Among the various games we have played, puzzle games have been a part of our childhood, and we all have loved the way such games acted as brain teasers and helped stimulate our nervous system.
As we grow up, we need such mind-teasing games for the healthy working of our brain cells. And as most of our time is spent online, why not make room for online puzzles and keep our brains refreshed? Therefore, my new list will include the best puzzle games you should consider downloading on your device for all the perplexity you need.
15 Best Puzzle Games For Android and iOS
1. Worldle91
The popular NYT word guessing game Wordle isn’t a secret to anyone. In fact, it’s the most popular game today, which has kick-started a whole world of online games, and the latest addition is Worldle91. It’s for geography nerds who need to guess countries from their silhouettes.
The game shows you a country outline, and your job is to guess which country it is. After each guess, the game provides helpful clues such as distance, direction, and proximity to the correct answer. Using those hints, you have six attempts to figure out the right country.
- Pros: Unique geography-based puzzle, great learning tool
- Cons: Can get tricky if your geography knowledge is limited
- Availability: Web / Mobile browsers
2. Mineweeper91
If you’ve ever used a Windows PC in the early 2000s, chances are you’ve already played Minesweeper. Minesweeper91 is the modern version of the classic game, where the goal is actually quite simple. You need to reveal all the safe cells without triggering a hidden mine.
Each revealed tile displays a number indicating how many mines are in the surrounding eight cells. Using logic and deduction, you mark suspected mines and clear the rest of the board.
- Pros: Classic logic puzzle, easy to learn but hard to master
- Cons: Can feel punishing if you make one wrong guess
- Availability: Web / Mobile browsers
3. Sudoku91
Sudoku91 takes the classic Sudoku puzzle and improves it with a cleaner interface and several customization options. The basic rule remains the same: fill the 9×9 grid with numbers from 1 to 9 without repeating them in rows, columns, or 3×3 sections. However, Sudoku91 adds multiple difficulty levels ranging from Easy all the way to Evil for players who want a real challenge.
What makes it stand out is the flexibility. You can customize the theme, highlight conflicts, toggle notes, and even use keyboard shortcuts for faster gameplay.
- Pros: Clean UI, multiple difficulty levels, customization options
- Cons: Advanced levels can be extremely challenging
- Availability: Web / Mobile browsers
4. Hocus
Hocus is a mind-bending perspective puzzle game. It is currently one of the top-rated puzzle games on the Play Store right now. In this game, your goal is to get a cube to the red finish marker as fast and efficiently as possible. It might look easy to play but can be pretty challenging.
One of the most incredible things about this game is that it lets you create and play other user-created puzzles. With over 100 puzzles, you can easily play this game for a few hours whenever you are bored.
- Pros: Pick up and play game, easy to learn
- Cons: Can get repetitive
- Availability: Android and iOS
5. Threes
Amid all the available puzzle games online, Threes has a similar concept of sliding tiles to form a particular number, in this case, three and its multiples. When you start playing the game, it will give you a walk-through on how to play it so that it gets easier for you.
It follows a simple drill of sliding the tiles and joining them to add the two titles. Even though it is an easy process, it will still take a while to join the tiles. It starts with making a three, followed by other multiples of three. Each step expects you to make one, and you have to use your brain while sliding to form the desired number.
The game has ease of flow, and once you start playing it often, you will enjoy it, and sliding tiles to form numbers will be your everyday goal.
- Pros: Addictive in a good way
- Cons: Can stutter sometimes
- Availability: Android and iOS
6. Mekorama
Mekorama is an adorable 3D puzzle game just like Treasure Tracker and Monument Valley. In this game, you control a cute little robot and navigate it through different puzzle rooms, each with different mechanics. Due to the variety in obstacles, the game keeps being fresh.
Whenever you finish a level, you unlock five more. So you won’t ever feel stuck, and the progression will be pretty open-ended. With over 50 levels to unlock, the game is quite a delight for those who like a challenge but want a laid-back experience.
