Halloween Word Search

This free printable Halloween word search hides 12 spooky words in a 13 by 13 letter grid, with an answer key on page 2. Words run across, down and diagonally, which suits most children in grades 2 to 4. Download it as a PDF for US Letter or A4, or open it in the maker to make it easier, harder, bigger or in large print.

Halloween word search printable (PDF)

This Halloween word search printable comes in four versions: the 13 by 13 puzzle, its answer key, a large print 10 by 10 puzzle and a puzzle with a hidden message that spells Happy Halloween. Click a picture for the PDF, or use the maker to change the words, the grid size or the difficulty.

New: make a whole Halloween activity pack with bingo, a word scramble, a writing prompt and a greeting card.

Words in this Halloween word search

Bat, broom, candy, cauldron, costume, ghost, haunted, moon, pumpkin, skeleton, spider and witch.

The words are all common Halloween vocabulary, so the puzzle doubles as spelling practice. Here is what each word means, which helps with younger readers and children learning English:

Which Halloween word search is right for your child?

How to use this Halloween word search

• Classroom party: hand it out as children arrive, so early finishers have something calm to do.
• Spelling practice: ask children to copy each word onto the back of the page after they find it.
• Vocabulary warm-up: read the word list aloud and talk about each word before starting, using the table above.
• Race a partner: two children share one sheet and take turns finding a word.
• Quiet time at home: a screen-free activity for the week before Halloween.

Word search tips for kids

1. Look for the first letter of a word, then check the letters around it for the second letter.
2. Find long words like CAULDRON and SKELETON first; they are easier to spot.
3. Look for unusual letters, such as the K in SKELETON or the W in WITCH.
4. Run a finger or pencil along each row so you do not lose your place.
5. Cross each word off the list as you find it.

Make your own Halloween word search

Open the word search maker with the Halloween theme to change the words, grid size (8 by 8 up to 20 by 20), difficulty, uppercase or lowercase letters, fonts and colors. Add your class name or children’s names as hidden words. The maker creates a new puzzle and a matching answer key each time, and your words are never added to the page link unless you share it.

Printing the Halloween word search

• Download the US Letter or A4 version to match your paper, and print at 100% (“Actual size”).
• The puzzle is black and white. The answer key uses a pale yellow highlight that prints as light gray on a black and white printer.
• To print only the puzzle, choose page 1 in your print settings.

Halloween word search with answer key: how the puzzle is built

The 12 words have 70 letters in all, and the grid has 13 × 13 = 169 squares, so the words fill about 41% of the grid, a little less because some words cross. The other squares hold random letters that act as decoys. The longest words, cauldron and skeleton, have 8 letters, and the shortest, bat, has 3. This is how the 12 words divide by length:

The most common letters in the word list are O (8), T (6), N (6), E (5), A (4), M (4). Look for the rare letters first, such as K, W, Y: a W is a good place to start a search for witch, and a K points to skeleton. Wikipedia’s word search article describes the history of the puzzle, which was first published in 1968.

Hard Halloween word search: how big is the search?

The difficulty of a word search comes from the number of places a word could hide. Every extra direction doubles the number of places to look, and a bigger grid multiplies it. For an 8-letter word such as cauldron, the numbers are:

So a hard Halloween word search on a 20 by 20 grid hides each long word in one of 1,716 possible places, while the easy 13 by 13 puzzle has only 156. That is why the maker’s level and size settings make such a big difference, and why a hard Halloween word search is a real challenge for adults.

Halloween word search for kids: how to adapt it

• Younger children (ages 5 to 7): use the easy 10 by 10 grid, where words run only across and down, and read the list aloud together.
• Children who find small print hard: choose the large print version, which has bigger letters in a clear font.
• Early finishers: try the hidden message version. The squares left over after all the words are found spell out “Happy Halloween”.
• Mixed groups: print the puzzle at two levels and let children choose.

More Halloween printables

• Halloween word search with a hidden message that spells Happy Halloween.
• Halloween puzzle pack with four word searches from easy to hard.
• October 2026 calendar to count down to Halloween.
• Browse all printable worksheets and puzzles.