The Telegraph Launches New Puzzle- PlusWord

PlusWord is a newly created puzzle from The Telegraph which combines the challenge of a crossword with online word-finding games. Launched today, PlusWord is the latest addition to The Telegraph’s long tradition in puzzles, being the first quality newspaper in the UK to publish a daily cryptic crossword in 1925. 

Invented by the Telegraph’s Puzzle Editor Chris Lancaster, PlusWord is free to play and available daily in print, online and via the Telegraph App. The hybrid puzzle challenges users to solve crossword clues and then find the five letter PlusWord. One new puzzle will be published daily at midnight online.

A Telegraph PlusWord book featuring 150 puzzles is also available for purchase, with a second volume due later in the year. 

Chris Lancaster, Puzzle Editor, The Telegraph said: “The Telegraph’s puzzles have an unparalleled history, evolving with the times. Puzzles are a key part of our offering and PlusWorld is the latest addition to this celebrated collection.”

The Telegraph’s puzzles have an unrivalled history. The Cryptic Crossword is considered one of the most popular and well-known crosswords in the world.  British Intelligence used a competition held at The Daily Telegraph in 1942 as a hidden means of recruitment. Each of the successful competitors able to complete a crossword in 12 minutes or under were contacted by the War Office and invited to work in the code-breaking division at Bletchley Park. In 1944 secret codewords related to D-Day started to appear in The Daily Telegraph’s daily crossword puzzle.

The Telegraph Puzzles website first launched in 2008, featuring puzzles including crosswords, sudoku and many more, along with leaderboards.

In January 2022, the Sunday Telegraph launched Britain’s biggest weekly puzzles section – an eight page broadsheet pull-out including brain-training puzzles, an expanded selection of children’s puzzles along with a host of other new challenges. The Saturday Telegraph also gained a new weekly puzzles pull-out running across four broadsheet pages.

The Telegraph will be publishing its 30,000th crossword at the end of this month. There will be further investments in puzzles, with the Telegraph launching an exciting new digital puzzles product which will feature PlusWord later this year.