Mini Crossword (The Indian Express)

Rate it

A small dated crossword from The Indian Express, ten clues on a 5x5 grid.

Play Mini Crossword (The Indian Express)

on indianexpress.com

Express Mini Crossword for October 5, 2026 by Aishwarya Khosla: an empty 5x5 grid with black squares, the 1 Across clue Recede highlighted, and the Across and Down clue lists beside it in the PuzzleMe

The Indian Express publishes a mini crossword every day on its Puzzles and Games pages: a grid of about five by five squares with ten short clues, solved in a few minutes. It sits behind the paper's Express Premium subscription, and the last two weeks of minis can be played from the same page.

About Mini Crossword (The Indian Express)

The Express Mini Crossword is the small daily crossword of The Indian Express, the Delhi-based English-language national daily. Each day's puzzle is dated and titled, for example "Express Mini Crossword: October 5, 2026", and carries its setter's byline; the minis we saw were set by Aishwarya Khosla.

The grid is a mini: five squares by five with a few black squares, about ten answers in all, across and down. Clues are short and plain rather than cryptic ("Recede", "Shore bird", "Zero, in tennis", "Media mogul Turner"), so a regular solver finishes in two to five minutes. The puzzle runs in the PuzzleMe player, with a timer, an Assist menu to check or reveal a square, word or the whole grid, and a print option.

The mini sits beside The Indian Express's full-size crossword and its sudoku on the paper's Puzzles and Games hub, and each dated page lists the previous two weeks of minis to catch up on. The puzzles are part of Express Premium: without a subscription the page shows a padlock and a Subscribe for full access prompt where the grid would be.

It suits readers of the paper who want a quick, clue-led warm-up in English with an Indian newspaper's voice, in the space between the NYT Mini and a full daily crossword.

How to play Mini Crossword (The Indian Express)

Open the Mini Crossword page on The Indian Express and sign in with an Express Premium subscription.
Pick today's dated mini, or an earlier day from the list beside it.
Click a square or a clue; the clue bar shows which answer you are filling, across or down.
Type each answer from its clue; crossing letters help with the harder ones.
Fill every square to finish, and use Assist to check or reveal a square or word if you are stuck.

Tips

Start with the clues that have only one plausible short answer, such as abbreviations and fill-in-the-blanks, then use their letters on the crossings.
Read across and down for the same square: on a 5x5 grid every letter belongs to two answers.
Missed a day? The page lists about two weeks of past minis.