How do you submit a guess?
Type a real word of the required length and press ENTER. Easy uses four-letter words, Normal uses five and Hard uses six. Each mode gives six standard tries; a valid wrong guess uses one of them.
You are looking for the exact hidden word, not merely a word that obeys some of the clues. Keep known positions in mind when choosing your next guess. A separate daily puzzle is also available in the game.
What do the colours mean?
- Teal: this letter occupies the correct position. Keep that positional fact.
- Pink: this copy of the letter matches an answer letter somewhere else. Try a different position for it.
- Grey: this copy has no remaining match. With repeated letters, that can mean an extra copy rather than the complete absence of the letter.
Our default colours are teal and pink. The game also offers an alternate colour setting; the matching rules do not change when you change the palette.
Why can the same letter receive different colours?
Exact-position matches are counted first. Other copies receive an elsewhere match only while unmatched copies of that letter remain in the answer. You cannot collect two positive matches from an answer containing just one copy.
Here is an original teaching example, separate from the game you will open below. If the answer is CABIN and the guess is CACAO, the first C and first A match exactly. The extra C and A receive grey feedback because their answer copies have already been used.
| Position | Guessed letter | Feedback |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | C | Teal: correct position |
| 2 | A | Teal: correct position |
| 3 | C | Grey: no unused copy |
| 4 | A | Grey: no unused copy |
| 5 | O | Grey: no unused copy |
Does a coloured keyboard key identify the position?
No. The keyboard keeps the strongest information seen for a letter: an exact match takes precedence over an elsewhere match, which takes precedence over grey. It does not mean every copy of that letter belongs in every position.
In the CABIN example, the C key can remain teal even though the second guessed C is grey. Read the individual row tiles to see which position was correct and which copy was excessive.
What should your next guess test?
Keep confirmed positions, move elsewhere-matched letters away from ruled-out positions, and use the other squares to test plausible letters. Do not infer a second copy merely because one copy earned teal.
A hint can reveal an unresolved answer letter. Use the normal feedback to explain why a candidate fits rather than treating a hint or an early lucky guess as a universal solving method. Open Word Vault below and choose Normal for five-letter rounds.
Questions
- How many guesses do I get? Six standard guesses in Easy, Normal and Hard. The word length changes between modes.
- Does grey always mean a letter is absent? No. If you guessed the letter more times than it occurs in the answer, an extra copy can be grey while another copy is teal or pink.
- Are the teaching example and my next puzzle the same? No. CABIN and CACAO illustrate the feedback rule. Opening the game starts its own puzzle.
