Can you solve the HARDEST logic puzzle? The Einstein Riddle

Legend says that Einstein invented this puzzle as a child. The following puzzle is adapted from the version in Life Magazine, 1962. Who drinks the water? And who owns the zebra?

Zebra Puzzle/Einstein Riddle on Wikipedia

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[zebrastripes]

Einstein didn't write this. It was written by the Canadian in the purple house #6 who drinks beer, eats Skittles, and has a pigeon with a video camera strapped to its head.

[teambellavsteamalice]

Actually this type of puzzle is called a Logigram. The main brand of puzzles in the Netherlands (Denksport) has them just like sudoku's. Then you have dozens of them in one little booklet. Various difficulties too, so you can work your way up to harder ones and get increasingly advanced booklets.

[VaTom]

I don't believe that Albert knew about Reeses, M&Ms, Snickers, and Kit Kats when he was a child.

[HaldaneSmith]

Everybody drinks water, and nobody owns a zebra. The zebra owns you.

[mittfh]

It's just a standard logic puzzle, as found in many puzzle collection books. Draw the stepped grids, label them with the six categories, mark the matches and exclusions (ensuring they're replicated across all relevant grids - e.g. The first clue tells you that the Englishman doesn't live in any other coloured house, and no other nationality lives in the red house), and start filling in the table for each house / colour / nationality / pet / drink / confectionary.

[Blackadder]

I did these all the time as a kid on rainy days (we didn't have nintendos back then and only 2 tv channels)
you had them in various difficulty levels

[wayneyadams]

Using grids in Excel make the puzzle go faster because it is so easy to duplicate a grid when necessary, and eliminating a grid is also very easy. This is the most difficult version of this puzzle I have ever seen, most to the time there are fewer options and fewer cluse I have also seen versions with people sitting around a circular table which adds its own complications.

[danielhanson]

This puzzle was reprinted in Reader's Digest, June 1963 edition, p. 24.

[masscreationbroadcasts]

*Reads thumbnail*
You're joking, right?
There has to be more to it, right?
Ah, 15 parts. Thank you.

[BlackFiresong]

I made one of those full 5x5x5 logic puzzle type grids to solve it. Very satisfying!

[ACarbonBasedLifeform]

I try solving this problem every couple of years (so that I forget the answer), and it's the first time I actually solved it!

[StephenMarkTurner]

I remember this as a kid, although the countries and candies are different.

[nurlant]

Wasn't it about alcohol than beverages and cigarettes than candies?

[markphc]

All this problem needs is a pencil, paper, and more patience than I possess

[flopyman]

Doing separate grids makes a lot more sense... I ended up doing the first letter of each group per section, it was messy, but got there in the end.

[GaurangAgrawal]

I lost my patience, after I thought I had to make separate cases (grids).

It was all becoming too much for me and I just couldn't do it anymore. I hope that I would have solved this till the end just to enjoy the satisfaction of solving this problem but alas!

[antoocello]

I remember doing this a few years back, it's a fun one

[nickmajora]

This took me a long time, over an hour but I'm glad I solved it. For some reason I thought if you needed to use multiple grids then you were doing it wrong and missing a deduction. I kept a single grid until I got the answer to water then I started a 'guess' grid and fortunately the first guess grid ended up without contradictions. I was glad to see Presh using multiple grids because I thought I failed a deduction somewhere.

[muralinagarajan]

Dear Presh, I have no words to express my appreciation for the way you create the placeholder videos that run at the same speed of your speech delivery without which your explanations could more than easily go above the head.. What more - the importance of the same for a puzzle such as this can never be exaggerated...
SOME PERSONAL HSTORY: I always love logical puzzles and scour different sources for the same. I came across this puzzle more than 25 years ago in some local magazine. I could have solved it but for my patience / discipline.. 🙂

[itsmesnacks]

when i first saw this puzzle it said something along the lines of "if you solve it you're smarter than 99% of people in the world" so i tried and succedeed, but in reality anyone can solve it you just need a LOT of patience and some logical thinking