Becca Monaghan
Jan 12, 2022
A quick flick through social media will show feeds inundated with photos of grids with grey, yellow and green squares. This is all thanks to Wordle, a deceptively simple word puzzle that has snowballed into a viral sensation.
Each day, players have six attempts at guessing the hidden five-letter word. The colour-coded system offers hints to whether they’re close or not.
If a letter tile turns into a green square, the user has got the correct letter in the right place.
A yellow tile means the letter is featured in the word, but it is in the wrong place. Meanwhile, grey means that the letter is not in the word at all.
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While people have been turning to Twitter to showcase their triumphs playing the daily game, Wednesday’s word had everybody riled up – because of its American spelling.
Brits turned to the platform to express their frustration that “word 207” was “misspelt.”
Spoiler warning: The word was “favour”, but the puzzle used the American English spelling, “favor.”
“The Wordle word is a disgrace today, a DISGRACE I tell you,” one player fumed.
Well. There’s a lesson for British English speaking players of Wordle.— Chris Addison💙 (@Chris Addison💙) 1641966984
Right well I’ve had a go at this thing. I’m told it’s not always this annoying. ⬜🟩⬜⬜⬜ 🟨🟩⬜⬜🟨 ⬜🟩🟨🟩⬜ ⬜🟩⬜🟩🟩 ⬜🟩⬜🟩🟩 🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩— Tom Peck (@Tom Peck) 1641973788
Stewards enquiry needed on this one. Wordle 207 4/6 ⬜⬜⬜⬜⬜ ⬜🟨🟨⬜⬜ 🟨🟨🟨⬜⬜ 🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩— Robbie Collin (@Robbie Collin) 1641973584
Controversial Wordle 207 4/6 🤷♀️ ⬜🟨⬜⬜⬜ ⬜⬜⬜⬜🟩 ⬜⬜⬜🟩🟩 🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩— Allie Hodgkins-Brown (@Allie Hodgkins-Brown) 1641973925
Geez, American spwlling nearly got me on this one. I actually thought of the right word at row 2, but didn't enter… https://t.co/NhwcP9o1j1— Arteis (@Arteis) 1641940535
Might have done better if it was my own language!!!!!!!! Wordle 207 5/6 ⬛🟨🟨⬛⬛ 🟨🟨🟨⬛⬛ ⬛🟩🟨🟩⬛ ⬛🟩⬛🟩🟩 🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩— Olivia Alabaster (@Olivia Alabaster) 1641975593
Wordle making me forget every word that’s ever existed since about a week ago. 207 4/6 ⬛⬛🟨⬛⬛ 🟨⬛⬛⬛⬛ ⬛🟩⬛⬛🟨 🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩— Chris Cox (@Chris Cox) 1641975012
The Wordle word is a disgrace today, a DISGRACE I tell you. Wordle 207 5/6 ⬛⬛🟨🟨⬛ 🟨🟩⬛⬛⬛ ⬛🟩🟨⬛⬛ ⬛🟩⬛🟩🟩 🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩— Guy Walters (@Guy Walters) 1641975301
Nobody told me there would be American English in my word game. Wordle 207 6/6 🟨⬛⬛⬛⬛ 🟨⬛⬛⬛⬛ ⬛🟨🟨🟨⬛ 🟨🟨⬛🟨⬛ ⬛🟩🟨⬛⬛ 🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩— Alex Olney (@Alex Olney) 1641974829
#Wordle 207 3/6 ⬛🟨⬛🟨⬛ ⬛⬛🟨🟨🟨 🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩 Oof, that took way longer to think about words with those 3 yellow letters in a… https://t.co/Wzx0wuyGly— Rathika C (@Rathika C) 1641974922
Wordle 207 6/6 ⬛⬛🟨⬛⬛ ⬛⬛🟨⬛⬛ ⬛🟨⬛⬛⬛ 🟨🟨🟨⬛⬛ 🟨🟨⬛🟩⬛ 🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩 Me when I realise what the word is: https://t.co/C7bC3g9Sgl— Jamie (@Jamie) 1641946499
The concept was created by Josh Wardle, a Wales-born software engineer now based in Brooklyn.
The virality of Wordle stunned Wardle, who said: “It going viral doesn’t feel great to be honest. I feel a sense of responsibility for the players. I feel I really owe it to them to keep things running and make sure everything’s working correctly.”
He does, however, seek comfort in the fact that it helped people through such a difficult time.
“I get emails from people who say things like ‘hey, we can’t see our parents due to Covid at the moment but we share our Wordle results each day’. During this weird situation, it’s a way for people to connect in a low effort, low friction way.”
You can have a go of Wordle here – but be warned, it’ll have you hooked.
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