Solve any crossword clue by pattern
Know some of the letters but not all of them? Type what you've got, mark the blanks with a question mark, and Crossword Puzzle Solver finds every word in the dictionary that fits.
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Crossword pattern solver
Fill in the letters you know. Leave a box blank for unknown letters, or use the +/− buttons to change the word length.
More word-solving tools
Anagram Solver
Unscramble any set of letters into real words — great for jumbles and letter-tile games.
ToolWord Finder
Search by starting letters, ending letters, or a substring anywhere in the word.
GuideHow to Solve Faster
Practical techniques crossword editors and speed-solvers actually use.
How the crossword solver works
Crossword Puzzle Solver checks your pattern against a dictionary of more than 370,000 English words, built from a standard open word list. When you enter a pattern like C?T, the solver treats each question mark as a wildcard for exactly one letter, then returns every word of that exact length whose fixed letters line up with what you typed.
Results are sorted with common, everyday words first — since crossword grids overwhelmingly favor words you'd recognize over obscure ones — followed by the rest of the matches in alphabetical order.
Tips for using letter patterns
- Count your squares first. A five-letter answer needs a five-character pattern, blanks included.
- Enter every letter you're confident about, even just one or two — each fixed letter dramatically narrows the results.
- If you get too many matches, check crossing clues in the puzzle to fill in another letter, then search again.
- If you get zero matches, double-check the word length — it's the most common source of a missed answer.
Frequently asked questions
How do I use a crossword solver pattern?
Type the letters you already know into the boxes in their correct positions, and leave a box empty for every square you don't know yet. Use the + button to add boxes for longer answers, or − to remove them for shorter ones. The solver returns every dictionary word that matches the exact shape you've entered.
Is this crossword solver free to use?
Yes — Crossword Puzzle Solver is free, with no account or sign-up required. Every search runs against a dictionary of over 370,000 words loaded directly in your browser.
Does it work for cryptic crossword clues?
The pattern solver is built for the letter-shape part of any crossword — standard American-style grids, British cryptics, or general word puzzles — once you know the answer's length and any checked letters. It doesn't parse cryptic wordplay (anagram indicators, hidden words, and so on) automatically; pair it with our anagram solver for anagram-style clues.
What's the difference between the three tools?
The pattern solver above matches letters in fixed positions. The anagram solver rearranges a bag of letters into valid words, ignoring order. The word finder searches by prefix, suffix, or substring, which is handy for word games beyond crosswords, like word-building games and vocabulary puzzles.