- Pros: Looks quite good considering its a mobile game
- Cons: Might not run properly on older phones
- Availability: Android and iOS
7. Chess light – Puzzle Game
Chess light is a puzzle game based on, you guessed it, “Chess!”. The game puts you in over 180 different chess scenarios where you have to find a way to win. The game is free and comes with no ads, which is rare for games these days.
There are even six different difficulty options if you find the game is hard or too easy. You can even receive a hint if you feel like you are stuck. Fans of chess will definitely want to check this game out.
- Pros: Huge variety of puzzle combinations
- Cons: Have to know the basic rules of chess
- Availability: Android and iOS
8. Brain It On
Brain It On is an apt puzzle app to use when you want to challenge your brain. When I used the app, I could not help but scratch my head into how exactly can I play the simplest-looking game. The game works in a horizontal format and has a number of levels to reach.
You have to begin playing without doing much; open up the app, and select the first level (the first few levels are unlocked while others are locked), and start puzzling. Before you start, you have to make any shape of your choice on a plain canvas, beginning the main way of playing the game.
This means that the app needs you to do something on the canvas to execute a particular task. For instance, there will be a situation wherein you have to make something so that a glass kept on the canvas falls on the ground.
As the levels increase, the difficulty of the puzzle increases, which makes Brain It On one of the best Android puzzle games as well as on iOS. Furthermore, you can upgrade the app to get rid of ads.
- Pros: Simple UI
- Cons: Need to watch ads for hints
- Availability: Android and iOS
9. Monuments Valley
Monuments Valley is a puzzle video game wherein you are required to use your brain and help the character reach the destination. Anyone talking about puzzle games ought to mention Monument Valley. Hence, it had to make an entry on my list of best puzzle games.
While in the game, you have to play to puzzle to start playing the actual. The game is interesting as it has a 3D setting, and it is pretty fun to play.
The only drawback of the game is that it is a paid app, which slightly gets disappointing. Nonetheless, if spending money on apps is not a problem for you, Monuments Valley 1 and 2 are must-have puzzle games.
- Pros: Intriguing concept
- Cons: Paid app
- Availability: Android and iOS
10. Empty
Empty is a puzzle game similar to Monuments Valley, at least in terms of its artistic design. It’s a very zen-like puzzle game with a laid-back approach. Meaning you can play the game and not feel frustrated but rather healed.
The gameplay is quite simple, where you have to clear the room by rotating it. The game aims to teach us the value of simplicity in life with each level. It is entirely free and comes without any ads, which is quite rare for a game nowadays.
- Pros: Relaxing music and style
- Cons: Simplistic gameplay
- Availability: Android and iOS
11. Two Dots
The Two Dots Puzzle game moves around the two dots present on the app. You have to connect the dots in a way they meet each other, and a connection between the two is formed.
When you open up the app, the app will give a gist of how to play the game by letting you connect the two dots available on the screen. Once the process gets completed, you can start with the first level of the game, which will eventually take you up the hill of the more and more levels (with new ways of playing).
Keep in mind that you can connect the dots horizontally, vertically, or form a right-angle but can’t connect them diagonally. Additionally, you get limited moves, so you have to hurry up and use your brain before you make a move.
When you are at a particular level, you will be given some targets to make you cross the level. The initial levels are pretty straightforward, and you will feel like a pro until you reach more levels and realize it’s not as easy as it appeared.
- Pros: Engaging
- Cons: Can lag sometimes
- Availability: Android and iOS
12. Escape Puzzle Game
Escape Room is one of the puzzle types wherein you have to look for objects smartly. The game has a storyline where a girl introduces you to the game’s concept, following which you can start playing.
With a medieval backdrop, the game also provides you with a limited number of hints so that you move ahead with ease in situations when you get stuck.
The game begins with the first level (and moves up more levels), wherein you have to find a given number of objects and use them in the scene itself. You will have to tap on the various things placed and find the hidden things or combine two things to repair an item — the possibilities of proceeding ahead are many.
While the Escape Room is intriguing, the difficulty level makes it one of the well-suited puzzles for adults. However, kids can also play it to sharpen their brains.
