[ Log In ] [ Create account ] FAQ

New York Times Crossword Answers, Stats, Observations

XWord Info contains data about NYT puzzles dating back to 1942. Have fun exploring and you'll start seeing crosswords in a whole new light. Curious? Take the XWord Info Tour or see the FAQ.

Syndicated
Sun
Mon
Tue
Wed
Thu
Fri
Sat

Zachary Spitz	The Saturday, July 15, 2017 crossword is by Zachary Spitz 15x15, 72 words, 30 blocks
	Across LitePDFSolution & Notes

Eric Berlin	The Sunday, August 13, 2017 crossword, THE MAGIC SHOW, is by Eric Berlin 21x21, 140 words, 72 blocks
	Across LitePDFSolution & Notes

Rich Proulx	The Monday, August 14, 2017 crossword is by Rich Proulx 15x15, 76 words, 40 blocks
	Across LitePDFSolution & Notes

Zhouqin Burnikel	The Tuesday, August 15, 2017 crossword is by Zhouqin Burnikel 15x15, 78 words, 36 blocks
	Across LitePDFSolution & Notes

Andrew Kingsley John Lieb	The Wednesday, August 16, 2017 crossword is by Andrew Kingsley and John Lieb 15x15, 74 words, 34 blocks
	Across LitePDFSolution

Peter A. Collins	The Thursday, August 17, 2017 crossword is by Peter A. Collins 15x15, 78 words, 39 blocks
	Across LitePDFSolution & Notes

Brendan Emmett Quigley	The Friday, August 18, 2017 crossword is by Brendan Emmett Quigley 15x15, 70 words, 32 blocks
	Across LitePDFSolution & Notes

Mark Diehl	The Saturday, August 19, 2017 crossword is by Mark Diehl 15x15, 60 words, 22 blocks
	Across LitePDFSolution & Notes

PDF and Across Lite links require an NYT Crossword subscription. Across Lite also requires this software.

The next (Sunday) puzzle will be available in 3 hours and 24 minutes.

NEW Variety: solve the August 20 acrostic online.

Some pages at XWord Info require registration

Puzzles

Solutions from a calendar
Enter a date:
Sunday puzzles listed by date with titles
Puzzles with circles or shaded squares
Rebus puzzles (symbols or multiple letters in a single square)
Puzzles with the fewest and most blocks
Highest and lowest word count puzzles
Puzzles with the longest avg. word length
Unusual symmetry and asymmetry
Pangrams and puzzles with the fewest letters used
Scrabble scores: highest daily, lowest daily, highest Sunday, lowest Sunday
Schrödinger puzzles aka quantum crosswords
Most wide open grids
Record stacks and some notable 15s
Grids with unchecked squares
Grids with no short answers or with very short answers
Grids with repeated answer words
Uniclue puzzles
Non-square or other oddly shaped grids
Freshness Factor™ Hall of Fame
Most common grid patterns
Patrick Berry's 2011 special six-part "Cross" word contest puzzles and solutions
Eugene T. Maleska's stepquotes
The six 1999 Millennium puzzles.
Will Shortz picks his favorite puzzles and his favorite constructors
Puzzles with comments from Will Shortz
Will Shortz provides a clue-by-clue analysis of how he edits a crossword
Puzzles with Notepads or Jim's personal notes
Jeff Chen's Puzzles of the Week: solve them or view grids with comments or constructors
The Misenko duplicates
Stats about NYT Puzzle Editors

Variety (Second Sunday)

Personal collections

Grid Art — puzzles that caught my eye
Puzzles with interesting visual elements
Nonlinear puzzles

★ Tools for Constructors ★

Clue and Answer Finder: shows clues used for any answer, or finds words that match any pattern — our most popular page!
Analyze your own puzzle or present your puzzle on a web page for anyone to solve
Search through clues or notepads
Understand the different account levels
Read about the XWord Info Word List
✅ Download the XWord Info Word List

Across Lite and PDF links

Words and Letters

Most popular answer words
Most popular words by length
Missing words not found in any puzzles
All Fifteen-letter words sorted alphabetically
Most popular 15s across all puzzles
Even longer words sorted by length
Debut words in the past month
Random unique words
Debut words by year
Most answers of each length
Record setting letter counts
XWord Info Bar Game

Constructors

Older crosswords from The Pre-Shortzian Puzzle Project

Data from puzzles before Will Shortz became editor are kept separate from modern puzzle stats. XWord Info has all 16,083 pre-Shortz crosswords from 2/15/1942 to 11/20/1993.

Selected pre-Shortz observations

Tips

Click on any date to see that day's full puzzle including answers.
This site continuously updates its data. Bookmark this page for easy future access.
See your account information or change your password.
Questions? See the XWord Info FAQ list.
Please help keep XWord Info alive and well. Donate today!

Tell your friends you like XWord Info

★ Collaborate and Compete

Now you can solve NYT puzzles with your friends, or compete in a new way.

To begin, read the FAQ
Collaborate with a friend
Compete against a friend

Clue and Answer Finder

The XWord Info Finder page displays clues for any word, or words that match any pattern.

You can now search clues as well.

Contact us

XWord Info was created by Jim Horne.

It is now operated by Jeff Chen who provides commentary on each daily puzzle.

Email:

If you prefer to remain anonymous, take our survey.

Stay up to date: subscribe to our mailing list. We promise no spam.

Jim sometimes still writes about crosswords at his personal blog: The Further Adventures of Jim Horne

About the Database

There are 8,673 Shortz Era puzzles from Sunday, November 21, 1993 to Saturday, August 19, 2017.

Puzzles come from 857 different constructors and include 107,616 unique answer words.

We now have an additional 16,083 older puzzles going back to Sunday, February 15, 1942.

Info for programmers

XPF Universal Data Format (XML) defined
Puzzles in JSON format with sample code

The Crossword Blogosphere

The latest posts from various blogs

Recent pre-Shortzian blog posts

Fetching...

Some Older Special Posts

Science Puzzles

The Science section in the December 7, 2010 New York Times was a special edition about the science of puzzles. Jim contributed an essay and two puzzles.