Create word search

Using the online word search maker is as easy as entering the first words that come to mind around a certain topic and let the word search generator do the rest!

The generator creates the word search in real-time, so you can directly see the result of your input.

Changing the difficulty and look of your word search can be done in various ways. The free version allows you to change the 'Size' and the 'Directions' via the Settings-tab.

Increasing or decreasing the word search grid size can tune the difficulty up or down and it can help with the space that the puzzle takes up on the screen.

The directions can be turned on or off individually. The diagonal directions (southwest/northwest/etc..) are the most difficult to find, so if you want to make the word search a little easier, disable those.

If you want to surprise your players, you can opt for the 'Field shape' feature via the Premium-tab. This allows you to deviate from the default square grid and generate a word search with all kinds of shapes: 'Smiley', 'Diamond', 'Circle', 'Cross', 'Pyramid' and 'Star'

To create the best look, experiment with the 'Size' from the Settings-tab as well, since the distribution of the cells might improve further!

If you want to spice up the word search puzzle and make it a bit more educational/challenging, you can change the Premium 'Type of Word Search' to 'Questions'

This way, the player does not directly see the answers to look for, but only the questions/descriptions describing the answer! A cool way to experiment with alternative educational material :-)

Generating interactive puzzles that can be played in teams is of course even more fun! The 'Play in teams' option on the Premium-tab does just that.

After setting up the teams and starting the word search battle, the team members are connected digitally causing correctly given answers to by synchronised automatically to the other team members.

The word search owner (probably you!) has a cool control room via the Premium-tab that shows the progress of each team, so you can determine who finishes first!

If you want to make sure that your word search is unique every time it gets played, enable the Premium feature 'Allow regenerating puzzle'. This way the word search generator is activated each time the player opens up the puzzle and thus gets a unique puzzle every time.

In combination with the Premium 'Use countdown timer', you can create the ultimate repeatable puzzle challenge. Find all the answers within 60 seconds.

Players can reset their puzzle after they have finished, and then try again! :)

You can also hide the hints altogether via the 'Hide Hints' Premium feature, this way the player will have no idea what to look for, making it even more challenging and for some, fun :).

The other option is to show the hints below the word search puzzle, which could make it a bit more compact for smaller screens.

Each language has their own unique character sets, and so the word search generator should be able to include those characters in the randomly generated cells. The 'Character List' option on the Premium-tab does exactly that.

You can include any character you like, allowing you to create Chinese puzzles, other foreign language characters, like (ë and á) and any character you can think of.

Solving word searches in virtual meetings or via central digital school boards can be tough since communicating where you see a word is not really easy by default.

But the solution is here! Enable the Premium 'Show numbers' and each row and column will get their own number, making it easy to call out character coordinates and allowing for central play!

Adding a hidden solution to a word search puzzle is not the easiest feature to implement since we have to work with randomly inserted words by you, the puzzle creator and this leaves random amounts of 'open' puzzle cells.

But, there is hope! The Settings > Hidden solution field has some nifty helper features to put you on the right track and to make sure that the puzzle is solvable. To do this, it coaches you while you are entering the hidden solution.

The hidden solution will either be a perfect fit, or too short, or too long. Whenever it is too short, it will show you which characters could not fit. You can use this info to increase the size of the grid, or by removing a word so that more space is available for the hidden solution. When it is too long, it will mention how many characters your hidden solution needs to add in order for it to fill up all the remaining squares.

If you want to make your word search feel extra special with the latest modern interactions, then enabling 'Fancy select' on the Premium-tab is the way to go.

For desktop computers, it will allow you to see the direction you are hovering the mouse in and thus get a better feel for the word that you are selecting. Together with friendly colours and a rounded design, this might feel more user-friendly.

On mobile devices you will be able to use the regular pattern of clicking on the start and end squares.

If you want to give the word search a modern look, you can choose to disable the 'Show borders' option on the Premium-tab, under the Custom styling options.

Since the borders between the text cells are now removed, it feels more like it belongs together and there is less space wasted to the unnecessary. Might make it easier to see words too!