The International Phenomenon that is Wordle Quiz

Answer: His partner

The game was based on an old pencil and paper game, Jotto, and an American game show, Lingo. Wardle made the first version of the game in 2013 and used a variation of his name for it. He revived the idea in January 2021 as a game that he and his partner, Palak Shah, could play together.

He shared it with his family, and posted a link on his website in October. In November the number of players rose from ninety to over two million.

Answer: New York Times

Wardle didn't want the game to take over his life. Since he and his partner enjoyed playing some of the games on the New York Times website, he sold it to them for an unknown seven figure sum, with the proviso that the game should remain free for the players. It appeared on their website in February 2022.

Answer: Five

There are apparently 2315 target words in the English language version. Josh Wardle's partner, Palak Shah, selected them from a list of about 12000 five-letter words.

There are variations of Wordle in dozens of different languages, and many similar games with different length words.

Answer: 6

The target word should be guessed in six tries for a win. Some variations with longer words allow more guesses.

Answer: Green

A letter which is in the right place in the target word will be surrounded by a green square, or orange if you use the alternate mode for players with color vision problems.

So if you guess 'DRONE' and the target is 'GRAPE', the letters 'R' and 'E' will be highlighted in green on both the grid and the keyboard.

Answer: Yellow

A letter which is in the word, but not in the correct place, will be surrounded by a yellow square. It is also highlighted in yellow on the keyboard. The alternate mode for players with color vision issues uses a light blue.

In the variant games with more than one word to be guessed, such as Dordle or Tridle, a letter may be green in one word, and yellow in another

Answer: Grey

A letter which is not in the target word will be surrounded by a grey square in the grid. On the keyboard it will appear as dark grey.

There is a variation of the game, called Murdle, which is a bit like Hangman, so you lose a life for every incorrect guess. You may have an unlimited number of guesses, but if you have ten wrong letters you are dead.

Answer: One

Although the game appears with a grid for guessing, the correct answer is a string of five letters which make a word.

Most variations of the game also require a single string of characters, but there is a version, Crosswordle, which needs eight intersecting answers in a mini crossword grid.

Answer: ROATE

Only valid words are allowed as guesses. Apparently the game allows 12972 different words as possible guesses for the 2315 possible solutions. Many people think it a good idea to find the vowels first, so AEIOU might sound promising, but it is not a real word; nor are ABCDE and ZYXWV. Tyler Glaiel, an American designer of video games, decided to write a program to work out the optimal word for starting.

The result was 'roate', which is a variation of 'rote'. It may be the word which is most likely to result in fewest guesses for the final answer, but it will never give an answer in one guess, because it is not in the shorter list of five-letter words.

Answer: One

Sadly, for some people, there isn't a new game every hour. There is only one new game each day on the New York Times website. Perhaps that is why there are so many similar games and variations.