Unch Crosswords

Thank you **so much** to everyone who has contributed to Unch - all our excellent editors, setters, interviewees, & designers, & of course our AMAZING readers who've bought copies! Thanks to your generosity we've just donated £1000 to @readingagency.bsky.social! ❤️💰🎉 www.youtube.com/shorts/pd0PG...

Today is, unfortunately, last posting day for Stamp in the Independent. Fellow 'sampling' every second? Bloody odd TV chef (5) Many thanks to those who have solved, blogged, commented upon and/or complained about my puzzles over the last three years! puzzles.independent.co.uk/games/crypti...

Good puzzles! Good people!

A couple of recent changes in my open source #crossword software: Exolve (exolve.app, github.com/viresh-ratna...): Clicking on "Reveal all!" used to also reveal ninas. I wanted solvers to try to have the fun of looking for ninas even after revealing the solution, so I've stopped this bahaviour.

This #CrypticSunday Replacement Stream Service will try to tap into the S&B vibe via the puzzle @mpcryptics.bsky.social forgot to bring and the (apparently much harder) alternative @ouroborosop.bsky.social grid, because these are the two that are up on MyCrossword! www.twitch.tv/pantherapuzz...

**Bluest Biting Centaurs – Ep. 83** We only like the Bluest Biting Centaurs when we’re riding down a great river on a miniature horse, checking out the shades of the “Plantlife!” === If that sounds like something you’d be happy to stash in a hidden chamber […] [Original post on offgrid.tlmb.net]

"The York 2026 Sloggers & Betters gathering is being held today. 🧩🧩🧩 Twelve puzzles have been distributed at the gathering, but for those crossword enthusiasts who aren’t in York, but would like to attempt one or more of the puzzles, PDF files of all of them can be displayed by clicking..." 👇

Great day up in York. Lovely to meet so many people I know from the online crossword space. Here's a puzzle I forgot to print and bring with me. www.mycrossword.co.uk/cryptic/4060 Don't eat it all at once.

🤣

Hello! I set a crossword for you. www.mycrossword.co.uk/cryptic/4040

Hints & Tips are out for this month's thematic 3D #cryptic #crossword by Curmudgeon/Chalicea, including for: One admitting sad experience after daughter’s absconded (5) 3dcalendarpuzzles.co.uk/hints-tips-o...

Nice one! 🎉🎉🎉 First of many, I hope :)

Farewell then, Knut. My last cryptic crossword for The Independent. puzzles.independent.co.uk/games/crypti...

Daughter just sent me this and, I mean, #notacrossword, but still amazing and I Want It

“They are of no educational value” says superintendent (Berkshire Eagle, 1925)

The next featured grid is now up, and it's a great one by @mpcryptics.bsky.social! I'm honoured to host it at cogs-turn.com. The grid will unlock a clue a day over the next few weeks. Here's today's clue, which reminds me of a recent championship: Collection's purpose concealed by mother (6)

Send us a voice message! www.speakpipe.com/Unch_Crosswo...

WAT

I set today’s Independent. I still cannot believe it is the last one. Thank you to Mike, all of the bloggers over on 225 and all of the solvers for these last 3 years. puzzles.independent.co.uk/games/crypti...

It's a Saturday night, so I've put my tin hat on and written about cryptic crosswords and AI. Thanks as ever to @mycrossword.co.uk for letting me bang on www.mycrossword.co.uk/blog/will-ai...

Today's Parseword clue is by me, originally published in a themed puzzle for issue 1 of Unch magazine 💫 www.parseword.com/daily

Cryptic crossword folk coming to @enigmatistelgar.bsky.social's Sloggers & Betters event in York: If you'd like a signed copy of Alys Cummings's ‘Murder Most Cryptic’, let me know and I will pick one up one for you this Sunday at Ilkley Lit Fest: www.ilkleyliteraturefestival.org.uk/events/90-al...