- Pros: Story format
- Cons: Adverts
- Availability: Android
13. Move The Block
Move The Block is one of the classic sliding puzzles (among free puzzles) where you are required to slide the objects (in this case, blocks) to win the puzzle. The puzzle game has a number of levels under Basic, Premium, and Old categories (eight to be precise), with each level coming with sub-levels.
When you start with the first level, you will be guided around the game and the options available for you to use and play with ease. The game is an interesting one, and as you move forward, you won’t even realize how addictive the game will get, and you will end up playing it more than the allotted time period.
Of course, as you move up the levels, the levels will get difficult, and you might need the help of the hints available at your disposal. This is where the game’s drawback appears; to get each clue, you have to watch an ad video that makes it annoying.
- Pros: Daily Rewards
- Cons: Mid-gameplay ads
- Availability: Android and iOS
14. Jigsaw Puzzles Real
If you haven’t played a jigsaw puzzle, have you ever played a puzzle at all? One of the classic puzzle games of all time, the game’s name is enough to be one of the best free online jigsaw puzzles.
The game follows the simple process of joining the puzzle pieces and forming a single picture. The app provides you with various options to choose from: be it pictures related to nature, animals, aerial, and many more, and you can pick the ones you like and arrange the jigsaw puzzle.
Before the pieces are spread around, you will be given a small glimpse of the whole picture to start playing. You can further view the image again and again to get a better idea.
The game makes sure it twists your brain and acts as an element of nostalgia when jigsaw puzzles are actual board games.
- Pros: Various Puzzle options
- Cons: Ads, ads, ads
- Availability: Android and iOS
15. Skillz
Skillz is one of the mobile puzzle games that tease your brain and puts your brain to some good use.
The app lets you decide if you want to play as a single-player or play a multi-player game. Upon choosing, there will be a number of levels, and you will be taken to the first level. As a reminder, other levels will be locked until you pass the initial ones. Hence, skipping levels is not an option. In addition to this, there is an option to replay the game if you weren’t satisfied with your previous performance.
The levels include searching for a particular number or letter among the same numbers or letters, thus testing your brainpower and speed. The game proves pretty addictive as the urge to cross all the levels takes over once you start playing it. However, the presence of ads is a problem.
- Pros: Single/Multi-Player option
- Cons: Time-based gameplay
- Availability: Android and iOS
Types Of Puzzles
For those who think that puzzles are all about finding the puzzle pieces and completing a jigsaw, you need to know that there are many kinds of puzzles available for us to play with. These include riddles, trivia puzzles, math puzzles, pattern guessing, logic puzzles, and many more. This list contains puzzles such as trivia, sliding, logic, paper-and-pencil puzzles, among its various types. Hence, read on for more:
Frequently Asked Questions
1. Are puzzle games good for you?
Online puzzle games keep your mind sharp. Just as we need a physical workout to maintain our fitness, we need mind exercises (in the form of puzzles and more) for brain fitness. I hope my list of best free Android puzzle games (iOS too) acts as a helping tool to keep you busy in something productive other than just social media.
2. Do puzzle games help with problem solving?
It’s a well-known fact that video games improve problem-solving skills. One research even says that children’s creativity is enhanced by playing any kind of video game, including violent games. However, that’s not the case when the children use other forms of technology, such as a computer or cell phone.
Do let me know which games from our best puzzle games list you liked the most. If you have more suggestions to make, I will take them and add the best ones to my list.
Until then, keep on puzzling your brain and make it fitter and better!
