Free Games How to play the mini crossword
A crossword is a grid of squares you fill with letters so that the words read correctly both across and down. In a mini, the grid is just five squares by five — small, quick, and friendly. Every word is a common, everyday word, and the clue for the word you are on always appears in the banner above the grid.
- Tap a square to start; the word it belongs to lights up.
- Type letters with the big buttons below the grid, or your keyboard.
- Tap the square again to switch between the across word and the down word.
A gentle tip
Start with the answers you are sure of. Because every square is shared by an across word and a down word, each letter you place gives you a free clue to the words crossing it — so the grid gradually fills itself in.
Enjoy words? Try our large-print Word Search, Word Scramble, or browse all the word games and brain puzzles. Or head back to all of our free games.
Where the crossword came from
The crossword puzzle was invented by Arthur Wynne, a journalist working for the New York World, who published the first one in the paper's Fun supplement on December 21, 1913. He called it a word-cross, and it was diamond-shaped rather than square, but the basic idea was already complete: a grid filled in from clues that run both across and down.
The puzzle caught on slowly at first, then quickly, and by the 1920s American newspapers had found that a crossword could bring readers back day after day. A crossword puzzle book published in 1924 became a surprise bestseller, and the format spread from newspapers into puzzle books and magazines everywhere. Our version keeps the numbered grid and the two-way clues that Wynne set out, alongside the rest of our word games.
