Building an AI crossword engine for editorial-style puzzles
I’m building Daily Crossword Unlimited because crossword products have a hard content problem.
A good crossword app needs a constant supply of fresh, high-quality puzzles. That is easy to understand as a market problem because crosswords are not a new or speculative format. They are a proven, long-running puzzle category across newspapers, publishers and mobile apps.
Daily Crossword Unlimited is my attempt to solve that from both sides.
On the front end, it is a published crossword app.
Behind it, there is an AI-assisted generation engine designed to create editorial-style crossword puzzles for the kind of market served by major puzzle publishers, app studios, newsletters and education platforms.
The system already has 2,000+ validated puzzles, and I can share a substantial sample pack for independent review. That matters because crossword quality is not vague. Editors, constructors and experienced solvers can review the output and judge whether the puzzles are actually good enough.
I’m also working on other projects now, so I’m thinking through the right commercial path for this one.
The options I’m considering are:
Licensing the app or puzzle engine
Selling the full app, generator, puzzle library and IP package
Finding a partner or operator who can commercialise it properly
I’d be interested to hear how other founders would position this.
Would you treat it mainly as a crossword app, a reusable puzzle generation engine, or a full acquisition asset?
