A daily puzzle to find the longest hidden word in the fewest guesses. Tap letters left to right across the grid, skipping any you like, to spell words.
The Mini Crossword
A bite-size daily crossword you can solve in a minute.
Play The Mini Crossword on the official site
nytimes.com · free, new puzzle daily
Play on nytimes.comWhat is The Mini Crossword?
The Mini is the NYT's bite-size daily crossword — a 5×5 grid you can usually finish in under a minute, with clever clues that punch above their size.
How to play The Mini Crossword
Fill the white squares so every across and down answer matches its clue. Short answers mean crossings carry a lot of weight, so a single confident letter often unlocks two entries at once.
Tips & strategy
- Start with fill-in-the-blank and proper-noun clues — they're the most certain.
- Let crossings correct you: if a down looks wrong, recheck the across it shares.
- Watch for plural 'S' and tense endings to grab cheap final letters.
Where to play
Play The Mini Crosswordnytimes.com · free, new puzzle daily
Keep your curiosity going
Your next daily obsession
More games to explore after The Mini Crossword.
One cryptic-crossword clue a day.
Work backwards to rebuild a Wordle solve.
Fill in the rows with chains of two-word phrases, then solve the mystery phrase using what you've learned.
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Solve four Wordle grids at the same time.
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