About Mini #295
Mini #295 is the daily 5×5 for Wednesday, July 22, 2026. Its grid has six black squares, laid out as three-square L-shapes in the top-left and bottom-right corners, which leaves 19 white squares for ten answers: five Across and five Down. By length, that's two five-letter, four four-letter and four three-letter answers.
The shortest clue is 6-Across, “Messy person”, at two words; the longest is 1-Across, “Smash success at the box office”, at six words. Clues worth knowing about before you start:
- Fill-in-the-blank: 4-Down, “Surrealist painter Salvador ___”
- Marked as a short form: 5-Down, “Public service announcement, for short”
Fill-in-the-blank clues are often the quickest way in, so 4-Down, “Surrealist painter Salvador ___”, is a good first stop. Some clues lean on a name or title, such as 4-Across, “The Capitol's rounded top” and 4-Down, “Surrealist painter Salvador ___”; if one is unfamiliar, work its crossing answers first. For more ways in, see the solving tips.
How this grid compares
This layout appears in 18 of the 241 daily 5×5 puzzles in our library dated up to July 22, 2026. The layout is rotationally symmetric: turn the grid upside down and the black squares land in the same places. That's two black squares more than the day before (July 21, 2026), which had four.
Like every daily 5×5 in our library, it was generated at our “easy” difficulty setting. The same date also has a 6×6 with 12 clues and a 7×7 with 16 clues.
More for July 22, 2026
Stuck? The hints for July 22, 2026 give three hints per clue, the answer key reveals one answer at a time, and there's a printable copy for solving on paper. The day after, Mini #296 (July 23, 2026), opens with 1-Across, “Shellfish in chowder”.