How to use crossing letters to crack hard clues
The clue is only half of the information you have. The other half is sitting in the grid: the letters you have already placed from crossing answers. Experienced solvers use those letters deliberately, and that is often what separates a stalled puzzle from a finished one.
Why crossings matter so much
In an American-style crossword, nearly every square belongs to both an across answer and a down answer. That means every answer you solve gives you letters for several others. A clue that looks hopeless with no letters, such as “Spring” (which could mean a season, a coil, a water source or a jump), becomes easy with two or three letters in place.
The practical lesson is simple: do not stay on one clue too long. Solve what you can elsewhere, then come back with more letters.
What a single letter can tell you
Vowels and consonants
English words rarely run more than three consonants in a row, and they rarely run more than two vowels in a row. If you have ?STR??, the next square is almost certainly a vowel. If you have ?EA??, the square after EA is very likely a consonant. You can often place a vowel or a consonant before you know the exact letter, and that alone narrows your thinking.
Letter pairs that belong together
Some letters come with predictable partners. Q is almost always followed by U in English. A final K is often preceded by C, as in BACK, TRICK or STOCK. When you see a crossing letter such as Q or a final K, you can often fill in its neighbor straight away.
Common word endings
The last few squares of a long answer are often the easiest to guess. Plural clues frequently end in S. Past-tense clues often end in ED. Clues describing an ongoing action often end in ING, and many clues for a person who does something end in ER. Grammar in the clue is a strong hint: “Running quickly” wants an -ING form, while “Ran quickly” wants a past tense such as SPED or RACED.
A worked example
Suppose the clue is Musical drama, five letters, and you have nothing yet. Candidates include OPERA and DRAMA itself, which does not work because the answer cannot simply repeat the clue. Now say a crossing gives you O in the first square and another gives you A in the last square. The pattern O???A fits OPERA, and OPERA fits the clue. You have gone from vague ideas to a confident answer using just two letters.
You can try this yourself: enter O???A in the crossword solver. It will return several five-letter words, and the clue tells you which one is right.
When a crossing seems wrong
Sometimes a crossing letter contradicts an answer you felt sure about. One of the two answers is wrong, and it is not always the one you suspect. Before erasing anything:
- Re-read both clues. Check whether either one uses a word in a less common sense, such as “spring” meaning jump rather than a season.
- Check tense and number. A plural clue needs a plural answer; a past-tense clue needs a past-tense answer.
- Count the squares again. An answer that is one letter too long or too short will throw off every crossing after it.
- Check whether the puzzle has a theme. Some themes break the normal rules, for example by putting several letters in one square.
Choosing which letters to get first
Not all crossings are equally useful. The first letter of a word is usually more helpful than a letter in the middle, because we recall words by their beginnings. Rare letters such as J, Q, X and Z are powerful clues in themselves, because only a handful of words contain them in a given position. So if you have a choice of where to work next, favor the clues that will give you starting letters or unusual letters for your hardest answers.
Putting it together
- Solve the easiest clues first, anywhere in the grid.
- Use vowel and consonant patterns before you know exact letters.
- Let grammar predict the ending.
- Treat contradictions as a reason to re-read both clues, not just one.
- When you know the letter pattern but not the word, use a pattern search, then choose the candidate that fits the meaning.
For more on reading the clue itself, see common crossword clue types. To practise combining a clue with a letter pattern, try the worked practice set.