Mini Crossword

Fill the 5x5 grid so every across and down clue reads correctly. Tap a square to type, tap it again to switch between across and down, and use Check or Reveal if a letter has you stuck. A new puzzle arrives every day.

Twenty-five squares, some of them blocked out. Every open square is part of two words - one going across and one going down - so if a clue has you stuck, the word crossing it will usually hand you a letter.

The clue for the word you are in sits above the grid. Use ‹ and › to walk through the clues, or open All clues under the keyboard to see the lot. You have finished when every square holds the right letter - filling them all in with the wrong letters does not count.

On a phone

Tap a square to start typing there. Tap the same square again to switch between across and down - the squares in the word you are filling are shaded, so you can always see which way you are going. The keyboard at the bottom of the screen is the game's own, not your phone's, so nothing slides up over the grid when you start typing: the clue, the grid and the keys are all on the screen at once, and on a small phone the grid shrinks so that they fit.

On a keyboard

Tab into the grid, then: letters type, the arrow keys move (and pressing up or down puts you into the down word), space switches between across and down, backspace clears the square you are on - or steps back and clears the one before it if you are already on an empty square - and Enter jumps to the next clue. Press Tab again and you walk the on-screen keys; the Check buttons come after them.

When you get stuck

The three buttons under the keyboard are the way out. Check letter tells you whether the square you are on is right. Check word does the same for the whole word you are in. Neither one tells you what the answer is: a right letter turns green, a wrong one turns red and is crossed out, and an empty square is left alone. Typing over a square clears its mark.

Reveal letter fills the square you are on with the right letter and underlines it, so you can see later which ones you were given. Using either is fine - the puzzle still counts, and the completion card says how much help you used.

There is a new grid every day, and everyone playing on this device gets the same one. Once you have done today's, Practice gives you a different puzzle that does not count towards your streak.

Touch: tap anything on the board to use it. Every button and key is at least 44px tall, so it works with a thumb. The squares of a board are as big as the screen allows - on a small phone some of them are smaller than that, which is why the keys and the number pad, not the squares, are what you type with.

Keyboard: Tab moves between the controls and Enter or Space activates the one you are on. That covers the buttons the game screen always has - Pause, Restart and this page's link - as well as anything the board adds.

Pause stops the clock and freezes the board; Restart gives you a fresh one.

Your score is how long you take, in minutes and seconds. Lower is better.

There is one new puzzle a day, the same one for everybody on this device, and playing on days in a row builds a streak. Once today's is done you can practise as much as you like.