Quick SNITCH

A quantitative guide to the degree of difficulty of the Times Quick Cryptic Crossword

Crossword Setters and Difficulty

This table shows an overview of all crossword setters in the database, including how many crosswords they've authored and how difficult their puzzles tend to be.

  • Setter: The name of the person who created the crossword. Click the name to view all their crosswords.
  • Average NITCH: A measure of difficulty, where 100 is average. Higher numbers are harder; lower numbers easier.
  • # Crosswords: The total number of crosswords attributed to that setter.
  • 25th Percentile: 25% of the setter’s crosswords are easier than this value. It gives a sense of their easiest puzzles.
  • Median: 50% of the setter’s crosswords are easier/harder than this value. A difference from the average highlights a skew in the distribution
  • 75th Percentile: 25% of their crosswords are harder than this. It shows how difficult their tougher puzzles are.

You can click on any column header to sort the table by that column. Click again to reverse the order (ascending/descending).

Setter Average NITCH # Crosswords 25th Percentile Median 75th Percentile
Joker 100 89 92 99 111
Mara 91 82 85 91 96
Teazel 98 81 89 96 107
Izetti 97 75 86 96 106
Hurley 94 75 87 93 102
Orpheus 89 55 80 87 97
Jalna 99 54 91 99 106
Wurm 97 50 91 96 102
Pedro 103 44 95 102 110
Trelawney 74 42 69 74 78
Oink 84 39 76 83 89
Breadman 109 38 98 104 115
Felix 100 34 91 101 107
Alex 91 26 83 88 99
Pipsqueak 82 20 74 83 91
Asp 109 18 101 105 115
Cheeko 121 16 110 112 139
Jimmy 86 16 81 84 89
Dangle 86 13 78 88 93
Juji 99 11 91 96 109
Beck 100 11 93 97 108
Myles 103 11 93 102 112
Shay 116 11 102 111 128
Bjorn 114 9 104 114 126
Rongo 94 7 85 95 98
Lupa 111 7 102 120 122
Juno 109 6 102 108 117
City 111 5 110 113 113
Peridot 97 5 83 100 110
Corelli 106 4 100 103 110
Kenny 101 4 94 104 111
Tango 83 3 75 76 88
Loon 113 3 105 109 120
Kybos 113 3 110 115 117
Heron 100 2 98 100 102
Des 103 2 99 103 107
Alfie 95 2 94 95 95
Bubbles 84 1 84 84 84
Marty 89 1 89 89 89
Noel 118 1 118 118 118
Apus 95 1 95 95 95
Teasel 93 1 93 93 93
Oran 126 1 126 126 126
Jet 111 1 111 111 111
Hawthorn 106 1 106 106 106