About Mini #402
Mini #402 is the daily 5×5 for Friday, November 6, 2026. Its grid has four black squares, laid out as stacked pairs in the top-left and bottom-right corners, which leaves 21 white squares for ten answers: five Across and five Down. By length, that's four five-letter, four four-letter and two three-letter answers.
The shortest clue is 3-Down, “Business companies”, at two words; the longest is 6-Across, “Like a noble gas that won't react”, at seven words. Clues worth knowing about before you start:
- Marked as a short form: 7-Across, “Where many college students live, for short”; 6-Down, “Texter's ‘No clue,’ briefly”
There's no fill-in-the-blank this time, so a good first stop is the shortest slot: 4-Down has only three letters. Some clues lean on a name or title, such as 1-Down, “Capital of Vietnam” and 6-Down, “Texter's ‘No clue,’ briefly”; 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 31 of the 348 daily 5×5 puzzles in our library dated up to November 6, 2026. The layout is rotationally symmetric: turn the grid upside down and the black squares land in the same places. The day before (November 5, 2026) also had four black squares, arranged differently.
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 14 clues.
More for November 6, 2026
Stuck? The hints for November 6, 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 before, Mini #401 (November 5, 2026), opens with 1-Across, “Every last one”; the day after, Mini #403 (November 7, 2026), opens with 1-Across, “‘For your information,’ in a memo”.