Daily Eight: the crossword, the go problems and other eights

Two different games go by the name Daily Eight, and they have nothing in common but the number. The Daily Eight is a crossword from The Irish Times, added in February 2026 next to its Crosaire and Simplex: a 7x7 grid with eight clues, four across and four down, compiled by Niamh O'Connor and meant to take a couple of minutes. The 101weiqi Daily Eight (每日八题) is a set of eight go problems posted each day on the go training site 101weiqi, one for each rank band from about 12 kyu to 4 dan and above, with earlier days kept below the current one. If you came for a quick crossword, you want the first; if you play go, the second.

Several other daily games are built around eight. The word games differ in what you start from. CrossEights Daily gives no clues at all, only a few anchor letters in a cross-shaped grid of eight eight-letter words, and it gets harder from Monday to Saturday. EightUp gives eight short definitions and seven letters to spell every answer from. Eightile is an anagram ladder against a five-minute clock that ends on an eight-letter word, in English, Spanish, French or Galician. Spellcase scrambles eight clued words into 64 letters, and Knight Hop hides one eight-letter word on a board read by knight's moves. Octordle is the one to pick if you already play Wordle: the same colour rules, played on eight boards at once.

For a quiz, Octalect asks eight themed questions in English on iPhone and iPad, and DIE ZEIT's Wissenstest des Tages asks eight in German on the news. Los 8 errores from Clarín, the Buenos Aires paper, is a spot-the-difference with eight differences to find each day; it asks you to log in with a free Clarín account. Two logic grids round it out: the Daily Mail's 8x8 Kurosu 8, and Octophobia, where the number 8 is the thing to avoid.

A good start is The Daily Eight for a short crossword, then CrossEights or EightUp if you want more words, and Octordle when you want a longer session.