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Can someone explain the revealer of today’s crossword to me? I just blindly guessed the theme words today because I couldn’t figure it out.

Hi all! I’m a puzzle fan working on something for crossword lovers, and I’d really value input from people who actually solve.

I’m curious what you love about crossword books and what drives you crazy about them. Too easy, too hard, tiny print, repetitive clues, bad binding?

It’s a short anonymous survey (about 2 minutes): Survey

I’ll post a summary of what everyone said once the results are in. And feel free to vent in the comments too; I’m reading everything! 🧩

Anyone know where I can get challenging puzzles regularly? I've been doing the newsday saturday stumper for a while now as my weekly hard puzzle but its $75/month and cant really justify paying that much for one puzzle as I dont really use newsday for anything else.

Spoilers are welcome in here, beware!

How was the puzzle?

Spoilers are welcome in here, beware!

How was the puzzle?

Spoilers are welcome in here, beware!

How was the puzzle?

Hey guys, just wanted to come on here to see if there are on recommendations for a newbie like me. My time today was 27 minutes and I just am a bit disappointed. I’m 20 and literally just started getting into crosswords, so I know it’ll take some time before I start getting my times down.

Besides just doing more crosswords do yall have anything specific that you do to decrease solve time? Also how much do you think it’s just an IQ filter—I’m curious as to the consensus on that is.

Colossal Canada Crossword by Kelly Ann Buchanan

Clue (82-Across): New York's 'Times', et al.

Answer? SNS or SQS, the middle letter is coming from either Iran or Iraq but I don't understand how either possible answer fits the clue. Any pointers?

The theme seems to be TIME, where each of the theme answers contain a circled letter which together spell TIME, and the clues are all “See circles”. Thus, the clues for each theme answer are “Time”, leading to answers JAILSEN(T)ENCE, FOURTHD(I)MENSION, POPULAR(M)AGAZINE, and TEST(E)RSSHOUT – all alternative meanings of “time”. The circled letters are also positioned in a straight vertical line.

The puzzle comes with a note:
> Shortz Says: This is the first puzzle I can remember in which the theme answers are clued by the grid itself. Everything is very smoothly worded, too. An amazing feat.

Maybe this kind of playful theming wasn’t as common 20+ years ago, warranting a note on what today would seem like a pretty standard theme. But given the effusiveness of Shortz’ note, I was expecting a little more aha! in the reveal, so I’m wondering if there’s some extra layer of theme or pun or something I’m missing.

I do the puzzle in pen and paper form in my local newspaper. There were multiple formatting errors today!! The “down” heading was in the same font, size and not bolded. clue for 80 across was written as 90. And clue 13 down was written as 113.
Is this my locale paper messing up or are these errors in all the print versions? Just curious who to be annoyed with.

Edit to add: I’ve put a picture in the comments so you can see what I’m referring to. The puzzles title was “The Full 12 Rounds”

I am not a native English speaker but I like solving crosswords and try my best. This time though I just do not understand the answer. I found this one in The Atlantic 10/8/26.

Spoilers are welcome in here, beware!

How was the puzzle?

A proud moment for my lovely wife and co-solver tonight.

Spoilers are welcome in here, beware!

How was the puzzle?

Launch party free + open to the public at the Jam Handy in Detroit on 11/12. Preorders now open: https://www.blockpartypuzzles.com

Block Party: Michigan Edition has....

• 80 Puzzles
• 3850 clues
• 14 Michigan-ish constructors
• 7 cluing angles of ERIE
• 5 chapters (southeast, UP, Up North, Central + West, Across the Mitten)
• 1 Michigan monarchy mentioned (do you know it?)

Spoilers are welcome in here, beware!

How was the puzzle?

hey folks! i've been building and shipping crosswords on my own apps for about 2 years, and have had nearly 500,000 plays so far. it's been such a fulfilling journey.

after looking at dozens of other products, i realized there are very few polished tools out there that make games publishing easy (coming from a designer's perspective). so, along the way i built a lot of tools to make that easier: faster grid building, easy-to-use word libraries, website embeds, import/export all formats, collaborative features, and one place to manage puzzle publishing (web and print).

if you make crosswords (solo or with a team); i'd love to introduce you to the platform in exchange for some early feedback! DM me if you're interested to try it out?

Hi all! I'm relatively new to constructing and have a question. I've been using CrossFire to make my puzzles, which is great, but I feel like it's not giving me quite what I need in terms of establishing the grid layout. What I mean is, it's irritating to try and find the best alignment of themed answers by deleting and re-entering the words one square down or two squares to the left, for instance. I wish I could simply type the answers in and then drag them around the board to find where they best fit into place.

I have some graphic design background, and I considered creating an Illustrator file where I can enter the answers and click and drag them into place within a grid. I've even been tempted to create a physical grid and cut out papers with my themed answers on it to fiddle around with to try and find that ideal layout, but these hardly seem like the most efficient options.

So my question for you all is, what methods do you use to find the best alignment of themed answers within your grids? Does anyone have any recommendations on a program to use that allows one to move answers around more easily in the manner I described?