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. 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 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 clue to the words crossing it, so the grid fills in as you go.
Browse more free word games for seniors, or print puzzles to solve with a pencil from our large-print puzzles section.
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. My version keeps the numbered grid and the two-way clues that Wynne set out, alongside the rest of my word games.
