Solve the quote
Starter clue: V = E
KSTEHAIXTKGUYKYVQAVQSVOUAJVCVTENVAAVTYOKHHVZPITKQIAJVTIQV.
Decoder — write your answer under each cipher letter:
- A
- B
- C
- D
- E
- F
- G
- H
- I
- J
- K
- L
- M
- N
- O
- P
- Q
- R
- S
- T
- U
- V
- W
- X
- Y
- Z
Cryptogram maker
Type a sentence of your own and this page turns it into a cryptogram you can print: every letter swapped for another one, a decoder strip to write in, and an answer key on a page of its own. Free, no sign-up, and your words never leave your browser.
Nothing you type is sent anywhere. This is a static page. The letters are swapped by a few kilobytes of JavaScript running inside your own browser, and there is no server on the other end to receive anything. Whatever you write — a pupil's name, a family joke, a verse — stays on your machine.
Your cryptogram
Friday warm-up
How often each cipher letter appears. In ordinary English the commonest letters run E T A O I N S H R D L U.
- V10V appears 10 times.
- A6A appears 6 times.
- T6T appears 6 times.
- K5K appears 5 times.
- I4I appears 4 times.
- Q4Q appears 4 times.
- H3H appears 3 times.
- Y3Y appears 3 times.
- E2E appears 2 times.
- J2J appears 2 times.
- O2O appears 2 times.
- S2S appears 2 times.
- U2U appears 2 times.
- C1C appears 1 times.
- G1G appears 1 times.
- N1N appears 1 times.
- P1P appears 1 times.
- X1X appears 1 times.
- Z1Z appears 1 times.
Show the answer key
A CRYPTOGRAM IS A SENTENCE WITH EVERY LETTER SWAPPED FOR ANOTHER ONE.
Full key — A=T B=X C=V D=U E=Y F=B G=M H=P I=O J=H K=A L=Z M=J N=L O=W P=F Q=N R=Q S=C T=R U=I V=E W=K X=G Y=S Z=D
The puzzle above was made when this page was built, so there is always one to look at. Type your own sentence and press Make the cryptogram to replace it.
How to make a cryptogram, step by step
- Type your sentencePut your own words in the box: a quote for the class, a birthday message, a Bible verse, the name of the place you are going on holiday. Anything from a few words to about two lines works well on one sheet.
- Pick how much help to giveGive away one, two or three starting letters if the solver is a beginner, or none at all for a proper challenge. You can also show a letter frequency table, which is the single biggest help a new solver can get.
- Choose the print sizeStandard is 20 pt on paper. Large is 26 pt. Extra large is 34 pt — big enough to read across a table, and the size to pick for anyone with tired eyes.
- Make the puzzlePress the button and the sentence is encoded straight away, right here in the page. Press “Shuffle the code” to swap the letters around differently and get a completely new-looking puzzle from the same sentence.
- Print itPress “Print this sheet”. The form, the menus and this explanation all drop away and you get a clean US Letter page with room to write. The answer key prints on a page of its own, so you can hand out the puzzle page by itself.
What people make these for
The classroom
A spelling list, a line from the set text, or a message that tells the class where the trip is going. Cryptograms make children read letter patterns instead of whole words, which is exactly the skill you want them practising. Print one sheet, photocopy the rest.
Birthdays and holidays
Hide a message in a party bag, run a Christmas or Easter puzzle at the table, or set the clue that leads to the next stop on a treasure hunt. A cryptogram generator is much faster than working the swaps out on paper yourself.
Church and Sunday school
Encode a verse for the week, make a take-home sheet, or set a group activity that needs nothing but a pencil. Nothing you type is uploaded, which matters when the words are personal.
Senior centres and care homes
Set the size to extra large, keep the sentence short and give away two letters. The result is a puzzle that is genuinely readable — 34 pt type with a writing line under every letter.
What each option does
Starting letters. A cryptogram with no help at all is a real piece of work. Giving away the commonest letter turns a twenty-minute puzzle into a ten-minute one, and giving away three makes it approachable for a nine-year-old. The letters are shown the way newspapers show them, cipher letter first: Q = E means every Q you see is really an E.
Punctuation. Keeping commas, apostrophes and full stops makes a puzzle noticeably easier, because an apostrophe near the end of a word is almost always followed by S or T. Turn punctuation off for a cleaner-looking, harder sheet.
The frequency table. This counts how often each cipher letter appears in your puzzle. Compared against the usual order of English letters — E T A O I N S H R D L U — it is the fastest way in for someone who has never solved one.
The answer page. It always starts on a fresh page and never shares one with the puzzle, so you can hand out the puzzle without handing out the solution. For a sentence of ordinary length that means the puzzle is page one and the answers are page two. On screen it stays folded away until you open it.
Questions
Does my sentence get uploaded anywhere?
No. The encoding happens in your browser with a small piece of JavaScript that is part of this page. There is no server to send it to — this whole site is a set of static files. Your text is never transmitted, never stored and never seen by us. You can check: put the page in aeroplane mode or unplug the network and the maker still works.
What is a cryptogram, exactly?
A cryptogram is a sentence in which every letter has been swapped for another letter, consistently, all the way through. If E becomes Q in one word, E is Q in every word. No letter ever stands for itself, which is a rule this generator enforces for you. Solving one means working out the swap from the letter patterns.
How long should the sentence be?
Somewhere between 40 and 150 letters is the sweet spot. Shorter than about 30 letters and there is not enough repetition to work from, so the puzzle becomes guesswork. Longer than about 200 letters and it stops fitting on one page in large print.
Can I make several different puzzles from one sentence?
Yes. Press “Shuffle the code” as many times as you like. Each press picks a brand new letter swap, so the same sentence comes out looking completely different. Handy when you want two groups in the same room working on the same quote without copying.
Is it really free? Do I need an account?
It is free and there is no account, no email box, no watermark and no advert. Print what you make, photocopy it, hand it round the class or the senior centre. We pay for this the same way we pay for the rest of the site: some people like the puzzles enough to buy the iPhone app.