🔤 Word Game

Word Search

Find every hidden word — drag across the letters. Make your own puzzle or print it out.

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Words to find

  • ELEPHANT
  • GIRAFFE
  • DOLPHIN
  • PENGUIN
  • LEOPARD
  • GAZELLE
  • FALCON
  • BADGER
  • IGUANA
  • WALRUS
  • MONKEY

Printing keeps the grid and word list and drops everything else.

Overview

Word Search: play online or print your own

A word search is the most approachable puzzle there is: a grid of letters with words hidden inside it, and nothing to learn before you start. This one generates a fresh puzzle every time from eight topic lists — animals, countries, food, space, sports, music, coding and nature — or from any list of words you type in yourself. Drag across the letters to select a word; find them all to finish.

Three difficulties change both the grid size and how sneakily the words are hidden. Easy hides words left-to-right and top-to-bottom only, on a 10×10 grid. Medium adds diagonals on 13×13. Hard uses all eight directions on 15×15, which means words can run backwards and upward too. Every puzzle is generated in your browser, and the print button gives you a clean sheet with just the grid and the word list.

100% freeYour own wordsPrintableNo sign-up
How to play
  1. 1Pick a topic and a difficulty, or switch to your own word list.
  2. 2Drag from the first letter of a word to its last letter.
  3. 3Found words turn green in the grid and get struck through in the list.
  4. 4Find every word to complete the puzzle — the timer tracks how long it took.
Key features
  • Eight built-in topics, plus any custom word list you paste in
  • Three difficulties changing grid size and hiding directions
  • A different puzzle every time, generated in your browser
  • Words can be selected in either direction — you do not need to guess which way it was written
  • Print a clean puzzle sheet with just the grid and word list
  • Mouse and touch drag selection, and a completion timer

Frequently asked questions

Can I make a word search with my own words?
Yes. Press 'Use my own words' and type or paste a list, one per line or comma separated. Spaces and punctuation are stripped automatically, so 'polar bear' becomes POLARBEAR. Words too long for the grid are listed separately rather than silently dropped.
Can I print the puzzle?
Yes. The print button produces a clean sheet with just the grid and the word list — the controls, header and page furniture are hidden. It works for classroom handouts and printable activity sheets.
Do words run backwards?
Only on Hard. Easy uses left-to-right and top-to-bottom only, Medium adds the two forward diagonals, and Hard uses all eight directions, which includes right-to-left and bottom-to-top.
Does it matter which end I drag from?
No. A word counts whether you select it from the first letter or the last, because you cannot know from looking which direction it was hidden in.
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Full guide

How to Solve a Word Search Fast — and How the Puzzles Are Built

The scanning techniques that actually speed you up, why some words hide better than others, and how a generator places them.

Scanning techniquesWhy words hide wellHow generators work

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