | Yes |
| Delivery | Immediate, in your member area |
Questions Before You Buy
Is there a free demo?
Yes. It generates real puzzles from the real generator, one at a time and watermarked. Any paid edition removes both limits.
Can an Ikura puzzle have more than one solution?
No. Every board is checked before it is published and kept only if exactly one arrangement satisfies all six totals. If the givens you asked for do not pin the board, the generator adds one rather than publish an ambiguous puzzle.
Which edition do I need to make a whole book?
Lite will do it with Instant Puzzle Books, assembling straight from your current settings. Productivity is the one you want if you are producing at volume, because it adds batch creation and full book editing across several collections.
I already own Cross Sum. Do I need to buy this?
Not for the puzzles, those are already yours: Cross Sum Variations unlocks Ikura at Lite, and Cross Sum Time Saver unlocks it at Productivity, so batch creation and Puzzle Book Studio come with what you own. What is not included is Productivity Interactive, the edition that turns a printed set into a lesson you can run on screen or a playable set on your own site.
How is this different from Cross Sum?
Cross Sum is the heavier puzzle: mixed operators, negative numbers, fractions, and a different board. Ikura is addition only on a 3×3 grid with the digits 1 to 9 used once each, drawn the way magazines print it. Same engine underneath, much lighter puzzle on the page.
Can I change the grid size?
No. Ikura is always 3×3. That is the puzzle rather than a setting, and difficulty comes from how many digits are given instead.
Will my puzzles look like everyone else’s?
The boards will not repeat: every run is de-duplicated, so a hundred puzzles come back as a hundred different boards. At the standard four given digits the printed digits can sit on either of two patterns, the four corners or the four edge centres, so the pages do not all look alike. The styling is yours as well, since circles, outlines, total boxes, side discs and both fonts all take your own colours.
What do I need to let readers play these online?
The Productivity Interactive edition and the free BookPublisherTools WordPress plugin. You export the set, publish it to your site, and readers play it there.
Add a Page Your Readers Finish Smiling
A mixed puzzle book that is all heavyweights is exhausting, and readers put it down. Six months from now your catalog can have Ikura pages doing the quiet work in every mixed title you publish, plus a book or two of nothing else, and not one answer key you had to verify yourself.
The demo is free, it runs the real generator, and the puzzles it makes are the puzzles you would sell. Print six tonight. If your readers do not finish them smiling, you have lost an evening. If they do, you have a page you can drop into every mixed book you publish from here on, and one less thing to proof before it goes to print. Try the free demo.
