History of Jigsaw Puzzles — From 18th-Century Maps to Mobile Apps
How the jigsaw puzzle went from a 1760s London map lesson to a Depression-era craze, die-cut mass production, and digital apps, plus tips to solve faster.
A jigsaw puzzle is a simple pastime: you cut a single picture into many pieces and then put it back together. But this pastime wasn't originally made for fun. It began in 18th-century England as "dissected maps" designed to teach children geography.
In this post, we look at when and by whom the jigsaw puzzle was created, where the name "jigsaw" came from, how wooden puzzles gave way to cardboard ones, the booms during the Great Depression and the pandemic, and the path to digital puzzle apps. At the end, we also cover the basic tips for solving puzzles quickly.
1760s London: A World Map on a Wooden Board
The person usually credited with first making the jigsaw puzzle as a commercial product is John Spilsbury (1739–1769), a London cartographer and engraver. He apprenticed under Thomas Jefferys, the Royal Geographer, and in 1763 he advertised himself as a "map dissector in wood."
Spilsbury mounted world maps on thin wooden boards and cut them out along national borders. It was a teaching aid that let students learn the locations and shapes of countries by fitting the pieces back together. At the time, these were called "Dissected Maps." He made puzzles on eight themes: the world, Europe, Asia, Africa, America, England and Wales, Ireland, and Scotland.
That said, Spilsbury was not the only originator. Letters record that Jeanne-Marie Leprince de Beaumont, a French writer and educator living in England, was already using "wooden maps" in her lessons from around 1759. That's why today it is usually said that "Spilsbury was the first to commercialize the jigsaw puzzle."
Dissected maps became popular in upper-class education. Royal governess Charlotte Finch used them to teach the children of King George III and Queen Charlotte. Spilsbury died in 1769 at around the age of thirty, but his wife and his former apprentice Harry Ashby carried on the business.
Where Did the Name "Jigsaw" Come From?
Early puzzles were called "dissections." The current name came from the tool used to cut the puzzles.
| Period | Change |
|---|---|
| Around 1760 | Wooden maps cut with marquetry saws |
| Late 1800s | Cardboard puzzles appear, but wooden puzzles remain the mainstream |
| Around 1880 | The fretsaw becomes the main tool and gets linked to the word "jigsaw" |
| 1906 | The term "jigsaw puzzle" appears in the record |
Strictly speaking, several tools were used to cut puzzles, including fretsaws, jigsaws, and scroll saws, and of these, "jigsaw" stuck as the name. Cardboard puzzles had already appeared by the late 1800s, but manufacturers felt they "looked cheap," and wooden puzzles were more profitable, so cardboard didn't catch on widely for some time.
Becoming a Pastime for Adults: The 1900s and the Great Depression
Jigsaw puzzles shifted from children's teaching aids to an adult hobby in the early 20th century. In the United States, a puzzle craze swept through adults from 1907 to 1910, spreading to Europe a year or two later.
Puzzles of this era were quite different from today's.
- They were made of solid wood.
- The pieces often didn't interlock, so even a slight bump could scatter them.
- The box often didn't show the finished picture.
Puzzle historian Anne Williams attributes this craze to the economic downturn of 1907, the growing popularity of crafts among middle-class women, and the spread of foot-powered scroll saws.
The second big boom came during the Great Depression of the 1930s. Puzzles were cheap, could be enjoyed for a long time, and could be swapped with friends once finished. Around this time, puzzles became more complex and better suited to adults, and companies even made puzzles featuring their product images to hand out as promotional items.
From Wood to Paper: Die-Cut Mass Production
Most puzzles today are made from cardboard, which is compressed paper. The manufacturing process is similar to stamping out dough with a cookie cutter.
- The picture is printed and mounted on cardboard.
- A die (puzzle die) with steel blades set in the shape of the pieces is prepared.
- A press pushes the die hard into the cardboard, cutting out all the pieces at once.
From the 1930s, puzzles were stamped out with huge hydraulic presses. The precisely cut pieces fit snugly, but the equipment was expensive, so only large companies could make puzzles. After World War II, rising wages made hand-cut wooden puzzles expensive, and cardboard puzzles became the center of the market.
More recently, lasers are also used to cut wood or acrylic. This lets makers cut puzzles freely to any size and piece count, and it's easy to remake lost pieces.
The Rules Behind Piece Counts and Shapes
The piece count printed on a puzzle box often differs slightly from the actual number. That's because the pieces are arranged in a grid of rows and columns.
| Label | Common layout | Actual piece count |
|---|---|---|
| 500 pieces | 27 × 19 | 513 |
| 1,000 pieces | 38 × 27 | 1,026 |
Modern puzzle pieces interlock with their neighbors through rounded tabs and blanks. A puzzle that locks together tightly enough that you can pick up an assembled section without it falling apart is called "fully interlocking," and puzzles in which nearly all the pieces share the same shape are harder to tell apart and therefore more difficult. Old wooden puzzles, on the other hand, sometimes included special pieces shaped like animals or objects ("whimsies").
There are world records, too. By piece count, a 551,232-piece puzzle assembled by university students in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, in 2011 holds the Guinness record. Since 2019, the World Jigsaw Puzzle Championship has also been held every year.
The Pandemic and Digital Puzzle Apps
Jigsaw puzzles have drawn renewed attention every time people stayed at home. When outings were restricted during the COVID-19 pandemic, demand for puzzles surged to levels comparable to the Great Depression.
Along with this, puzzles also moved onto screens. Compared with paper puzzles, digital jigsaw puzzles differ in the following ways.
| Item | Paper puzzles | Digital puzzles |
|---|---|---|
| Space | Need a large table | A phone is enough |
| Lost pieces | Can happen | Never |
| Difficulty | Fixed per box | Piece count and rotation can be changed |
| Pictures | Only the puzzles you buy | Switch between many pictures instantly |
| Feel | The joy of handling the pieces | Quick, with touch |
Apps can't replace the tactile feel of paper puzzles, but they are a good alternative when you want to finish a round in a short time or can't occupy a table for long.
Tips for Solving Puzzles Faster
Whether on paper or in an app, the basic tips are the same.
- Start with the edges: First pick out the border pieces with one straight side and the four corner pieces to build the frame.
- Sort by color and pattern: Group pieces with similar colors and textures, such as sky, buildings, or people.
- Do the eye-catching parts first: Complete areas with lots of clues first, such as text, faces, and sharp edges.
- Sort by shape: For areas with uniform color like the sky, sort pieces by the number and position of their tabs and blanks.
- Take a break: When you get stuck, moving to another area for a while often helps you solve it surprisingly fast.
In a 2021 study, children aged 3 to 5 were asked to solve several types of puzzles, and they solved ordinary puzzles with a picture and differently shaped pieces the fastest. This also suggests that using two clues together, picture and shape, is the key to solving puzzles.
Wrapping Up
Starting as a map teaching aid in the classroom, the jigsaw puzzle has survived for more than 250 years by changing its form. Even as the material shifted from wood to cardboard and from cardboard to screens, the joy of the moment when scattered pieces become a single picture remains the same.
If you'd like to enjoy puzzles casually on your phone, puzzle apps from Keke Studio such as JIGGLEBELL Jigsaw, or K-Pop Jigsaw Puzzle: NOCTIVE and VELORA, where you assemble K-pop-style artwork, are one option.
