What’s With Wordle?

Maura Mahmood | Writer

If you’ve been on social media anytime within the last month, you have probably heard the word “Wordle” or seen posts with colorful square emojis. People young and old have found joy playing and sharing this game, but what is it?

Wordle is a new online word game that has taken the internet by storm. With bright-colored letters and challenging daily puzzles, this guessing game is designed to test your lexicon and logic.

The object of the game is to guess a five-letter word within six tries. Every time the player guesses a word, they are given clues in the form of different colored tiles to help them get closer to the correct answer.

Why do people love it? Something that sets this game apart is that there is only one puzzle available per day. All players get the same word daily and can share scores with their friends or family. This is highly entertaining for competitive game players.

Wordle was originally created by Josh Wardle, a software engineer who designed the game for his puzzle-loving partner. He released the game to the public in October of 2021 and it has since amassed a massive following. The New York Times bought Wordle in January 2022.

Since the rise of the game’s popularity, offshoots such as Quordle, where players guess four words synchronously, have been created. I enjoy Taylordle, a Taylor Swift-themed derivation.

To play the game, type "Wordle" into a Google search and look for nytimes.com. Comment your score below!