The New York Times (NYT) is an American daily newspaper based in New York City. The New York Times covers domestic, national, and international news, and publishes opinion pieces, investigative reports, and reviews. As one of the longest-running newspapers in the United States, it serves as one of the country's newspapers of record. As of May 2024, the newspaper has a readership of 9.9 million digital-only subscribers and 640,000 print subscribers, making it the second-largest newspaper in the United States by print circulation, only behind the Wall Street Journal. The Times has received 137 Pulitzer Prizes as of 2023, the most of any publication, among other accolades. The New York Times is published by The New York Times Company; since 1896, the company has been chaired by the Ochs-Sulzberger family, including its current chairman and the paper's publisher, A. G. Sulzberger. The Times is headquartered at The New York Times Building in Manhattan.
Word games are spoken, board, card or video games often designed to test ability with language or to explore its properties.
A crossword is a word game consisting of a grid of black and white squares, into which solvers enter words or phrases ("entries") crossing each other horizontally ("across") and vertically ("down") according to a set of clues. Each white square is typically filled with one letter, while the black squares are used to separate entries. The first white square in each entry is typically numbered to correspond to its clue.
A cryptic crossword is a crossword puzzle in which each clue is a word puzzle. Cryptic crosswords are particularly popular in the United Kingdom, where they originated, as well as Ireland, the Netherlands, and in several Commonwealth nations, including Australia, Canada, India, Kenya, Malta, New Zealand, and South Africa. Compilers of cryptic crosswords are commonly called setters in the UK and constructors in the US. Particularly in the UK, a distinction may be made between cryptics and quick crosswords, and sometimes two sets of clues are given for a single puzzle grid.
Mastermind or Master Mind is a code-breaking game for two players invented in Israel. It resembles an earlier pencil and paper game called Bulls and Cows that may date back a century.
The National Puzzlers' League (NPL) is a nonprofit organization focused on puzzling, primarily in the realm of word play and word games. Founded in 1883, it is the oldest puzzlers' organization in the world. It originally hosted semiannual conventions in February and September of each year, but conventions are now held annually, in July.
William F. Shortz is an American puzzle creator and editor who is the crossword editor for The New York Times. He graduated from Indiana University with a degree in the invented field of enigmatology. After starting his career at Penny Press and Games magazine, he was hired by The New York Times in 1993. Shortz's American Crossword Puzzle Tournament is the country's oldest and largest crossword tournament.
Word ladder is a word game invented by Lewis Carroll. A word ladder puzzle begins with two words, and to solve the puzzle one must find a chain of other words to link the two, in which two adjacent words differ by one letter.
Crosswords DS is a puzzle video game developed by American studio Nuevo Retro games released by Nintendo for the Nintendo DS handheld video game console. It was previously released in Australia as CrossworDS but a new OFLC entry confirmed that Nintendo Australia re-released it with a European localization. Crosswords DS features over 1,000 crossword puzzles that the player solves by using the stylus. Despite the title, it also features word search puzzles and anagram puzzles. It makes use of similar handwriting mechanics that the Brain Age titles make use of. Crosswords DS is included in the Touch! Generations series of titles, which includes such popular games as Brain Age: Train Your Brain in Minutes a Day! and Nintendogs. The background music was composed by Fabian Del Priore.
The New York Times Crossword is a daily American-style crossword puzzle published in The New York Times as part of The New York Times Games, online on the newspaper's website, syndicated to more than 300 other newspapers and journals, and on mobile apps.
Merl Harry Reagle was an American crossword constructor. For 30 years, he constructed a puzzle every Sunday for the San Francisco Chronicle, which he syndicated to more than 50 Sunday newspapers, including the Washington Post, the Los Angeles Times, the Philadelphia Inquirer, the Seattle Times, The Plain Dealer, the Hartford Courant, the New York Observer, and the Arizona Daily Star. Reagle also produced crossword puzzles for AARP: The Magazine and the American Crossword Puzzle Tournament.
The New York TimesSpelling Bee, or simply the Spelling Bee, is a word game distributed in print and electronic format by The New York Times as part of The New York Times Games. Created by Frank Longo, the game debuted in a weekly print format in 2014. A digital daily version with an altered scoring system launched on May 9, 2018.
Wordle is a web-based word game created and developed by Welsh software engineer Josh Wardle. Players have six attempts to guess a five-letter word, with feedback given for each guess in the form of colored tiles indicating when letters match or occupy the correct position. Wordle has a single daily solution, with all players attempting to guess the same word. During 2023, Wordle was played 4.8 billion times.
Josh Wardle is a Welsh software engineer who developed the viral web-based word game Wordle. The New York Times Company acquired Wordle from Wardle in late January 2022. Wardle lives in Brooklyn, New York.
Wyna Liu is an American puzzle creator and editor of the New York Times game Connections.
Tracy Bennett is an American editor and puzzle editor. She edits The New York Times Games products Wordle and Strands.
Letter Boxed is a online word puzzle video game created by Sam Ezersky and published in 2019 on The New York Times Games. It was the third game published in the puzzles section on the New York Times website after the Crossword and Spelling Bee. Originally created as part of an effort to attract new subscribers, Letter Boxed is one of a suite of casual games that has become an important revenue driver for the company, and for which "The New York Times has attained the reputation for having fun, quick and easy daily games."
The online platforms of The New York Times encompass the established applications, websites, and other online services developed by The New York Times for its operations.
The New York Times Games is a collection of casual print and online games published by The New York Times, an American newspaper. Originated with the crossword in 1942, NYT Games was officially established on August 21, 2014, with the addition of the Mini Crossword. Most puzzles of The New York Times Games are published and refreshed daily, mirroring The Times' daily newspaper cadence.
Strands is an online word game created by The New York Times. Released into beta in March 2024, Strands is a part of the New York Times Games library. Strands takes the form of a word search, with new puzzles released once every day. The original pitch for the game was created by Juliette Seive, and puzzles are edited by Tracy Bennett.
