r/crossword
▲ 70 r/crossword
Roz Chast cartoon "alas, I left my wee epee on a mesa in Soho."
May be paywalled. Sorry.
u/yooperann — 2 days ago
▲ 0 r/crossword
Today's New Yorker Xword Has a VERY Naughty Word
Check out 13 Down in the August 18 2026 edition of the. New Yorker crossword by Aimee Lucido.
u/RealSugarPlumFairy — 2 days ago
▲ 5 r/crossword
Doing the Daily the day before?
The daily crossword usually comes out around 10pm the night before. I always wait, no matter how late I stay up, to do it during the day of that date. I feel a little cheap if I do it immediately when it comes out bc it’s like I’m stealing tmr’s fun.
u/Thiccuri — 2 days ago
▲ 5 r/crossword
pencil for crossword books?
i’ve gotten really into puzzle books this past year and have a couple of crossword puzzle books that have that weird kind of newspapery paper and am looking to see what pencils people like/recommend for books like this? i don’t want pens bc i make way too many mistakes and need to erase stuff. my biggest issues with most pencils i use is that they’re really thick for these tiny boxes, rip up the paper when i erase, hard to see, rip the paper when the pencils too sharp, etc. just wondering what people are using!
u/buffy_stars28 — 3 days ago
▲ 81 r/crossword
NYT Midi 8/15/2026 8 across
Weird that the answer is also a word in the clue, right?
Edit: I mean 8/16 not 8/15
u/Yifkong — 5 days ago
▲ 39 r/crossword
An 8x7 crossword puzzle with no black squares
This puzzle came out of a recent discussion on the "Crosscord" discord server, about whether this grid was fillable. A number of 7x7 blockless puzzles have been created before, but I believe this is the first standard-style 8x7. An exhaustive search over my wordlist returned only this 1 fill, and (all things considered) I'm surprised it's as clean as it is. There are definitely some obscurities in the puzzle... solve at your own risk!
u/hawkxor — 5 days ago
▲ 34 r/crossword
Designed my first Crossword!
New to crossword construction, but I had a lot of fun (as well as some frustration) along the way. Proud of myself for having followed through, even though I know this one is gnarly in some spots.
u/lavache_beadsman — 4 days ago
▲ 0 r/crossword
NYT Saturday 8/13/2008 Clue Help
Answer for ‘58D Sat’ was MET, can anyone help explain why? I think I’ve gone through 20 different definitions of set as a verb and nothing is clicking
EDIT: title’s wrong should be 8/23/2008
u/YouDressRatchet — 4 days ago
▲ 0 r/crossword
<SPOILERS!> Saturday’s puzzle killed my streak
So many things I didn’t know and wasn’t sure of (but ultimately were already correct), that I never thought to question that a bell ringing is not a >!real (my brain was thinking Scottish real (actually spelled reel) which is sound related so it never clicked it was wrong)!< but a >!peal!<.
It’s disappointing to have been tripped up by something so dumb. Ugh.
u/ClampLoader — 4 days ago
“Check Puzzle” Etiquette?
Hey it’s Mike Birbiglia! I know I’m not on here much, but I thought some people on here might be able to shed light on what is the etiquette on “check puzzle?” On my podcast, Working It Out, Jo Firestone and I randomly stumbled into this thing that we have in common and it started to give me a little bit of clarity.
u/birbigs — 7 days ago
▲ 5 r/crossword
Construction Advice Regarding Theme Answer Lengths?
I have an idea for a theme that I really love and have compiled a list of about 30 words and/or phrases that could be used as answers in that theme. I've been wanting to take a shot at making a 21x21 puzzle, but the issue is the answers I have are all in the 6-10 letter range.
Specifically, four are 10 letters long, including the revealer. Two are 9 letters long. Four are 8 letters long. Nine are 7 letters long. Twelve are 6 letters long. And technically there are two I could combine for one 16-letter-long answer, but it wouldn't be the cleanest.
Obviously I can't use all of those, so I am going to have to pare the list down regardless, but I am trying to gauge if it would be editorially frowned upon to do a 21x21 grid where the marquee 13-21-letter answers aren't the theme answers, but rather there are maybe a higher quantity of theme answers at a shorter letter count. I'd still have those long answers, they'd just be fill rather than the theme answers.
The other option of course is to pare the list down to just the best 6-10 and do a standard 15x15 puzzle, but I was curious what others think.
Thanks!
u/SpeakNowAndEnter — 4 days ago
▲ 12 r/crossword
Do NYT Thursdays Allow Nonsense/Nonreal Theme Answers?
To clarify: I mean do they allow an answer to not be a real word if it is part of the theme. I feel like I have seen examples of this in the past but I can't think of any specific examples, so I might be misremembering.
For example, if someone's theme was that every theme answer was missing the word "cat" from it, would DOMESTIED (domesticated, minus cat) and INTOXIED (intoxicated, minus cat) be allowable? Or does the answer always have to be a real word/phrase no matter if it's part of the theme?
That's not the best example because I'm not sure how you would build a whole theme around that, but that's the general idea of what I'm curious about.
u/SpeakNowAndEnter — 5 days ago
▲ 0 r/crossword
Cryptic Crossword from 2020...
So I found a Cryptic Crossword from 2020... (The Economist, Christmas Ed)
10A Peter's in a jam (6). Doesn't seem to be PICKLE or MUDDLE because I've got -U-M-E
17D Sparkles on radio like British bandleader (8). GLITTERS doesn't fit because I've got -E-E-E-S, but I can't make JEWELERS or BEJEWELS make any sense in my head.
Anyone got any insight? Thanks in advance!
u/oliversisson — 4 days ago
▲ 3 r/crossword
Washington Post, Sunday, August 16, 2026 - Why the underlines?
Just finished Sunday's puzzle and had several cells underlined. I checked the LA Times Crossword Corner website and their answer key did not have any answers underlined. Is this just an error on WashPo's website? (I can't for the life of me figure out what the underlined cells should spell out, anyway.)
u/hesitantmistake — 4 days ago