The Times Cryptic Crossword

The Times Cryptic is the main crossword of The Times of London, and the puzzles are numbered in one long run: number 29681 appeared on Friday 23 October 2026. A new one comes out every day from Monday to Saturday. On Sundays its place is taken by The Sunday Times Cryptic, which has its own numbering, and the paper's crossword page also carries the shorter Quick Cryptic, the Concise, a Saturday Jumbo and the Sunday Mephisto.

Every clue is a small puzzle in two parts: a straight definition at one end and wordplay that builds the same answer, through anagrams, hidden words, letters taken from other words, homophones, reversals and abbreviations. The number in brackets gives the length of the answer and how it splits into words.

Online, the puzzle opens in the Times solving screen on the web or in the Times Puzzles app. You type into the grid, with a pencil mode for tentative letters, a timer, and buttons to check or reveal answers and to reset the grid. The crossword page lists the last two weeks of puzzles, so a missed day can still be played.

It needs a subscription: Times Puzzles on its own, or a full digital subscription to The Times. It suits solvers who already know the basics of cryptics; newcomers usually start with the Quick Cryptic and move on.