Daily puzzle guides
How the week gets harder, how long a solve should take, and how to think your way through each puzzle. No spoilers, ever: the archive stays playable, so we write about thinking, not answers.
How the Daily Week Works: Monday to Sunday
Our daily puzzles get harder through the week, Monday to Sunday. What each day asks of you, how long a solve should take, and why a hard Sunday is a promise, not an accident.
Read the guide →Word Trail: How to Spend Six Guesses Well
Six guesses for a hidden five-letter word. Most people lose Word Trail in guess three, not guess six. How to open, when to stop chasing greens, and how to beat the repeated-letter trap.
Read the guide →Word Ladder: How to Think in One-Letter Steps
A word ladder looks like a vocabulary test and behaves more like arithmetic. Count the letters that have to change, find the ones that never move, and the chain usually appears before you type it.
Read the guide →Balance: How to Think in Suns and Moons
Balance has three rules and no numbers, which makes it the daily puzzle people misjudge most. The sandwich, the counting rule, and how to break a wall without guessing.
Read the guide →Mini Sudoku: How to Think Through a 6x6 Grid
A 6x6 sudoku is not a small 9x9. The boxes are 2x3, the maths is tighter, and the technique that cracks it is different. How to scan, when to pencil, and what to do when you stall.
Read the guide →Mini Sums: How to Think Through a 5x5 Cage Puzzle
Mini Sums looks like arithmetic and plays like deduction. Which cages have only one answer, why the row rule does half the work, and what to do when the grid stops moving.
Read the guide →How We Make the Daily Puzzles
Every daily board is built by one program and then checked by a second, independent one. What we test for, why we throw thousands of boards away, and why you will never have to guess.
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