Also Read: Best Android Games To Enjoy Mobile Gaming
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#Puzzle #Games #Android #iOS
![Is this e-reader case a gun?Is an e-reader case as dangerous as a Glock 19?Last month, Louisville, Kentucky-based creator Luke The Maker showed off a bizarre, 3D-printed, pistol-shaped case design for the popular minimalist Xteink X4 e-reader. The X4 lies vertically atop the plastic gun’s slide, with a cutout on the side to access its buttons. Though the frame was digitally modeled after a real gun, this “case” can’t shoot bullets. Squeezing the trigger does nothing at all. He calls his contraption the “Gundle.”In a post showing off the wacky accessory, Luke (whose last name is Blackford) can be seen flipping through Cormac McCarthy’s Blood Meridian and J.D. Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye before tossing the gun e-reader case in his car’s center console.“The perfect e-reader for public reading,” text reads over the clip.But even though this internet experiment is clearly intended as a joke or commentary, it’s possible future 3D printers won’t see it that way. Lawmakers in multiple states are pushing for laws mandating gun-blocking software on all new printers sold. This still-evolving technology would, in theory, scan every file before it’s physically printed and try to algorithmically determine whether it’s a firearm or firearm part. If the software decides that the thing being printed looks enough like a gun, it stops the printer from completing the job. That is, if it even works. Lawmakers in New York and California are leaving it up to a panel of industry experts to weigh whether the proposed vision is even technically feasible. Despite that cloud of uncertainty, legislation mandating this blocking tech has already become law in New York and passed California’s state assembly.“I didn’t want it to be so publicly available. I just didn’t want tons of them out there.” That may sound reasonable enough, but makers and industry experts previously told The Verge that the tech is underdeveloped and risks introducing false positives where non-guns that look gun-like get unnecessarily blocked. Blackford’s e-reader case falls directly in that detection gray area. Blackford says he didn’t explicitly make the Gundle to challenge the proposed laws, but he also didn’t shy away from expressing his opinion about them.“I’m not for that kind of thing because I’m big into open software,” Blackford says. “It’s just a wild frontier right now, so I definitely don’t trust [gun blueprint scanning tech] now.”“If people want to 3D print a gun, they’re going to do it,” he adds. “I don’t think it’s up to the people making the slicers to control that kind of thing.”Those pushing for these mandates, meanwhile, wouldn’t say whether their proposed tech would stop Blackford from making a harmless case. New York Gov. Kathy Hochul’s office didn’t respond to questions about Blackford’s device specifically, or the implications false positives could have for a maker’s ability to freely express themself.“Governor Hochul is laser-focused on improving public safety and reducing gun violence in New York,” deputy communications director at the Office of Governor Kathy Hochul and spokesperson Jess D’Amelia tells The Verge. “This law relies on the expertise of leading subject matter experts to evaluate and harness emerging technologies while addressing the real and growing threat of ghost guns and illegally manufactured weapons of war. The Governor is confident these measures will make all New York communities safer.”“The intent of the law is not to block prints like this, but I think this print is a really good example of why that’s hard.”Cliff Braun, associate director of technology policy and research at the Electronic Frontier Foundation, who has spoken critically of California’s proposal, says it’s unclear whether the proposed system would flag Blackford’s design. While the technology exists, Braun says it’s currently in a “limited form.” Critics say a more cautious detection system that relies on hashes to flag known firearms and parts from a database could be trivially easy to sidestep by simply making small changes to a file’s design. A more expansive approach using AI to analyze a file’s geometry and predict if it’s a gun, by contrast, may be more prone to mistakes. Things that look gun-ish but aren’t, in other words, might get swept up. Lawmakers in both states are leaving it to expert panels to iron out the details of implementation, but the final result, Braun says, will have to grapple with an unavoidable tradeoff between false positives and false negatives.