OSRS Puzzle Box Solver
Solve any OSRS puzzle box or sliding puzzle: set your tiles, get the moves, often the fewest possible, and play them step by step. Every clue box and Monkey Madness.
Have a screenshot? Paste it, drop it here or choose it, and the page reads your board from it.
Your screenshot stays on your device: it is read on this page and never sent anywhere.
Pick a tile number below, then tap the square where you see that tile in your puzzle. Tap two squares to swap them. The square left empty is the gap.
25 entries: the 24 tile numbers as they sit in your puzzle row by row, and 0 for the gap.
Play it one move at a time
Lost your place? Press Where am I? to copy this step's board into your board, change any square that differs from your game, and the page finds your step or solves again from there.
Every move
Which tile is which
What each tile shows, 24 tiles
| Tile | Square | What it shows | Looks like |
|---|
Every move is checked. The page plays its moves on your board before it shows them. When it says the moves are the fewest possible, no shorter solve exists; otherwise it gives the least any solve could take. Tile pictures and descriptions are of the finished pictures, checked against the OSRS Wiki on 6 November 2026.
How to solve a puzzle box
Every sliding puzzle in the game is a 5 by 5 board: 24 tiles and one gap. Number the tiles of the finished picture 1 to 24, left to right along each row from the top, with the gap in the bottom right corner. Pick your picture above, then set each tile where it sits in your puzzle: tap a number and then the square, or type the numbers row by row with 0 for the gap. The tile guide shows each numbered tile and what is on it, and it is easiest to place the tiles you are sure of first and fill in the look-alikes last. A move slides one tile next to the gap into it, so each step names the tile to click and the way it slides.
A screenshot saves the typing. Paste it, drop it on the page or choose it from your files or photos, and the page finds the puzzle, works out the picture and fills in the board. It marks any square it is not sure of, and a board read from a screenshot is only solved once you press Use this board, so compare it with your game first. If it cannot find the puzzle, drag a box around the puzzle on your screenshot. Screenshots are read on this page and never leave your device.
The page finds the moves as soon as the board is complete. Step through them with Next move, and Undo goes back one. If your game and the page drift apart, press Where am I?, fix the squares that differ, and the page picks up from the step that matches or works out a new solve from your board.
Where puzzle boxes come from
Puzzle boxes come from hard and master clue scrolls. On a hard clue, 23 steps hand you one when you talk to the person the clue names, and the box shows the castle, tree or troll picture. On a master clue, 16 anagram steps give either a light box or a puzzle box, and a master box shows the Zulrah, Cerberus, Gnome child or Theatre of Blood picture. Solve the box, then talk to the same person again for your next clue or your reward casket. Stacked clues wait in your scroll boxes while you work through one.
Hard clue steps that give a puzzle box, 23 steps
| The clue | Talk to | Where |
|---|---|---|
| BAKER CLIMBAnagram | Brambickle | Located on Trollweiss Mountain. |
| BLUE GRIM GUIDEDAnagram | Lumbridge Guide | Just outside of Lumbridge Castle. |
| DARN DRAKEAnagram | Daer Krand | Upstairs in the eastern wing of the Sisterhood Sanctuary, just north of the Nightmare's arena. |
| DR WARDEN FUNKAnagram | Drunken Dwarf | In Keldagrim, east side in the house with broken glass. |
| MY MANGLE LALAnagram | Lammy Langle | Hosidius spirit tree patch |
| BSOPME MZETQPSCipher | Arnold Lydspor | Piscatoris Fishing Colony general store/bank (requires completion of Swan Song) (North of fairy ring AKQ) |
| BXJA UNJMNA YRCARCipher | Soar Leader Pitri | first floor of the Hunter Guild (requires completion of Children of the Sun) (North-west of fairy ring AJP) |
| GBJSZ RVFFOCipher | Fairy Queen | Fairy Resistance Hideout (requires Fairytale II - Cure a Queen quest to be finished, use a fairy ring with the codes AIR, DLR, DJQ, and AJS in that order) |
| IWPPLQTPCipher | Gunnjorn | Barbarian Outpost Agility course |
| ZSBKDO ZODOCipher | Pirate Pete | On the dock north-east of the Ectofuntus |
| A general who sets a 'shining' example.Cryptic | General Hining | Speak to General Hining found at Tyras Camp. |
| Citric cellar.Cryptic | Heckel Funch | Speak to Heckel Funch on the first floor in the Grand Tree. |
| Generally speaking, his nose was very bent.Cryptic | General Bentnoze | Talk to General Bentnoze, found in the northernmost part of Goblin Village; he'll give you a puzzle box. |
| Gold I see, yet gold I require. Give me 875 if death you desire.Cryptic | Saniboch | Speak to Saniboch at the Brimhaven Dungeon entrance. |
