At this point in the pandemic, we’re all looking for something nice to distract us from all the chaos, even for a moment, which may explain why simple, unpretentious gameplay. word became very popular. A web-based puzzle that requires players to guess a new five-letter word every day in six tries or less, and everyone gets the same word. You may have seen people on Twitter sharing the gray, green, and yellow square patterns showing how they performed in Wordle that day, without explaining the solution (more on that in a second).
according to a beautiful New York Times profile of the word creative and software engineer Josh Wardle (get it?) designed the game as a gift for his partner, Palak Shah, who loves word games and puzzles. The couple apparently got into the NYT Spelling Bee and daily puzzle games in 2020 and wanted to create a new game that Wardle Shah would love. The perceived scarcity of the game – just one puzzle a day – leaves the player wanting more.
Where can I find Wordle?
The game is web-based, so there is no official app to download (although it has not been tried by several emulators). You can play using a mobile or desktop browser; just go www.powerlanguage.co.uk/wordle/. You have until midnight when the word resets and there is a new word for you to guess. I usually start a game, leave the browser tab open, and come back later trying to find the right word.
How do I play Wordle?
Everyone’s own strategy for how they approached that first grid of empty squares. It’s a solid plan to choose a word with multiple vowels as your first guess; when you rule out various vowels, it narrows down the word choices considerably (and no, I’m not telling you my secret starting word). Type your word and press the “Enter” key.
Letters in the word and in the correct place will turn green, letters in a different place in the word will turn yellow, and letters that are not in the word of the day will turn gray. Note that a green or yellow letter can appear more than once in a word – for example, if you get a green “a”, there may be another “a” elsewhere in the word – but you won’t know that until then. you play the next word. And fake words are not allowed – for example, if you try to enter the AEIOU, the game will give you the message “Not in the word list”.
In the screenshot below, the keyboard shows the letters you guessed incorrectly (that is, not in the word) in dark gray or black, and the letters that you haven’t guessed yet are in light gray. You’ll know you’ve won when all the letters turn green (and a compliment like “Impressive” appears).
What are these squares that everyone is sharing on Twitter?
Initially Wardle didn’t create a share component for the game, but after seeing users on Twitter sharing their results using green, yellow, and black square emojis, it added a share button that lets you copy your results when you’re done. The game in a way that doesn’t promise the day to those who haven’t played it yet. In the chart below, you can see that I guessed completely wrong on the first entry, got two correct letters in the right spots on the second guess, and guessed the word correctly on the third try (not bad!).
word 215 3/6
⬜⬜⬜⬜⬜
⬜⬜⬜– kim lyons (@SocialKimLy) 20 January 2022
Is there anything else I need to know?
High contrast “colorblind” version and dark mode available; You can open them by using the gear icon in the upper right corner next to the word WORDLE. If you’re feeling really lucky, you can also turn on “Hard Mode”, which requires you to add any hints to the next word. For example, in the first screenshot, in hard mode, I need to include R, T, and O in my third guess (so RADIO doesn’t work there).
It’s worth noting that this viewing option can be difficult for online screen readers such as low vision users. Developer Cariad Eccleston, founder antagonist.appcreated a way to make your results accessible (h/t to Liam O’Dell for this tip). Paste the results you copied from the Wordle site into the translator at: wa11y.co/and you get a text description of how you did it. Here is today’s description:
lower:
word 215 3/6Line 1: Nothing.
2nd line: 4th and 5th are perfect.
3rd line: Won!– kim lyons (@SocialKimLy) 20 January 2022
Of course, since we’re on the internet, of wordle grids are made meme-ifiedredesigned for political messagingand many brands tried to enter the popularity of the game. But Wardle told the BBC It has no plans to add ads to the game and does not collect or do anything suspicious with anyone’s data.
Is there anything good on the internet? We deserved.