NYT Mini Crossword Answers and Hints for Saturday, Nov. 7, 2026: 7 by 7, 20 Clues

Joel Fagliano wrote the 20 clues in the New York Times (NYT) Mini Crossword for Saturday, Nov. 7, 2026, and the grid grows to seven squares on each side. Two of the clues are puns, and one pairs a shark movie with a French film. Each hint below opens with a tap, and the answers stay at the bottom in a marked spoiler section.

Hints for every clue

Across

• 1-Across (3 letters), Pupper

  internet slang for a young household animal that barks; it starts with D and ends with G.

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  Dog
• 4-Across (3 letters), Sight in a shark movie … or at the end of a French film

  the part of a shark that cuts through the water in English and a word for “the end” in French; it starts with F and ends with N.

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  Fin
• 7-Across (3 letters), ”___ you serious?”

  the form of the verb “to be” that follows “you”; it starts with A and ends with E.

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  Are
• 8-Across (3 letters), Genetic molecule

  the single-stranded cousin of the molecule that carries your genes, usually known by a three-letter short form; it starts with R and ends with A.

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  Rna
• 9-Across (7 letters), Canine expert

  the “canine” here is a kind of tooth, so think of the professional who checks your teeth; it starts with D and ends with T.

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  Dentist
• 11-Across (5 letters), Common word in a hotel Wi-Fi network name

  the person staying in the room, who gets the network’s login; it starts with G and ends with T.

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  Guest
• 12-Across (7 letters), What Dorothy from “The Wizard of Oz” wants to get over?

  the colorful arc from a famous song she sings; it starts with R and ends with W.

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  Rainbow
• 14-Across (3 letters), ___ Taylor (fashion brand)

  a woman’s first name; it starts with A and ends with N.

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  Ann
• 15-Across (3 letters), Prefix with friendly

  a clipped word meaning kind to the environment; it starts with E and ends with O.

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  Eco
• 16-Across (3 letters), “The Tell-Tale Heart” writer

  a 19th-century American author of gothic tales who also wrote about a raven; it starts with P and ends with E.

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  Poe
• 17-Across (3 letters), Barely manage, with “out”

  a verb for scraping together a living with difficulty; it starts and ends with E.

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  Eke

Down

• 1-Down (3 letters), Father’s Day honoree

  a three-letter word for a male parent that reads the same backward; it starts and ends with D.

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  Dad
• 2-Down (7 letters), Herb for spaghetti sauce

  a leafy herb that also tops a pizza; it starts and ends with O.

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  Oregano
• 3-Down (7 letters), The real deal

  a word for authentic, the opposite of a fake; it starts with G and ends with E.

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  Genuine
• 4-Down (7 letters), Toy that’s flying off the shelves?

  a plastic disc thrown at the park, and the question mark tells you the clue is a pun; it starts with F and ends with E.

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  Frisbee
• 5-Down (7 letters), On the shelves

  a shop’s way of saying an item is available to buy right now; it starts with I and ends with K.

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  Instock
• 6-Down (3 letters), Singer ___ King Cole

  a short first name for a mid-century crooner; it starts with N and ends with T.

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  Nat
• 10-Down (3 letters), Highest point value for a Scrabble tile

  the value printed on a Q tile in standard English Scrabble; it starts with T and ends with N.

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  Ten
• 12-Down (3 letters), Jay-Z’s genre

  a style of music built on spoken rhymes over beats; it starts with R and ends with P.

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  Rap
• 13-Down (3 letters), Misfortune

  an old-fashioned word for sorrow or trouble; it starts with W and ends with E.

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  Woe

Two shelves and a trip over the Oz question

Two clues in the Down list talk about shelves, and they sit side by side in the grid as 4-Down and 5-Down. One uses “flying off the shelves” as a pun, with a question mark to warn you that the phrase is about to be taken literally. The other states the plain opposite situation, with nothing tricky in it. If you solve the plain one first, its letters help you test the pun.

The least literal clue is the Dorothy one in 12-Across. “Get over” does not mean climbing a wall. It points to a song lyric about a place beyond something in the sky, so the answer is a thing in the sky, not a hurdle.

The ”…” clue at 4-Across works differently. The three dots join two scenes with “or”, and the one answer has to suit both: it is the part of a shark you spot above the waves and the closing word on a French film’s last frame.

Grid structure: 7 by 7 with six black squares

The grid has 49 squares, six of them black. Column 4 loses its first two and last two squares, and the other two black squares sit at the left and right ends of row 4. Rows 3 and 5 run the full width.

Count	Across	Down
Entries	11	9
3-letter entries	8	5
5-letter entries	1	0
7-letter entries	2	4
Letters covered	43	43

The six seven-letter entries are the two full rows (3 and 5) and four full columns (2, 3, 5 and 6), so every long answer crosses the others.

Today’s grid is 7 by 7; the rules for a Mini are on our Mini Crossword page.

Track a solving streak on our printable weekly calendar or the November 2026 printable calendar.

More of Saturday’s puzzles: Wordle hints, Connections hints, Strands hints, Spelling Bee hints and Pips hints. The bigger themed grid for Saturday is our Midi answers for Nov. 7, and the full-size puzzle is in our daily Crossword answers for Nov. 7. Friday’s grid is in our Mini answers for Nov. 6.

Today’s NYT Mini answers (spoilers)

Stop here if you still want to solve it yourself.

Clue	Answer
1-Across	Dog
4-Across	Fin
7-Across	Are
8-Across	Rna
9-Across	Dentist
11-Across	Guest
12-Across	Rainbow
14-Across	Ann
15-Across	Eco
16-Across	Poe
17-Across	Eke
1-Down	Dad
2-Down	Oregano
3-Down	Genuine
4-Down	Frisbee
5-Down	Instock
6-Down	Nat
10-Down	Ten
12-Down	Rap
13-Down	Woe

The answers come from the puzzle’s official data.

Yesterday's Mini Crossword answer

The Mini on Friday, Nov. 6, 2026: Across 1 Sued, 5 Force, 6 Carbon, 7 Area, 8 Bern; Down 1 Sorer, 2 Urban, 3 Eco, 4 Den, 5 Fare, 6 Cab. Yesterday's hints and full solution.