Ask a crossword solver whether they use pen or pencil and you'll trigger a strong reaction. The pen-users will tell you that solving in pen signals confidence, commitment, and competence — that switching to pencil is an admission of defeat. The pencil faction will counter that only overconfident fools lock themselves into erroneous answers, that intellectual honesty requires the ability to correct oneself. Both sides have been arguing for as long as printed crosswords have existed.
But here's the thing: the best competitive solvers at events like the American Crossword Puzzle Tournament don't really engage in this debate. When asked directly, most of them give an answer that surprises newcomers: they use different tools for different confidence levels within the same puzzle. The pen-vs-pencil question misframes the issue entirely.
The Origin of the "Ink" Mystique
The cultural prestige of solving in pen dates back to the 1940s and 1950s, when solving the New York Times crossword over breakfast was already a middle-class ritual. Writing in ink implied you were sure — that you didn't need the safety net of erasure. Margaret Farrar, the NYT's first crossword editor, allegedly favored pen-using solvers at social occasions. The implication was clear: pencil was for learners; ink was for experts.
This cultural mythology persisted into the modern era. Will Shortz has been known to use pen. Merl Reagle, one of the most beloved constructors of his generation, was a committed pen user. ACPT competitors have long favored ballpoint or rollerball pens for tournament solving — partly for the ink's visibility from judges' sightlines, partly for the speed advantage of a smooth-flowing ink instrument over a slow-dragging graphite pencil.
But this is the key fact that the pen-vs-pencil debate always glosses over: tournament solvers can't erase anyway. In a timed competitive environment, backtracking through scribbled-over letters is always faster than erasing. The "ink only" practice in competitive solving is a practical choice, not a philosophical one.
The Case for Pencil (It's Not What You Think)
Pencil proponents often frame their argument as humility — "I know I might be wrong." But the real case for pencil is cognitive, not emotional. Here's the research-backed argument:
When you write lightly in pencil to indicate a hypothesis, you're encoding confidence metadata directly into the grid. A light pencil mark visually signals "this is tentative." A firm, dark mark — whether pencil or pen — signals "this is confirmed." Your brain processes these visual differences and treats the grid's letters differently depending on their apparent confidence level. This is extraordinarily useful when you return to a difficult section of the grid after filling in neighbors.
In contrast, pen commits every letter to the same visual confidence level. Every letter looks equally certain, whether it's a gimme you filled in instantly or a speculative guess based on one crossing letter. This flattening of confidence information is the pen's real weakness — not the inability to erase.
| Factor | Pen | Pencil |
|---|---|---|
| Speed | Faster — no sharpening, smooth flow | Slightly slower; graphite drags |
| Confidence encoding | All letters look equally certain | Light vs. dark marks show confidence level |
| Error correction | Scratch-outs are messy and confusing | Clean erasure preserves grid readability |
| Psychological effect | Forces commitment; reduces second-guessing | Can encourage excessive hedging |
| Paper durability | No effect on newsprint | Repeated erasing damages newsprint grids |
| Tournament use | Standard; judges can see answers clearly | Not permitted in most ACPT rounds |
Why the Top 1% Use Both — A Third Path
The most sophisticated approach, used by many top-tier solvers, is a two-stage system that combines the benefits of both tools:
Stage 1: Pencil for the Uncertain Phase
During the first sweep through a puzzle — when you're building corner anchors, scanning for theme patterns, and filling in entries with limited crossing letters — use pencil. Write lightly for hypotheses, firmly for confident answers. This visual confidence gradient will guide your second pass through the grid, showing you exactly where to focus correction efforts.
Stage 2: Pen for the Confident Phase
Once a section of the grid is confirmed — when every entry in a quadrant has been cross-verified by its crossing letters — trace over those answers in pen. The act of "inking" a section is itself psychologically useful: it signals to your brain that this territory is settled, that you should move on to the remaining uncertain areas. Some solvers describe this as "claiming" a section of the grid.
This two-stage approach is particularly effective for larger Sunday puzzles, where the sheer size of the grid means some sections will be solved with high confidence while others remain speculative.
The Digital Complication
Of course, this entire debate becomes moot for the majority of solvers today. The NYT Crossword app, our own daily online puzzle, and most digital platforms handle the pen-vs-pencil question through interface design rather than physical tools. You type letters, you delete letters, you have a check button. There's no material difference between "pen" and "pencil" confidence — every letter looks equally certain in a digital grid.
Some digital crossword apps have tried to replicate the confidence metadata of physical pencil through interface features: light gray letters for uncertain entries, bold black for confirmed ones. The NYT app's "check" function does something similar by highlighting errors in red. But no digital solution has perfectly replicated the intuitive, analog beauty of a half-filled grid where the pencil marks themselves tell a story of confidence.
Our Recommendation
For print puzzles: use a mechanical pencil (0.5mm lead) for the solving phase. Write at two different pressures — light for hypotheses, firm for confirmed answers. When you're ready to "finish" a section, go over it with a rollerball pen. For digital puzzles: use the app's built-in error-checking features to simulate the same confidence-tracking mechanism. The tool matters less than the mindset.
What Actually Improves Your Score
After all of this analysis, here's the honest truth: pen vs. pencil is not a meaningful variable in your solving performance. The quality of your crossword vocabulary, the efficiency of your grid-scanning strategy, your pattern recognition, and your knowledge of crosswordese are what determine how quickly and accurately you complete puzzles. Whether you use a Bic ballpoint or a Ticonderoga No. 2 changes almost nothing.
What the debate reveals, though, is something real about crossword psychology: the physical act of solving — the ink on paper, the sound of pencil on grid, the ritual of the newspaper folded to the puzzle page — carries enormous emotional weight for dedicated solvers. That ritual is worth preserving, regardless of which tool you choose.
Use the pen if it makes you feel confident. Use the pencil if it makes you feel free. Use both if you want the best of each. Just keep solving.