“The intent of the law is not to block prints like this, but I think this print is a really good example of why that’s hard,” Braun says.Handguns like the one Blackford modeled his design on are particularly problematic. In 2022, the ATF updated its rules clarifying that the only parts of a firearm that legally require a serial number are those that provide the housing or structure for the weapon’s “primary fire control component.” In AR-15s and other long guns, that’s the receiver. Braun notes that the shapes of receivers are relatively unique and distinguishable, as are machine gun conversion devices. That’s not quite the same with a handgun. There, the part that requires a serial number is the frame. And unlike receivers, frames are visually far more ambiguous. Water hoses, toy guns, and power tools all share somewhat similar shapes.Dartmouth College associate professor of engineering Solomon Diamond tells The Verge that whether Blackford’s e-reader case gets blocked really depends on the type of technology that particular printer deploys. A more conservative hashing approach would fall flat because Blackford’s device wouldn’t match one of the exact hashes on a database of prohibited files. A different system using computer vision and AI to evaluate where an object likely resembles a gun, however, could flag it by mistake.“Basing blocking tech on visual resemblance is where the false positive concerns arise because a prop and a real functional firearm resemble one another,” Diamond told The Verge. “The technical challenge here is that depending on training data and algorithms used, setting decision thresholds that have acceptably low false positive rates might have unacceptably high false negative rates and vice versa.”“Visual resemblance might be fooled by [the] gun-shaped e-reader case,” he added.Diamond noted a third option, “geometric identification,” could potentially thread the needle. This approach, which is currently being deployed to guide quality control in manufacturing, can be fine-tuned for what Diamond refers to as “exact geometric match,” where a zero false-positive rate is at least theoretically possible. This approach is still relatively new when it comes to 3D print blocking tech.“Geometric Identification would not be fooled by your gun-shaped e-reader case,” he said.3D printer manufacturers and the experts setting the standards for how blocking software mandates will work are then left with a complex choice. Requiring systems that are both actually effective at detecting guns and technically feasible to introduce in the near future will necessarily mean some non-guns get caught in the crossfire. Pretty quickly, that starts limiting how makers, hobbyists, and artists can express themselves.“If you’re going to try and block all of those wonderfully creative humans, you’re going to make it very hard to print props or make social commentary,” Braun said.Blackford says making the Gundle was relatively straightforward. He first went online and did a simple search for “free gun model,” which turned up the blueprints for the gun shell part of the case. He then uploaded that to Fusion 360, his preferred modeling program, and added the e-reader on top and built the case around it. The Xteink X4 is one of the cheaper e-readers on the market, and though it has limited functionality, its devoted community regularly works to improve it. With the digital design finalized, Blackford sent it off to his Bambu Lab H2D printer. The entire process, from initial idea to printed product, took less than 24 hours.Even though the device doesn’t shoot, Blackford says he still hasn’t taken it out in public. He’s since published the files on his website, where anyone with a 3D printer can download them and make their own. Blackford admits he did this with some hesitation. The case isn’t a gun, but it looks enough like one that someone brandishing it in the open, or revealing it during a confrontation with law enforcement, could find themselves in a seriously dangerous misunderstanding. He talked things over with his wife before publishing, and ultimately decided to avoid larger marketplaces like Thingiverse or Printables so it wouldn’t spread too widely. This way, he says, people can still find it if they are interested but won’t randomly stumble upon it.“I didn’t want it to be so publicly available,” Blackford says. “I just didn’t want tons of them out there.”“If you’re going to try and block all of those wonderfully creative humans, you’re going to make it very hard to print props or make social commentary.”There’s also some question as to whether walking around with the case would violate already existing federal laws requiring toys or other “look-alike firearms” to have distinctive markings. These so-called “orange tip laws” are why fake guns and airsoft guns have blaze-orange plastic tips attached to their muzzles when they are manufactured and sold. But the e-reader case isn’t really a toy or a fake gun, but an art project.Regardless, Blackford says if he ever did take it out in public, he’d print a version in a different color to make clear it isn’t imitating a real weapon. That’s not an overreaction. Walking around in public with something that resembles a gun, even if it is functionally useless, can make interactions with police and other gun owners dangerous, or even deadly. In 2014, Cleveland police shot and killed a 12-year-old boy named Tamir Rice after he reached for a toy gun. A 2016 Washington Post report estimated that over the span of two years, police shot and killed 86 people who were holding realistic-looking toy weapons and pellet and airsoft guns.Supporters of blueprint scanning mandates say it’s necessary