Hello Buglers! Nice to see a post about @zaltzcricket.bsky.social's audio cryptic crossword on the @puzzculture.bsky.social today .... puzzculture.com/2026/10/15/d...

(4)

Check out Humph's latest puzzle!

Very bittersweet seeing so many excellent setters having their final Independent puzzles published.

After a few weeks of looking... found it! @unchcrosswords.com

Stream tonight? Stream tonight. I've been saving Ruskin's MyC Featured for a stream, so we'll start there. After that, it'll be a free-for-all. I'll aim for a 9pm BST start!

I’m speaking tomorrow (4pm) at the Scottish Aesthetics Forum/Centre for Ethics, Philosophy and Public Affairs in St Andrews. Come find out how conspiracy theories like QAnon exploit the aesthetic appeal of inquiry found in videogames & cryptic crosswords. Zoom link: www.scottishaestheticsforum.com

Hello to the people in the middle of the Venn diagram of Bluesky Users / MyCrossword setters! There’s a new topic up on the Forum, intended to be a place to ask/answer questions on setting and/or offer useful proactive pointers on good practice Any takers? www.mycrossword.co.uk/forum/5-sett...

If you are interested in how things are going with Unch so far - at least as far as money goes - give this a read...

This is a brilliant post from a brilliant crossword magazine - it’s a real insight into how setting up something like this works and great to see those order numbers on the rise as word of Unch spreads! 🙌🏻🙌🏻

@liari.bsky.social

If you are interested in how things are going with Unch so far - at least as far as money goes - give this a read...

Congratulations to Liam Hughes. timesforthetimes.co.uk/times-crossw...

In today's post, we celebrate 3 years of Puzzmo, discuss crossword bandits, MyCrossword's new forum for cryptic solvers, and puzzle sites to check out! puzzculture.com/2026/10/12/t...

A rambling and incomplete guide to cricket-related clues in crosswords from a cricket lover who thinks that there should be fewer of them. Tell me that wasn't on your reading list for today! 😉

The Observer and its Everyman crossword have been an important part of my puzzling journey from the beginning, so it was especially lovely to chat to the Observer’s brilliant puzzles editor, Caitlin O’Kane, about Murder Most Cryptic 🧩 🕵🏻‍♀️ 🖊️ observer.co.uk/puzzles/cait...

Great place to start for anyone curious about cryptics!

🚀 New MyCrossword release We now have a forum! www.mycrossword.co.uk/forum

Cryptic solving as a spectator sport: the final of the Times Crossword Championship, followed by the prizegiving, will be streamed live at 3.30 today and will also available to watch back after the event. www.youtube.com/live/uruPHke...

Just a heads-up that we are very nearly sold out of Issue 4. If you still haven't got one, now would be a good time! Issue 5 is on the way, too. To buy a copy or to sign up to the mailing list to find out when the next one's out, visit the website: unchcrosswords.com

Congratulations @alyseliza.bsky.social on the publication of your new book! Lovely to attend the launch yesterday in London and get to meet you in person.

📚 Happy publication day to Alys Cummings (@alyseliza.bsky.social) with ‘Murder Most Cryptic’! Congratulations on your book launch - we hope this new book flies off the shelves 🎉 Book lovers, grab your copy here 👉 buff.ly/HTfwVAM #CrimeBooks #NewBooks #CrimeFiction

If you listen to this latest episode of #OffGridPod you may well hear the familiar voice of a woman with a cryptic crime novel out soon…you’ll definitely hear chat about Bigfoot, soldiers, and Superman! @offgridpod.offgrid.tlmb.net.ap.brid.gy offgrid.tlmb.net/2026/09/27/c...

We all have to start somewhere, and this is my first public offering. I was asked to write the filthiest clues I could for a prosaic theme, and I hope I have got close. @davegorman.bsky.social, I bet Jane would like it. Any feedback very gratefully received! www.mycrossword.co.uk/cryptic/3994