Word Duel
Who guesses the 5-letter word first?
How to Play
Goal
Guess the secret word in 6 attempts or fewer – faster than your opponent!
Feedback
After each guess: Green = correct letter, correct position. Yellow = correct letter, wrong position. Gray = letter not in the word.
Simultaneous
Both players guess the same word at the same time. You can see your opponent's progress (but not their words).
Winner
Whoever solves the word in fewer attempts wins. If tied: draw.
Strategy & tips
Your first guess should use five different, common letters — vowels plus the most frequent consonants. Words with doubled letters waste a position on the opening guess, because they ask the same question twice.
The second guess matters more than the first. Resist the urge to immediately use your yellow hits. A word with five entirely new letters narrows the space more than one that merely shifts two known letters around.
Yellow does not only mean correct — it also means wrong here. A yellow letter definitively rules out its current position, and that is the information players miss most. Keep a mental note, per position, of which letters cannot be there.
Variants
Hard mode
Every revealed hint must be used in the next guess. This rules out pure information plays and makes the game considerably harder.
More letters
Six or seven letters enlarge the search space but make each hit more informative.
Simultaneous
Both players guess the same word in parallel and see each other's progress — which is exactly how it works here.
How it works
1. Create a game
Click "Create Game" and receive a 6-digit code.
2. Share the code
Share the code with your friends – via WhatsApp, Telegram, or just tell them.
3. Play instantly
Your friends enter the code and you start playing immediately. No login required!
Origin
The pattern of guessing plus coloured feedback comes from a 1970s board game in which a hidden sequence of colours had to be deduced, using letters instead of coloured pegs. The word version became popular in 2021, when a browser edition spread purely through shared result grids.
Mathematically it is a search problem with feedback: every guess partitions the set of possible answers. The information-theoretically best opening can be computed — it maximises the expected halving of the solution space.
Frequently asked questions
How many guesses do I get?
Six. Solve the word in fewer guesses than your opponent and you win the duel.
What do the colours mean?
Green: right letter, right place. Yellow: the letter occurs, but elsewhere. Grey: the letter does not occur at all.
Can I see my opponent's guesses?
You see their progress but not their letters. The pressure comes from knowing how close they already are.