Crossword puzzles are a part of many people’s daily routines — mine included. What began as a casual hobby has grown into a years-long obsession, as evidenced by a 1,700-day streak (and counting). In my crossword experience, I’ve come to notice some words appear more often than others, and I’m not the only one who’s observed this.
In 2013, former New York Times product engineer Michael Donohoe published data regarding the most common words in the NYT crossword from 1996 to 2012. In turn, visual data analyst Noah Veltman created a list of the most common answers, plus a separate category of words he felt demonstrated a special level of “crosswordiness” (his word). While this data is over a decade old at this point, the NYT crossword hasn’t changed in format, and I expect the data to have remained relatively consistent since 2013. In addition to being a word nerd, I can be a data nerd, too. Let’s dig into some of the most interesting findings.
The most common crossword answers tend to be short, vowel-packed words. At the top of the list is “ERA,” appearing in 323 NYT puzzles during the aforementioned time span, which amounts to roughly 5% of the total puzzles. Rounding out the top five answers are “AREA, “ERE,” “ONE,” and “ELI.”
The reason those compact, vowel-heavy words are so common is that they provide a useful service to the crossword writers and editors. The people putting those puzzles together need a way to connect the longer, more distinctive words, and the most efficient way to do that is by implementing these briefer, more malleable pieces.
In other words, the shorter a word is, the likelier it is to fit into those parts of the puzzle where there’s limited space. Also, the more vowels, the better, given how common those letters are in the English language. A word such as “ERE” is perfect because it can easily connect two longer words, so long as each of them contain an “E” — the most common letter in the English language.
In 2018, engineer Jonathan Tan provided an update to support Donohoe and Veltman’s original findings, expanding the data to include 1994 through 2017. The results showed the same five words listed above still topped the list. That said, Tan’s findings showed each of those words has declined slightly in its frequency since 1994, though “ERA” continues to appear in more than 20 NYT crossword puzzles each year.
What exactly does “crosswordiness” mean? Veltman coined this term to describe a certain type of crossword answer that appears particularly often, and he even devised a scientific formula to back it up.
The easiest way to define the term comes from Veltman himself, who says, “Crossword puzzlers know that certain words that never show up in real life pop up in crosswords all the time.” In other words, words that exude “crosswordiness” are far more useful as puzzle answers than they are in any practical quotidian (a crosswordy word meaning “daily”) scenarios.
The data shows “ASEA” — meaning “on the ocean” or “in the direction of the sea” — exudes the most “crosswordiness.” This is followed by “SMEE” — the name of a pirate character in Peter Pan. In third place is “URSA,” a constellation-related answer that’s often paired with the clue “___ Major” or “___ Minor.” Personally, I always found the words “EWER” and “EPEE” (“a large jug with a wide mouth” and “a sharp-pointed dueling sword, respectively)” to fit this category, though according to Veltman’s formula, they don’t rank as highly as I would’ve guessed.
Looking to improve your crossword skills but don’t know where to begin? Familiarizing yourself with the most common words is a good first step, but that’ll only get you so far.
To take your crossword skills to the next level, you’ll need a greater understanding of how the clues are written. Some clues contain built-in hints meant to guide you, so here are a few tips:
- If the clue is plural, so is the answer.
- If the clue contains a list connected by the word “and,” the answer is also plural. If the list is connected by “or,” the answer is singular.
- If the clue is in a foreign language, the answer will be in the same language (minus any accent marks or other diacritics).
- If the clue mentions a city or country (e.g., “Money, in Mexico”) the answer will likely be in the predominant language spoken there (“DINERO”).
- If the clue is in italics, it relates to the puzzle’s overall theme. These answers may be a bit cryptic on their own, but they will coalesce into a theme once taken all together.
- If a clue ends in a question mark, the answer likely has an unexpected meaning that incorporates some sort of wordplay (e.g., a double entendre or pun).
Follow these tips, brush up on some common crossword answers, and you’ll be well on your way to becoming a skilled cruciverbalist in no time.
More from our network
Word Smarts is part of Inbox Studio, which publishes content that uplifts, informs, and inspires.
