How to Play a Word Search, and How Grids Are Made
A word search asks little of the player: spot a word, mark it, move on. What follows is how the marking works, how the printing works, and what a grid goes through before you see it.
How to play, step by step
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Mark a word by dragging
On screen a word is claimed by pressing on its first letter and dragging to its last. Mouse and finger behave the same, and the selection runs in a straight line, so a slanted word is taken exactly as a row is. Release on the right letter and it stays marked and leaves the list; release anywhere else and it clears.
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Or mark it from the keyboard
No pointer is required. The arrow keys walk from cell to cell, and a word is marked by fixing its first letter, moving to its last, and confirming — the same two points the drag uses. That is steadier than a trackpad, and it keeps the grid open to anyone who would rather not drag.
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Print the sheet
Printing produces a sheet rather than a photograph of the screen: title, grid, word list, and a discreet line at the foot, with margins that suit US Letter and A4. The answer key is a page of its own and entirely optional: include it when the puzzle is for you, leave it out when it is for somebody else.
What happens before a grid is shown
Before any grid is displayed, a machine reads it back. It confirms that every listed word sits exactly where it was placed, that none of them has been formed a second time by accident elsewhere in the letters, and that the random fill has not spelled anything unsuitable in any direction. A grid that fails is rebuilt rather than shown, which is what makes random filler safe on a sheet handed to a room.
Printing for a group? Run off one answer page and keep it beside you. Reading the solution from a single sheet is quicker than inspecting every finished grid by eye at the end.
Common questions
Do I need an account to play or print?
No. Every themed puzzle on this site plays in the browser and prints without signing in. An account only unlocks extras in the puzzle maker: unlimited sheets, larger grids, large print and a custom header.
Can I print a puzzle without the answer key?
Yes. The answer key is a page of its own and entirely optional — include it when the puzzle is for you, leave it out when the sheet is for somebody else.
Do the puzzles work without a connection?
A page you have already opened stays playable offline. The grid is written into the page itself rather than fetched, and “New grid” rebuilds one inside your browser instead of asking a server.
Which directions can the words run in?
Easy grids run left to right and top to bottom only. Medium adds the two diagonals that read upward and downward to the right. Hard adds every reversed direction, so a word may read right to left, bottom to top, or back down a diagonal.
Does everyone get the same grid on the same page?
Yes. Each grid is built from its own address, so the puzzle at a given link is identical on every device and on every visit. That is what makes a printed sheet worth handing to somebody else.