Your first month of word games
Wordle takes five minutes a day. A crossword takes twenty. You don't need to become a puzzle fanatic, but if you want to, here's how to get there from where you are now.
By Colin B. · Published June 13, 2026
Word games don’t ask much of you. No equipment to assemble, no court to find, no partner to schedule. You open the app, flip to a puzzle page, or set the tiles on the table, and you’re in.
The challenge is figuring out which game is actually yours. Wordle and a daily crossword are fundamentally different experiences from Scrabble or Bananagrams. Some people want the solo satisfaction of cracking a hard clue. Others want the chaos of everyone building words at the same time. Most want both, depending on the day.
This guide maps out the first month: where to start, how to get better, and when to add more.
Week one: free, no commitment
Before you spend a dollar, spend a week with the free stuff.
Wordle is already on your phone. One puzzle a day, five minutes, six tries to guess a five-letter word. The yellow/green tile feedback is addictive in a Pavlovian way. You’ll start opening it before your coffee brews. That’s fine.
The NYT Mini Crossword is also free, five minutes, 5×5 grid, usually one decent pun. Do this the same time as Wordle for a week. If you like it, you’ll want more.
NYT Connections is free too. Four groups of four words, connected by a hidden theme. Easier than the crossword, sharper than Wordle. It’s the gateway drug for people who don’t think they’re crossword people.
By the end of week one, you’ll know whether you want solo puzzle depth (crossword path) or social word chaos (board game path). A lot of people want both.
Week two: pick a lane
The crossword path
If the Mini felt too short, buy the NYT Monday Crossword Puzzles compilation. Monday is the easiest day of the NYT crossword week: themed grids, accessible fill, solvable in 10-20 minutes when you’re new.
The single most important thing about getting better at crosswords: finish every puzzle. Even if you check the answers section and write in the ones you couldn’t get. You need to complete the grid to build pattern recognition. Staring at a stuck clue for ten minutes teaches you nothing except frustration. Finishing the grid (even with help) teaches you that OSLO is always clued as “Scandinavian capital” and ERA shows up every third puzzle.
Crossword vocabulary is its own dialect. These recur constantly:
- Three-letter words: ERA, ORE, ALE, ETA, OLE, ENE, ERE, AWE
- Crossword-ese verbs: ALOE (clued “sunburn soother”), ETNA (small volcano, used constantly)
- Crossword geography: OSLO, OMAN, ERIE, LAOS, ENID (Oklahoma city)
You don’t need to memorize them. You’ll absorb them automatically over 50 Monday puzzles.
The board game path
If you want games that need other people, Bananagrams is the call. No setup: dump tiles, everyone races to build their own interlocking crossword grid. First person to use all their tiles wins. Teach it in two minutes at the table; you’ll be mid-game by minute three.
Bananagrams rewards fast vocab, not obscure vocab. You don’t need to know unusual Scrabble words. You need to build quickly and rearrange when you’re stuck.
Week three: going deeper
By week three, Monday crosswords should feel easier. That’s the right feeling: it means you’re building.
The upgrade from Monday: Try Tuesday. The NYT Tuesday puzzle is still gentle but requires more wordplay knowledge: puns, homophones, theme revealer answers. Tuesday is where you start learning how constructors think.
On pen vs. pencil: Most serious crossword solvers use pen. It’s not snobbishness; it’s discipline. Committing to ink means you think harder before writing. It slows down casual guessing. The fear of a blotched grid teaches you to confirm crosses before filling. Use pencil if you’re new; switch to pen once you can finish a Monday confidently.
If you’re playing Scrabble: Learn the two-letter words. There are about 105 of them in the Official Scrabble Dictionary. You don’t need all of them. Knowing ten good ones (QI, ZA, AA, XI, XU, KA, JO, OE, AE, AI) is worth an extra 20-40 points a game. The two-letter word list is free online.
Week four: building the habit
The word game habit lives in the gap minutes: waiting for coffee, commuting, ten minutes before a meeting. That’s where Wordle and the Mini live.
Paper crosswords are different. They need 20-40 minutes of actual sitting. The best crossword solvers have a ritual: same chair, same pen, same time of day. Ritual lowers the activation energy. If it’s just “whenever,” it doesn’t happen.
When to add the NYT Games subscription ($40/year): When you’re doing Wordle and the Mini every day and want more. The subscription adds Spelling Bee (addictive), Connections (good for 5-10 minutes), and the full crossword archive going back to 1993. The archive alone is worth it: decades of past Mondays for when you want to practice.
When to add Scrabble or Codenames: When you have regular game-night people. Both games are better with people who’ve played before. Don’t buy Scrabble just to introduce it cold; start with Bananagrams, which requires zero prior knowledge to enjoy.
What the first month actually builds
Thirty days in, you should have:
- A Wordle opening word that works for you (CRANE, SLATE, and TRACE are popular; try each for a week and track your score)
- A sense of which NYT puzzle is your daily anchor (the Mini, Connections, Spelling Bee, or the full crossword)
- At least 20 Monday NYT crosswords solved, pencil or pen
- A feel for whether you want more solo puzzles, more board games, or both
What you won’t have yet: speed. Crossword speed comes later, after your pattern recognition becomes automatic. Don’t chase time in the first month. Chase completion.
Going further
For gear, books, and our specific picks: Word Games & Wordle gear guide.
The NYT crossword’s daily blog, Wordplay, publishes constructor notes for each puzzle after it runs; reading why a constructor made certain choices teaches you how to think like them. Start there once the Monday grid feels easy.