Discovery Education Puzzlemaker Alternatives for Teachers (2026)

Discovery Education Puzzlemaker still works, and it is still free. Its crossword maker just goes by another name: Criss-Cross. You can build one at puzzlemaker.discoveryeducation.com without an account.

What Puzzlemaker does not do is save a puzzle, give students a link, or let them solve on a screen. If you need any of those, one of the eight alternatives below will suit your class better. We checked every tool on its live site in October 2026. One disclosure up front: Grid Genius is our product, and we review it as plainly as the rest.

Puzzlemaker alternatives at a glance

Here is how the tools compare on the basics: price, sign-up, answer keys and online solving. Puzzlemaker sits in the top row as the baseline.

All prices are as of October 2026, taken from each tool's own website on October 6. Plans change, so confirm before you pay for anything.

What Discovery Education Puzzlemaker still does

Puzzlemaker lives at puzzlemaker.discoveryeducation.com, and old puzzlemaker.school.discovery.com bookmarks redirect there. It offers ten puzzle types: Word Search, Criss-Cross, Double Puzzles, Fallen Phrases, Math Squares, Mazes, Letter Tiles, Cryptograms, Number Blocks and Hidden Message. None of them asks you to sign in.

The crossword takes two fields. You give it a title of up to 49 characters, then type your words and clues, one pair per line, up to 3,000 characters in all. Click Create My Puzzle and you get a printable page with three buttons: Show Answer, Print Puzzle and Rebuild Puzzle.

What it does well

• It costs nothing and asks for nothing. No account, no email address, no install.
• It prints cleanly. The page holds the grid, the clue list and optional instructions.
• It makes an answer key. Click Show Answer, then Print Puzzle.
• It reshuffles on request. Rebuild Puzzle lays the same words out again. Three builds of one list gave us three different grids.

Where it stops

• Nothing is saved. There is no save button and no puzzle link, so keep your word list in a document.
• Students cannot solve on a screen. The grid is an image made for paper.
• Answers must be one word. The first space ends the answer. Type "solar system The Sun and its planets" and Puzzlemaker makes the answer SOLAR, with the clue "system The Sun and its planets". Type SOLARSYSTEM instead.
• There are no settings. You cannot choose a grid size, add a word bank or change fonts.
• Versions are on you. Rebuild gives a new layout, but you track which key matches which copy.

If those limits never get in your way, keep using it. If they do, one of the tools below fills the gap.

8 Puzzlemaker alternatives, reviewed

We list Grid Genius first because it is ours. The other seven run roughly from the closest match to Puzzlemaker's free, no-account workflow to the furthest.

Grid Genius covers the jobs Puzzlemaker leaves to you: saving a puzzle, sharing it, and letting students solve it on a screen. Paste a vocabulary list into the free word-list maker, choose a 7×7, 11×11 or 15×15 grid, and download the worksheet and its answer key as PDFs. None of that needs an account. Our word-list walkthrough shows each step.

When you have a topic but no list, AI builds the whole puzzle for you: words, clues and grid. Students who get stuck can use AI Hints, which rephrase a clue or offer a related fact instead of filling in letters.

Crossword Labs feels like Puzzlemaker with a link attached. You type an answer, a space and a clue on each line, set a passcode, and save. Students get a URL they can solve on any device, and you can still print or export a PDF. The site describes itself as free, with no ads, no watermarks and no registration.

Armored Penguin's crossword maker is free and needs no account. Enter your words and clues in its form, and it builds a puzzle page. Buttons there give you a printable HTML or PDF copy, an answer key in either format, and online solving. The settings run deep, from ink-saving grey squares to the PDF page size.

The Teacher's Corner runs a free, ad-supported crossword maker with a long feature list. Start from a premade word list, paste your own with its Quick Add box, or give it a subject and let AI draft the words and clues. Finished puzzles print, download as a PDF or image, or go online as a playable, shareable puzzle.

Flippity turns a Google Sheet into a printable crossword. You copy its template, type words and clues, publish the sheet to the web, and open the link the template builds. It is free, some features are supported by ads, and there is no premium tier.

EclipseCrossword is a free Windows app. Install it from the Microsoft Store or as a direct download, type your words and clues, and print. Its site calls it free with no catch: not a trial version, and no ads.