to close an enforcement gap that’s giving those with felony convictions and others access to guns when they shouldn’t have them. Various laws prohibiting the manufacture and sale of 3D-printed ghost guns (untraceable firearms without serial numbers) already exist across the country. But people print in the privacy of their own homes, making enforcing those laws nearly impossible. Hochul has called this dynamic the “plastic pipeline” and warns of criminals printing guns on their kitchen tables. Mandating scanning software would shift the responsibility onto printer manufacturers, stopping the illegal guns before they are ever made.Whether the threat posed by 3D-printed guns actually justifies such a transformative change to how printers work remains up for debate. The guns are certainly getting better in terms of performance. There are also more of them. In 2024, the NYPD said it recovered 109 mostly 3D-printed guns from crime scenes. That’s up from just one recorded three years prior. A separate 2024 report from the gun control advocacy group Everytown found similar results in 20 other cities.All of that is a drop in the bucket compared to conventional guns collected at crime scenes. In 2025 alone, then-Mayor Eric Adams claimed the NYPD seized more than 5,200 illegal guns. The total number of firearms in the country more broadly has been estimated to outnumber people.But Blackford says he wasn’t convinced 3D-printed guns pose an especially immediate danger. In his view, they are still primarily made by tinkerers and gun enthusiasts with a passion for the process and plenty of time on their hands. In most cases, he’s convinced, getting a real gun is still much easier than printing one.3D printing, Blackford says, “is too much of a pain in the ass.”And if legislation like New York’s or California’s ever reaches Kentucky, Blackford says he’s ready to get creative, either by using VPNs or figuring out some other workaround. He’s likely not alone.“Some companies are going to be putting those locks in place, but I think open-source software is always going to prevail,” Blackford says.Follow topics and authors from this story to see more like this in your personalized homepage feed and to receive email updates.Mack DeGeurinCloseMack DeGeurinPosts from this author will be added to your daily email digest and your homepage feed.FollowFollowSee All by Mack DeGeurinTechCloseTechPosts from this topic will be added to your daily email digest and your homepage feed.FollowFollowSee All Tech#ereader #case #gunTech](https://i3.wp.com/platform.theverge.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2026/07/3D_gun.jpg?quality=90&strip=all&crop=0%2C10.732984293194%2C100%2C78.534031413613&w=1200&ssl=1 "Is this e-reader case a gun?Is an e-reader case as dangerous as a Glock 19?Last month, Louisville, Kentucky-based creator Luke The Maker showed off a bizarre, 3D-printed, pistol-shaped case design for the popular minimalist Xteink X4 e-reader. The X4 lies vertically atop the plastic gun’s slide, with a cutout on the side to access its buttons. Though the frame was digitally modeled after a real gun, this “case” can’t shoot bullets. Squeezing the trigger does nothing at all. He calls his contraption the “Gundle.”In a post showing off the wacky accessory, Luke (whose last name is Blackford) can be seen flipping through Cormac McCarthy’s Blood Meridian and J.D. Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye before tossing the gun e-reader case in his car’s center console.“The perfect e-reader for public reading,” text reads over the clip.But even though this internet experiment is clearly intended as a joke or commentary, it’s possible future 3D printers won’t see it that way. Lawmakers in multiple states are pushing for laws mandating gun-blocking software on all new printers sold. This still-evolving technology would, in theory, scan every file before it’s physically printed and try to algorithmically determine whether it’s a firearm or firearm part. If the software decides that the thing being printed looks enough like a gun, it stops the printer from completing the job. That is, if it even works. Lawmakers in New York and California are leaving it up to a panel of industry experts to weigh whether the proposed vision is even technically feasible. Despite that cloud of uncertainty, legislation mandating this blocking tech has already become law in New York and passed California’s state assembly.“I didn’t want it to be so publicly available. I just didn’t want tons of them out there.” That may sound reasonable enough, but makers and industry experts previously told The Verge that the tech is underdeveloped and risks introducing false positives where non-guns that look gun-like get unnecessarily blocked. Blackford’s e-reader case falls directly in that detection gray area. Blackford says he didn’t explicitly make the Gundle to challenge the proposed laws, but he also didn’t shy away from expressing his opinion about them.“I’m not for that kind of thing because I’m big into open software,” Blackford says. “It’s just a wild frontier right now, so I definitely don’t trust [gun blueprint scanning tech] now.”