Crosswords

How to play

In short

• Fill the white squares with words that match the clues. Where words cross, they share a letter.
• Two new crosswords every day for everyone: an arrowword with a hidden word and a classic crossword with numbered clues.

Arrowword

The clues are inside the grid, in the grey squares. The arrow shows where the word starts and which way it runs: right or down. A bent arrow means the word starts in the square next to the clue and runs the other way. One square can hold two clues, an upper and a lower one. On a phone the clue squares are small, so their text appears in the clue bar above the keyboard when you tap them.

The squares with small numbers make up the hidden word. Read them in number order to get the word described by the hidden word clue below the grid.

Classic crossword

The grid has white and black squares. Words start in numbered squares. The clues are in the Across and Down lists, below the grid on a phone and beside it on a wide screen.

How to play

1. Tap or click a square. The whole word lights up and its clue appears above the keyboard.
2. Type on the keyboard below the grid or on your computer keyboard. The cursor moves on by itself, and at the end of a word it jumps to the next unfinished word.
3. Tap the same square again, or the arrow button by the clue, to switch direction. The left and right arrows by the clue go to the previous and next word.
4. Tap a clue in the arrowword or in the list to select its word.

Help

• Check marks the letters that are wrong in red and leaves the rest alone.
• Letter reveals the correct letter in the selected square. If that square is already right, it reveals the first missing letter of the word, and if the whole word is right, a letter in the next word. A revealed letter cannot be changed.
• An unfinished crossword is saved in this browser, so you can come back to it at any time.

Daily crosswords and free play

• Daily crosswords: one arrowword and one classic crossword at medium difficulty, the same for every player in this language. New ones arrive at midnight. Time only runs while the game is on screen, and every revealed letter or check counts.
• Free play: a new crossword any time, easy, medium or hard.

Difficulty

• Easy: a smaller grid, familiar words and simple clues. Good for children.
• Medium: a bigger grid with place names, short symbols and less common words.
• Hard: the biggest grid and harder clues, such as capital cities, chemical symbols or a second meaning of a word.

Controls

• Touch and mouse: tap a square and type. The back arrow key deletes.
• Keyboard: letters type, arrow keys move the cursor, Space switches direction, Tab and Shift+Tab go to the next and previous word, Backspace deletes backwards, Delete clears the square under the cursor, Esc clears the selection.

Where the words come from

We wrote the words and clues ourselves. Spelling was checked against the Hunspell dictionaries, listed on the Licences and sources page.