Puzzle-maker.com builds a crossword from lines of answer, slash, clue, so multi-word answers are allowed. While you edit, you can preview the answer key, add a Name line and switch on a word bank. The free version is a printable web page with a sponsor's message, and the clean PDF costs extra.

WordMint is a worksheet studio for teachers. Type your questions and answers, or start from its library of more than 300,000 pre-made puzzles. Then convert the same list into a word search, a word scramble, bingo cards or a matching worksheet.

How to choose a crossword maker for your class

Feature lists blur together fast. These four checks settle most choices.

Start with your word list

Every tool here wants an answer and a clue for each entry. Two details decide how smoothly your list goes in:

• How a line splits. Puzzlemaker and Crossword Labs split at the first space, so each answer must be one word. Puzzle-maker.com splits at a slash. Grid Genius splits at a colon or a tab, so two columns copied from a spreadsheet paste straight in.
• How many words fit. Puzzlemaker takes 3,000 characters. The Teacher's Corner takes 30 words free (10 with an ad blocker, 50 on premium). Grid Genius takes up to 50 words. Flippity takes as many as you like, though long lists may not fit on one printed page.

Differentiate with the same puzzle

You can support different students without building a second puzzle.

• Word banks help younger students and English learners. Armored Penguin, The Teacher's Corner and Puzzle-maker.com each add one with a setting.
• Pair work suits Armored Penguin's information gap mode, which prints two half-solved sheets.
• Scaffolded clues are where Grid Genius differs. Write a backup hint for any word, and a stuck student sees your second clue first. AI Hints then rephrase the clue or add a related fact instead of giving the answer away. Our guide to differentiated vocabulary crosswords shows how to set it up.

Stop copying before it starts

One layout on every desk means a glance gives away a square. The fix is different layouts of the same words.

• The free route: build the puzzle and print it with its key, then rebuild for a new layout and print again. Puzzlemaker's Rebuild Puzzle button and Flippity's reload button both work this way. You label the versions and match the keys yourself.
• The organized route: a Grid Genius class set (Pro) prints 2 or 4 shuffled layouts, labeled by letter, each with its own answer key, in one PDF. Here is how to seat and grade the versions.

Check the printout, and who can see it

• Answer keys: every tool here makes one. Puzzle-maker.com charges for its PDF, and WordMint's free plan limits printing and leaves out PDF export.
• Branding: The Teacher's Corner keeps its citation on every puzzle. Free Grid Genius printouts carry a small footer.
• Name lines: Grid Genius worksheets print Name and Date lines. Puzzle-maker.com adds a Name line with its worksheet option.
• Test print first: Puzzlemaker prints whatever is on screen, so check whether the answers are showing.
• Visibility: free Crossword Labs puzzles are public and can turn up in search. Grid Genius puzzles saved from the word-list maker are private by default. Armored Penguin lists a puzzle publicly only when you press its List button.

Beyond crosswords: word searches, mazes and more

Puzzlemaker's other nine puzzle types are still there and still free. Its word search builds grids up to 40 by 40 letters and outputs an image or HTML.

If you are moving your word searches too, Armored Penguin, The Teacher's Corner, WordMint, Flippity and Puzzle-maker.com all make them. Crossword Labs pairs with WordsearchLabs, a free, ad-free word search maker, and its membership covers both. Armored Penguin also makes secret code puzzles, and The Teacher's Corner has a maze maker. For math squares, number blocks and the rest, Puzzlemaker remains a sound free choice. Grid Genius makes crosswords only.

The bottom line

If a quick paper crossword covers your needs, Puzzlemaker still does the job for free. Pick Crossword Labs for a free, ad-free link students can solve online. Pick Armored Penguin for answer-key PDFs and pair work. Pick Grid Genius when you want word lists, AI generation, AI Hints and anti-copy class sets in one place. The free tier covers lists, limited AI generation and AI Hints; class sets come with Pro.

Once you have picked a maker, our classroom crossword guide has ten ways to put it to work. Building newspaper-style grids instead? Our Crossword Compiler alternatives covers the free constructor tools.

Frequently asked questions