Sudoku.com vs Brainium Sudoku: Hints, Notes and Ad Removal

Sudoku.com and Brainium Sudoku are both free, both show ads and both sell a one-time purchase to remove them: Sudoku.com No Ads at $14.99 and Remove Ads at $11.99. Pick Brainium if you want hints that explain the logic, more control over notes and the board, and landscape play on iPad. Pick Sudoku.com if you want daily trophies, seasonal events and the app with by far the most ratings. The puzzles themselves are the same classic 9x9 sudoku. What separates them is the help each one gives you and how much of the board you can set up your way.

The App Store facts

From each app's US App Store listing, checked October 26, 2026. Prices and paid items change, so check the listing before you buy.

Brainium is the older app, on the App Store since 2011; Sudoku.com arrived in 2017 and has gathered 1.87 million US ratings to Brainium's 161,164. Their star ratings sit side by side in the table, and neither gap is big enough to decide this alone.

What each listing says it does

"Not in listing" means the App Store description does not mention it, not that the app lacks it. Both apps add features through updates faster than they rewrite their descriptions.

Ads and what removing them costs

Both apps carry Apple's "Contains advertising" note in their age rating, and both put the fix in a single purchase rather than a subscription. Sudoku.com No Ads costs $14.99 and Remove Ads costs $11.99, so Brainium's is the cheaper of the two. Either way you pay once and keep it.

Reviews on both listings complain about ad timing more than ad count: an ad that interrupts a puzzle mid-solve costs you the chain of thought you were holding. If you plan to play daily for years, either purchase is reasonable. If you would rather not pay anything, see the third option further down, or our list of sudoku apps with no ads.

Hints: a nudge or a lesson

This is the clearest difference. Sudoku.com describes its hints as a way to get unstuck, alongside auto-check and duplicate highlighting. Its listing frames all three as optional helpers that make a puzzle easier, and says you can finish without them.

Brainium leads its listing with the hint system. It says each hint shows the technique you need, explains why the answer is what it is, and uses animations and color to point at the cells involved. For a player stuck between Hard and Expert, that is the feature that moves you up, because you learn patterns like naked pairs and pointing pairs instead of being handed a digit. One caveat: a long-time reviewer on Brainium's page says the hints on the hardest puzzles have become less detailed, so treat it as a learning aid for the middle levels more than for expert play.

Notes, input and the board

Brainium gives you more switches. Auto-Fill Notes writes every candidate for you, which saves the counting on a fresh grid; Auto-Clear removes candidates when you place a number; Number Painting lets you pick a digit and tap cells to fill them quickly. You can change the grid style, backdrop and font size, play in landscape with the controls on either side, and use a keyboard on iPad. A recent version note also mentions an undo button.

Sudoku.com keeps it simpler: your notes update themselves when you fill a cell, duplicates are highlighted, and auto-check can be on or off. If you like a plain screen that looks the same every time, that simplicity is a plus. If you play on an iPad propped up sideways, or you are left-handed, Brainium's layout options matter more.

Daily play and events

Both have a daily puzzle. Sudoku.com rewards it with trophies and runs Seasonal Events that hand out medals, which gives the app a collecting loop if that motivates you. Brainium's daily earns points and gold checkmarks, and it adds global and friend leaderboards, so you can see how you did against people you know. Neither listing describes an archive of past dailies. For more on that, see our daily sudoku app comparison.

Where Sudoku.com is the better pick

• You like events and trophies. Seasonal Events and daily trophies give you something to collect.
• You want killer sudoku from the same maker. Easybrain publishes Killer Sudoku by Sudoku.com as a separate app; our killer sudoku guide covers it.
• You want a simple screen. Fewer settings, fewer decisions.

Where Brainium is the better pick

• You want to understand the moves. Its hints teach the reasoning.
• You want automatic candidates. Auto-Fill Notes is an option Sudoku.com's listing does not offer.
• You play on iPad in landscape or with a keyboard. Brainium lists both. Our iPad sudoku guide goes further.
• You want to compare scores with friends. Its leaderboards include a friends view.

A third option: Sudoku Royale

If the reason you are comparing these two is the ads, Sudoku Royale is worth a look: it has no ads and nothing to buy, so there is no removal price to weigh. It sits closer to Brainium in spirit, with hints that name the technique and the cell rather than the number, plus an 88-level Journey and the Dojo drills for practicing single patterns. It is narrower in other ways: no undo, no automatic notes, no landscape on iPhone, and it is new, with only 11 US ratings. Our head-to-heads against Sudoku.com and Brainium go into detail, or get Sudoku Royale on the App Store and try it next to whichever you keep. Every other matchup is on the comparisons page.