| I watch the sea. I watch you fish. I watch your tree.Cryptic | Ellena | Speak to Ellena at Catherby fruit tree patch. |
| Identify the back of this over-acting brother. (He's a long way from home.)Cryptic | Hamid | Talk to Hamid, the monk at the altar in the Emir's Arena hospital. You will receive a puzzle box. |
| My name is like a tree, yet it is spelt with a 'g'. Come see the fur which is right near me.Cryptic | Wilough | Speak to Wilough, next to the fur merchant in Varrock Square. |
| Often sought out by scholars of histories past, find me where words of wisdom speak volumes.Cryptic | Examiner | Speak to an examiner at the Exam Centre. You might need to talk to several different examiners. |
| 'Small shoe.' Often found with rod on mushroom.Cryptic | Gnome trainer | Talk to any Gnome trainer in the Agility area of the Tree Gnome Stronghold. |
| Surviving.Cryptic | Sir Vyvin | Talk to Sir Vyvin on the second floor of Falador Castle (east side). |
| The keeper of Melzars...Spare? Skeleton? Anar?Cryptic | Oziach | Speak to Oziach in Edgeville. |
| The King's magic shouldn't be wasted by me.Cryptic | Guardian mummy | Talk to the Guardian mummy inside the Pyramid Plunder minigame in Sophanem. Partial completion of Icthlarin's Little Helper is required. The mummy will only be found in one of the four entrances, this might require players to check the other entrances. |
| This aviator is at the peak of his profession.Cryptic | Captain Bleemadge | Captain Bleemadge, the gnome glider pilot, is found at the top of White Wolf Mountain. |
Master clue steps that give a puzzle box or a light box, 16 steps
| Anagram | Talk to | Where |
|---|---|---|
| A Elf Knows | Snowflake | Weiss |
| Brucie Catnap | Captain Bruce | Shayzien |
| Car If Ices | Sacrifice | Zul-Andra, on the dock near Priestess Zul-Gwenwynig. |
| Ded War | Edward | Inside Rogues' Castle |
| Dim Tharn | Mandrith | Outside the Wilderness Resource Area. |
| Duo Plug | Dugopul | Graveyard on Ape Atoll, south of Awowogei's throne room. |
| Forlun | Runolf | Miscellania and Etceteria Dungeon (Requires partial completion of Royal Trouble.) |
| Im N Zezim | Immenizz | The impling inside Puro-Puro. |
| Mal in Tau | Luminata | East of the Burgh de Rott entrance, in town. |
| Mold La Ran | Old Man Ral | Meiyerditch |
| Mus Kil Reader | Radimus Erkle | Legends' Guild |
| Rip Maul | Primula | Myths' Guild |
| Rue Go | Goreu | Lletya |
| Slam Duster Grail | Guildmaster Lars | Woodcutting Guild in Hosidius. |
| Ten Wigs On | Wingstone | Between Nardah and the Agility Pyramid. |
| Twenty Cure Iron | New Recruit Tony | Graveyard of Heroes in Shayzien. |
Getting a different box
The game makes every box by sliding a random tile into the gap 101 times, starting from the finished picture, so every box it gives can be solved. Close a box before you hand it in and it mixes itself up again. For a different box, drop a hard box or destroy a master box and ask for another, or log out. If a second puzzle box from the same step is still in your inventory or bank when you finish, you cannot get your next clue until it is gone. The box counts for more than the clue: if another player kills you in the Wilderness, you keep the puzzle box over the clue, but you cannot hand it in without the clue.
The Monkey Madness I glider panel
During Monkey Madness I, Waydar asks you to fix the reinitialisation panel in the hidden glider hangar under the Grand Tree, a sliding puzzle like the clue boxes that is mixed with 255 slides instead of 101, so it usually takes more moves. Its picture is a glider among clouds, and the crate beside the panel holds spare controls that show it finished while the quest is running. If you would rather not solve it, Glough will do most of it for 200,000 coins and leave the last moves to you: enter the board he leaves and this page finishes it.
When a board cannot be solved
Half of all the ways to arrange 24 tiles cannot be solved by sliding. Read the tiles row by row and count the pairs where a higher number comes before a lower one: a board can be solved only when that count is even. Since every box the game hands out can be solved, a board this page rejects has two tiles the wrong way round, nearly always two that look alike. The page names the look-alike tiles in your picture so you can check those first.
How short the moves are
The page searches for the fewest moves first. Most clue boxes come out between 20 and 50 moves, and for more than 8 in 10 of them the page proves its answer is the fewest possible. For the rest, and for the glider panel's longer boards, it gives a short solve and shows beside it the least any solve could take, so you can see how close it is. Ironmen, Hardcore Worlds and the permanent Deadman world get the same boxes.
Update history
Every change to this calculator
- The board can now be read from a screenshot: paste, drop or choose one, check any marked squares, then press Use this board.
- The board, the tile tray and the tile guide now show each tile's picture from the game.
- Calculator added