“If people want to 3D print a gun, they’re going to do it,” he adds. “I don’t think it’s up to the people making the slicers to control that kind of thing.”Those pushing for these mandates, meanwhile, wouldn’t say whether their proposed tech would stop Blackford from making a harmless case. New York Gov. Kathy Hochul’s office didn’t respond to questions about Blackford’s device specifically, or the implications false positives could have for a maker’s ability to freely express themself.“Governor Hochul is laser-focused on improving public safety and reducing gun violence in New York,” deputy communications director at the Office of Governor Kathy Hochul and spokesperson Jess D’Amelia tells The Verge. “This law relies on the expertise of leading subject matter experts to evaluate and harness emerging technologies while addressing the real and growing threat of ghost guns and illegally manufactured weapons of war. The Governor is confident these measures will make all New York communities safer.”“The intent of the law is not to block prints like this, but I think this print is a really good example of why that’s hard.”Cliff Braun, associate director of technology policy and research at the Electronic Frontier Foundation, who has spoken critically of California’s proposal, says it’s unclear whether the proposed system would flag Blackford’s design. While the technology exists, Braun says it’s currently in a “limited form.” Critics say a more cautious detection system that relies on hashes to flag known firearms and parts from a database could be trivially easy to sidestep by simply making small changes to a file’s design. A more expansive approach using AI to analyze a file’s geometry and predict if it’s a gun, by contrast, may be more prone to mistakes. Things that look gun-ish but aren’t, in other words, might get swept up. Lawmakers in both states are leaving it to expert panels to iron out the details of implementation, but the final result, Braun says, will have to grapple with an unavoidable tradeoff between false positives and false negatives.“The intent of the law is not to block prints like this, but I think this print is a really good example of why that’s hard,” Braun says.Handguns like the one Blackford modeled his design on are particularly problematic. In 2022, the ATF updated its rules clarifying that the only parts of a firearm that legally require a serial number are those that provide the housing or structure for the weapon’s “primary fire control component.” In AR-15s and other long guns, that’s the receiver. Braun notes that the shapes of receivers are relatively unique and distinguishable, as are machine gun conversion devices. That’s not quite the same with a handgun. There, the part that requires a serial number is the frame. And unlike receivers, frames are visually far more ambiguous. Water hoses, toy guns, and power tools all share somewhat similar shapes.Dartmouth College associate professor of engineering Solomon Diamond tells The Verge that whether Blackford’s e-reader case gets blocked really depends on the type of technology that particular printer deploys. A more conservative hashing approach would fall flat because Blackford’s device wouldn’t match one of the exact hashes on a database of prohibited files. A different system using computer vision and AI to evaluate where an object likely resembles a gun, however, could flag it by mistake.“Basing blocking tech on visual resemblance is where the false positive concerns arise because a prop and a real functional firearm resemble one another,” Diamond told The Verge. “The technical challenge here is that depending on training data and algorithms used, setting decision thresholds that have acceptably low false positive rates might have unacceptably high false negative rates and vice versa.”“Visual resemblance might be fooled by [the] gun-shaped e-reader case,” he added.Diamond noted a third option, “geometric identification,” could potentially thread the needle. This approach, which is currently being deployed to guide quality control in manufacturing, can be fine-tuned for what Diamond refers to as “exact geometric match,” where a zero false-positive rate is at least theoretically possible. This approach is still relatively new when it comes to 3D print blocking tech.“Geometric Identification would not be fooled by your gun-shaped e-reader case,” he said.3D printer manufacturers and the experts setting the standards for how blocking software mandates will work are then left with a complex choice. Requiring systems that are both actually effective at detecting guns and technically feasible to introduce in the near future will necessarily mean some non-guns get caught in the crossfire. Pretty quickly, that starts limiting how makers, hobbyists, and artists can express themselves.