Idea crossword clue

The most likely answers for the crossword clue “Idea” are MIND, WHIM or KINK, with 4 letters. Below are 35 answers from 4 to 15 letters, best match first in each length, then what each top answer means and how to tell them apart.

Have some letters? Use the crossword solver

The best answers, explained

MIND 4 letters · noun

your intention; what you intend to do “he had in mind to see his old teacher”

THEME 5 letters · noun

(music) melodic subject of a musical composition “the theme is announced in the first measures”

NOTION 6 letters · noun

a vague idea in which some confidence is placed

THOUGHT 7 letters · noun

the content of cognition; the main thing you are thinking about “the thought never entered my mind”

ESTIMATE 8 letters · noun

an approximate calculation of quantity or degree or worth “an estimate of what it would cost”

SUBSTANCE 9 letters · noun

the choicest or most essential or most vital part of some idea or experience

ESTIMATION 10 letters · noun

an approximate calculation of quantity or degree or worth

INCARNATION 11 letters · noun

a new personification of a familiar idea “the incarnation of evil”

APPROXIMATION 13 letters · noun

an approximate calculation of quantity or degree or worth

GENERALIZATION 14 letters · noun

an idea or conclusion having general application

EXPERIMENTATION 15 letters · noun

the testing of an idea “not all experimentation is done in laboratories”

Telling them apart

With 4 squares, MIND, WHIM and KINK all fit. The first letter tells them all apart: M → MIND · W → WHIM · K → KINK. Fill in that crossing answer first.

With 6 squares, NOTION, BUBBLE, AVATAR, EMBLEM, PRAXIS and WHIMSY all fit. The first letter tells them all apart: N → NOTION · B → BUBBLE · A → AVATAR · E → EMBLEM · P → PRAXIS · W → WHIMSY. Fill in that crossing answer first.

With 7 squares, THOUGHT, MEANING, THEOREM, KEYNOTE and FIGMENT all fit. The third letter tells them all apart: O → THOUGHT · A → MEANING · E → THEOREM · Y → KEYNOTE · G → FIGMENT. Fill in that crossing answer first.

Other forms of this clue

Clues often use another form of the word, and the answer then takes the same form: “ideas” wants an answer that ends the same way.

What “idea” means

• noun: the content of cognition; the main thing you are thinking about (“it was not a good idea”)
• noun: your intention; what you intend to do (“the idea of the game is to capture all the pieces”)
• noun: a personal view (“he has an idea that we don't like him”)
• noun: an approximate calculation of quantity or degree or worth (“a rough idea how long it would take”)

A clue usually points at one of these senses, so the right answer is the one that matches the sense the puzzle means: check it against the crossing words.

About these answers

We match the clue against our own thesaurus and dictionary (Open English WordNet): words that mean the same as IDEA, and words whose definition is IDEA. We don't copy answers from newspaper puzzles, so a clue that leans on trivia or wordplay may need the crossing letters instead.