Game guide

How to play Tiánzì

Tiánzì is a free word-wheel crossword in Chinese, set on a teahouse table in Beijing: you swipe across the characters on a plate-shaped wheel to spell each word, and every character has its pinyin above it. Your goal is to fill all five little crosswords of Unit 1 of our studio's beginner Chinese course and learn its 14 crossword words: hello, thank you and sorry, good morning and good night.

Play Tiánzì

Genre: Word puzzle: a word-wheel crossword that teaches beginner Chinese, from Unit 1 of our studio's beginner Chinese course
Players: 1 player
Length: Most puzzles take about a minute, longer while the words are new to you. Unit 1 has five, so a first run through takes roughly 5 to 10 minutes, and you can stop after any puzzle. There's no clock.
Plays on: Phones, tablets and computers, in a web browser, with no download. Swipe, tap, click or press keys, on upright or sideways screens; no gamepad.
Language: The menus, clues and tips are in English; the words you spell are Chinese (Simplified characters), each with its pinyin.
Progress: Saved in this browser on this device: the sound setting, the puzzle you're on, the words you've found and the characters hints have shown in any puzzle you haven't finished, which puzzles you've finished with the fewest hints each took, and how many puzzles you've started and finished. A finished puzzle starts fresh when you play it again. A private window may not keep anything.
Price: Free. No download and no account.
Version: 1.0.0, updated November 8, 2026
Feedback: Comments on itch.io

How to play

On the title screen, press Play. When you come back, Continue takes you to the puzzle you were on, and Puzzles lets you play any of the five, in any order.
Each puzzle is a small crossword of 3 or 4 words, each two to four characters long, with a wheel of 5 to 8 characters, and every word in it can be spelled from those characters. Swipe from character to character and lift your finger to check the word. You can also tap or click the characters one at a time and press the tick, or Tab to a character and press Space.
The clue card next to the grid shows one word at a time: its meaning in English (with a picture for some words) and how many characters it has, as empty boxes. The numbered chips on the card, like 1↓ and 2→, put another word on the card, and so does tapping that word's squares in the grid.
You can spell any word of the puzzle at any time, not only the one on the card. A right word flies into the grid and the card moves on to the next open word. A wrong one shakes, and a word you've already found pulses.
Every character shows its pinyin above it: on the wheel, in the word you are spelling, and in the grid once a word is found. The pinyin comes from the course, so you can say each word as you find it.
When you're stuck, the light bulb gives a hint: it shows a hidden character of the word on the card, in red. You hold three, and a used one comes back after 30 seconds of play. The Shuffle button moves the characters to new places round the wheel. There's no clock and no score.
Find every word to finish the puzzle. A short cheer appears with a line saying how many hints it took, and after Puzzles 1 and 3 a grammar tip explains words you just played, shown in full. Next puzzle goes on, and the light on the teahouse table moves from morning to night across the five.
Finish Puzzle 5 with all five done to reach the end card: the words of Unit 1 and your hint total, counting the fewest hints each puzzle took. Play Unit 1 again starts over from Puzzle 1.

Controls

Keyboard

Control	What it does
Tab, then Space	Move to a character on the wheel and pick it; Space on each character of the word, then Enter, spells and checks it. The arrow keys move round the wheel's characters
Enter	Check the word you've picked, or press the button that has focus (Play, Next puzzle and so on)
Backspace	Take back the last character
Escape	Clear the word; with no word, open the pause menu. Escape again resumes
Space	Shuffle the characters, when no button has focus
? or /	Use a hint

Mouse

Control	What it does
Click a character, then the next	Spell a word one character at a time; click the last character again to take it back
Click the tick beside the word	Check the word you've clicked (the button on the word's other side takes back a character)
Hold the button down and drag across the characters	Swipe a word; let go to check it
Click a chip or a word's squares	Put that word's clue on the card
Click the light bulb or Shuffle	Use a hint, or move the characters round the wheel
Click the menu button (top left) or the sound button (top right)	Open the pause menu (Resume, Start this puzzle again, Puzzles, Back to the title), or turn the sound on or off

Touch (phones and tablets)

Control	What it does
Swipe across the characters	Spell a word; lift your finger to check it. Slide back onto the character before to take the last one off
Tap characters one at a time, then the tick	Spell a word character by character; tap the last character again to take it back
Tap a chip or a word's squares	Put that word's clue on the card; tap a square where two open words cross again for the other word
Tap the light bulb or Shuffle	Use a hint, or move the characters round the wheel
Tap the menu button or the sound button	Open the pause menu, or turn the sound on or off

Tips

Most words here are two characters, and most cross another word. Find the words that cross a stuck word first: each puts its shared character into the other word's boxes on the card, and once every character of a word is showing, from crossings and hints together, it fills itself in.
A hint can finish a word for you. In a two-character word that crosses another, one shown character is all the word has left, so the hint fills the word in. To aim a hint, put the word you're stuck on on the card first, with its chip.
Use the pinyin on the wheel to match sound to character. The meaning on the card tells you which word to build, and the pinyin above each wheel character tells you how it is said, so you can put the characters in the right order.
One character can be said two ways. When two words in a puzzle read the same character differently, its wheel tile shows both readings with a slash between them, and each word in the grid shows its own.
Read the grammar tips, because they're about the words you just played: the first comes after Puzzle 1, the second after Puzzle 3. Chinese writing that appears inside a tip comes with its pinyin in brackets.
Your progress saves as you play, in this browser. Back to the title in the pause menu keeps the words you've found and the characters hints have shown, and Continue picks up where you were. Start this puzzle again in the pause menu clears that puzzle, and a puzzle you've finished starts fresh when you play it again from Puzzles.

Screenshots

Puzzle 5 of 5 on a dark wood teahouse table: a small crossword of white tiles with blue edges on a bamboo mat, two words found with their pinyin above each character, the clue card with a meaning and character boxes, and a blue-and-white porcelain plate with pinyin-topped characters and a gold trail across three of them. — Swiping a word across the wheel, with one clue on the card

Puzzle 2 of 5: a found word with its pinyin on the grid, a hint's character shown in red, and the clue card asking for a meaning with empty character boxes. — A found word and a hint's red character

After Puzzle 1: the finished crossword with a card saying well done, a grammar tip in full and a Next puzzle button. — A grammar tip after a puzzle, shown in full

Recent updates

Version 1.0.0 · November 8, 2026

The first release of Tiánzì, a word-wheel crossword that teaches your first Chinese.

Five puzzles from Unit 1 of our studio's beginner Chinese course: hello, thank you and sorry, good morning and good night.
Swipe the characters on the wheel to spell each word, or tap them one at a time, or tab to them from the keyboard. A word is two or more Chinese characters.
Pinyin above every character: on the wheel, in the grid and in the word you are spelling, so you can say it as you find it.
One clue at a time, on a big card: each word's meaning in English, how many characters it has, and a picture for some. Tap a chip or a word's squares to look at another clue.
Hints show a character when you're stuck (three in hand; a used one comes back after 30 seconds of play). Shuffle moves the characters round the wheel. There is no clock and no score.
A teahouse table in Beijing: dark rosewood, a gaiwan of green tea, a dish of sunflower seeds, a paper fan, a plum branch, an inkstone, blue-and-white porcelain tiles and a porcelain plate for the wheel. The light moves from morning to night across the five puzzles.
A grammar tip after some puzzles explains the words you just played, shown in full.
Works on phones, tablets and computers, in your browser, with nothing to download. Sound can be turned off at any time. Your progress is saved in your browser.

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