A printed word search is finished when the ink dries. The same set, sent out as web output, keeps working on a site you already own. That is a current Puzzle Maker Pro path, not a future app: generate playable output (JSON / HTML) and publish it with the BookPublisherTools WordPress plugin, or host the player yourself.
This page is the why — print title plus playable sample as two products from one run. The upload steps already live in Publish a Puzzle Catalog.
What the embed is for
Website owners are not buying another paperback. They want a board a visitor can solve in the browser, on their domain, without sending people to a third-party puzzle toy.
Typical jobs:
- A free sample next to a KDP or Etsy word-search title (“play one, then buy the book”).
- A lead-gen or membership extra on a site you already run.
- A practice path for a class or course that is not a printed packet.
The embed is the product the visitor plays. The WordPress page around it is yours: your nav, your email capture, your “get the book” button. Interactive editions are the per-module license that turns a static export into that playable catalog. You buy it for the puzzle types you actually want to play, not as a site-wide SaaS.
PuzzleWire, if the name comes up, is a future play-only SaaS and is not in current bundles. It is not how you embed a word search today.
The same run, two products
The commercial move is one word list and two outputs. The print file is the book or printable. The playable catalog is the sample or the extra. They should look related — same theme, same lists — so the person who finishes a board on your site recognizes the book.
Hexagon Word Search is the newest word-search module with live online play: honeycomb grid, three axes, JSON/HTML out, WordPress plugin or self-host. A square standard word search still carries the print listing; do not assume it exports HTML until that product page says so [confirm].
Newest modules generate online playable output. Not every older module offers every interactive lane (interactive PDF, Puzzle Slides, and web play are separate). Word search on the web here means online play, not an interactive PDF. Hexagon Word Search does not offer interactive PDF or Puzzle Slides; “Interactive” on that product is the browser game.
What a playable word search has to be
It has to be obviously a word search in the first five seconds. Find the word, mark the word. On a hexagon board the lines stair-step; the rule is still a straight run of touching cells. If you need a one-page “how this grid works” for readers, that is a solver note, not this article.
It has to live on your site. The plugin publishes a catalog as its own page or in a post. One catalog plays per page — plan the IA that way (a sample page, a weekly challenge page), not as five players stacked in one article.
It has to have an ending that works for you. A short free set that lands on your own button is a sales path. A leveled sequence that stays in the visitor’s browser is a practice path. Nothing comes back to you as a class dashboard; progress is local to that browser. Do not sell it as an LMS.
It has to match the print promise. If the book is large-print easy lists, the sample should not be a 40×40 expert board. If the shop is kids’ vocabulary, the playable set is that list, not a leftover adult quote file.
What this is not
This is not a replacement for the print product. Most word-search money is still books and printables. The embed is the second product: proof, sample, habit.
This is not a tutorial for the desktop app or for the plugin. Editions explain what Creative Interactive and Productivity Interactive unlock. The catalog tutorial explains export, zip, and shortcode. Use those when you are ready to publish a set.
This is not “every word search in the catalog plays online.” Check the module you own. Newest ones do. Hexagon Word Search does.
When it is worth doing
You already have a WordPress site and a word-search title (or you are about to). Put a short set on a page you control, make the last screen yours, and keep the long file for KDP, Etsy, or TPT. Same lists. Two products. That is the whole embed.