“If you’re going to try and block all of those wonderfully creative humans, you’re going to make it very hard to print props or make social commentary,” Braun said.Blackford says making the Gundle was relatively straightforward. He first went online and did a simple search for “free gun model,” which turned up the blueprints for the gun shell part of the case. He then uploaded that to Fusion 360, his preferred modeling program, and added the e-reader on top and built the case around it. The Xteink X4 is one of the cheaper e-readers on the market, and though it has limited functionality, its devoted community regularly works to improve it. With the digital design finalized, Blackford sent it off to his Bambu Lab H2D printer. The entire process, from initial idea to printed product, took less than 24 hours.Even though the device doesn’t shoot, Blackford says he still hasn’t taken it out in public. He’s since published the files on his website, where anyone with a 3D printer can download them and make their own. Blackford admits he did this with some hesitation. The case isn’t a gun, but it looks enough like one that someone brandishing it in the open, or revealing it during a confrontation with law enforcement, could find themselves in a seriously dangerous misunderstanding. He talked things over with his wife before publishing, and ultimately decided to avoid larger marketplaces like Thingiverse or Printables so it wouldn’t spread too widely. This way, he says, people can still find it if they are interested but won’t randomly stumble upon it.“I didn’t want it to be so publicly available,” Blackford says. “I just didn’t want tons of them out there.”“If you’re going to try and block all of those wonderfully creative humans, you’re going to make it very hard to print props or make social commentary.”There’s also some question as to whether walking around with the case would violate already existing federal laws requiring toys or other “look-alike firearms” to have distinctive markings. These so-called “orange tip laws” are why fake guns and airsoft guns have blaze-orange plastic tips attached to their muzzles when they are manufactured and sold. But the e-reader case isn’t really a toy or a fake gun, but an art project.Regardless, Blackford says if he ever did take it out in public, he’d print a version in a different color to make clear it isn’t imitating a real weapon. That’s not an overreaction. Walking around in public with something that resembles a gun, even if it is functionally useless, can make interactions with police and other gun owners dangerous, or even deadly. In 2014, Cleveland police shot and killed a 12-year-old boy named Tamir Rice after he reached for a toy gun. A 2016 Washington Post report estimated that over the span of two years, police shot and killed 86 people who were holding realistic-looking toy weapons and pellet and airsoft guns.Supporters of blueprint scanning mandates say it’s necessary to close an enforcement gap that’s giving those with felony convictions and others access to guns when they shouldn’t have them. Various laws prohibiting the manufacture and sale of 3D-printed ghost guns (untraceable firearms without serial numbers) already exist across the country. But people print in the privacy of their own homes, making enforcing those laws nearly impossible. Hochul has called this dynamic the “plastic pipeline” and warns of criminals printing guns on their kitchen tables. Mandating scanning software would shift the responsibility onto printer manufacturers, stopping the illegal guns before they are ever made.Whether the threat posed by 3D-printed guns actually justifies such a transformative change to how printers work remains up for debate. The guns are certainly getting better in terms of performance. There are also more of them. In 2024, the NYPD said it recovered 109 mostly 3D-printed guns from crime scenes. That’s up from just one recorded three years prior. A separate 2024 report from the gun control advocacy group Everytown found similar results in 20 other cities.All of that is a drop in the bucket compared to conventional guns collected at crime scenes. In 2025 alone, then-Mayor Eric Adams claimed the NYPD seized more than 5,200 illegal guns. The total number of firearms in the country more broadly has been estimated to outnumber people.But Blackford says he wasn’t convinced 3D-printed guns pose an especially immediate danger. In his view, they are still primarily made by tinkerers and gun enthusiasts with a passion for the process and plenty of time on their hands. In most cases, he’s convinced, getting a real gun is still much easier than printing one.3D printing, Blackford says, “is too much of a pain in the ass.”And if legislation like New York’s or California’s ever reaches Kentucky, Blackford says he’s ready to get creative, either by using VPNs or figuring out some other workaround. He’s likely not alone.“Some companies are going to be putting those locks in place, but I think open-source software is always going to prevail,” Blackford says.Follow topics and authors from this story to see more like this in your personalized homepage feed and to receive email updates.Mack DeGeurinCloseMack DeGeurinPosts from this author will be added to your daily email digest and your homepage feed.FollowFollowSee All by Mack DeGeurinTechCloseTechPosts from this topic will be added to your daily email digest and your homepage feed.FollowFollowSee All Tech#ereader #case #gunTech")
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