Crossword SNITCH

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

Times Cryptic Crossword 29196

Date 05 April 2025
Number 29196
Day of week Saturday
NITCH 111
Count of ref solvers 34
Ref solvers excluded with errors 0
Link to crossword View Crossword*
Times for the Times Link 29196

* Requires access to the Times Crossword Club

Detailed solving results

Reference, Tracked and Blog solvers with error-free solutions to this puzzle are shown below.

We also show the solver's Personal NITCH, which is their result on this puzzle compared to their average time, and the Wavelength Index of Times Cryptic Hardness, the WITCH, which is the Personal NITCH compared to the SNITCH.

Name TfTT Name Average time This time Personal NITCH WITCH
Paul Gilbert 05:52 09:12 156 140
Magoo 05:55 06:24 108 97
Nathan Panning 05:57 06:20 106 95
cmjhutton 06:06 07:19 119 107
Jason 06:08 08:39 141 127
verlaine Verlaine 06:29 07:31 115 103
aphis99 aphis99 07:18 12:37 172 154
Jif1603 08:31 06:57 81 72
HoneyBadger HoneyBadger 08:46 10:55 124 111
Umpire 09:03 10:34 116 104
tunflog 09:11 06:44 73 65
fshephe 09:12 03:24 36 32
AlanS 09:38 09:44 101 90
DrW 09:53 05:46 58 52
dhamm1958 10:06 09:28 93 83
Ciolf 10:31 11:16 107 96
chindit 10:40 13:00 121 109
lickert 10:55 08:33 78 70
scrabbler 11:10 13:44 122 109
keriothe_ keriothe 11:25 22:42 198 178
philjordan1147 BUSMAN 11:28 12:57 112 100
MikeOsborne mikeosborne 11:32 15:22 133 119
Tom Stubbs Tom Stubbs 11:37 13:34 116 104
chriswords 11:39 15:00 128 115
Heyesey 11:44 08:18 70 63
miked1961 11:47 13:56 118 106
Sheapey Sheapey 11:57 12:05 101 90
Amoeba89 Amoeba 12:07 15:36 128 115
m28ale 12:20 02:40 21 18
Brian Girling 12:30 07:14 57 51
Freemers 12:42 12:38 99 89
Glencairn 12:46 11:39 91 81
Silva 13:16 14:42 110 99
alexh 13:55 13:34 97 87
Tibthorpe 14:38 17:09 117 105
myles 15:00 17:05 113 101
franceslc11 15:01 18:06 120 108
Finzi 15:11 16:36 109 98
OliGrant 15:29 14:17 92 82
DunPangolin 15:32 16:40 107 96
andrewlake 15:45 17:06 108 97
Crossiant 17:26 17:09 98 88
KET 18:06 13:17 73 65
Dzhigit dzhigit71 18:46 17:39 94 84
pterodactyl 19:22 16:42 86 77
Zabadak3 Zabadak 19:46 17:55 90 81
goblin 22:06 16:48 76 68
ratterz 25:52 17:07 66 59
MartinP MartinP1 50:39 59:59 118 106

A guide to the solver status

Legend
 Reference solver used for SNITCH
 Other Reference solver
 Tracked solver
 Blog solver

Blog Solvers

Blog Solvers are those who have allowed their times to be taken from the Times for the Times blog.

Notes for Blog Solvers:

  • the most reliable format for reporting times is with format "mm:ss" or as "x minutes" in the title or at the start of the entry
  • only the first main comment for each blogger is used; responses to other comments or a second comment is ignored
  • to report errors, include "n errors" just after the time
  • If you just have a time it is assumed you have no errors unless you mention DNF or pink squares or giving up, etc, in the text
  • Examples of good time notifications are "38:30, 0 errors" and "39 minutes, 0 errors" in the comment title or as the first part of your comment

Notes

The definition of Reference and Tracked solvers is described on the Neutrinos page.

The results for Reference solvers are normally used to calcuate the SNITCH. When this happens they are shown in the list with a solid blue line to the left. In the previous SNITCH results listing for each crossword, these were the only entries shown.

The most common causes for Reference solver results not to be used are: (a) that they did not meet the criteria this month to be used as a reference (e.g. they may not have completed enough puzzles on each day of the week) or (b) they have been pushed out of the top 100 on the leader board. In these cases, the results are now shown, but their data is not used for the SNITCH calculation.

Where there is data for Tracked solvers, I show them also in this table. The solving data is not always available, as the Crossword Club site only shows the top 100 solvers to everyone. Logged-in users get their own leaderboard position and those around them, but this is not available to everyone. So the SNITCH site only gets data for those who have made the top 100 in the leaderboard at some point during the day.

As a result there are a few geographically advantaged solvers; those of us who solve early in the day (e.g. we in the Antipodes, those in Asia and those staying up late in North America) are more likely to hit the leaderboard even with slower times. Solvers who are just as capable but solve later in the UK day might not make the top 100 and I have no way to capture their results.

You may wonder why there are Tracked solvers (in red) with low average solving times, mixed in with the Reference solvers (in blue). These are usually those that, while they don't seem to be Neutrinos, are not well aligned to the SNITCH. So I don't use them as Reference solvers in the SNITCH calculation, but still show their overall results.

You might also notice that there's some inconsistency at the tail end of the Reference solver list. My cutoff point is an average solving time of 45 minutes. But if someone around this mark is chosen as a Reference solver, their next month's results might end up being over 45 minutes and they will still be used. Alternatively, a Tracked solver might creep in under 45 minutes on the next calculation, but didn't make the cut for the prior Reference list. It's on the to-do list to see if I can make this a bit more predictable.

Stored SNITCH Values

Here are the SNITCH values (stored on the day) from the crossword.

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