I may just be a late bloomer, but 2023 was the year I got into Wordle. It is a cute little boost of activating your brain and feeling accomplished while trying to figure out the right word of the day. It does something to the little gremlin at the back of my head that pulls the strings, and I am sure I am not the only one.

Screenshot of a Wordle guess (16/12/23). Matilda Forss / PRESSET.

If you have somehow managed to avoid an encounter with this game, here’s a summary of the concept: Wordle is a web-based word game, where players have six attempts to guess a five-letter word. After your first guess the letters turn grey (if they aren’t in the word), yellow (if they are, but in another place) or green (for correct and rightly placed letters). The words are checked against Wordle’s own dictionary, and it calls you out if you play a nonsensical word. The game boomed in December 2021 after they added the feature to share your results with friends with little emoji icons. The game has long had its time in the sun and since 2022 Wordle is published by The New York Times Company, and you can play it online or in their NYT games app.

The creator of Wordle is Josh Wardle and the game’s name is a pun on his surname. The game is inspired by the color-matching, code-breaking game Mastermind. Wardle admitted that he relaunched his prototype for Wordle after the pandemic. During lockdown he and his partner made a habit of playing two other NYT games – namely Spelling Bee and their daily crossword puzzle. Initially he only played the game with his partner. However, he then shared it with his relatives, and the obsession grew. The snowball effect of the site made Wordle go viral in 2021.

The game’s charm is that it doesn’t give you any hints upfront but simply explains to you the rules of the game. Your first guess is thus also your first clue. People often have a go-to first guess (mine is “PIANO”). It is loosely advised that you should use a word that has two vowels, as either the second and fourth letter or as the third and fifth, as your first guess. But you build the experience around your guesses, making the game feel also very personal. This personal touch is then combined with a feeling of common effort. Since the correct word is the same for all players on that specific day, it creates a small community between players. That’s why the bragging feature, being able to share your results was so powerful. Everyone has the same amounts of guesses, for the same word, and they all get there in their own way. If you haven’t already played it, I highly recommend trying it out.

Try the game here: https://www.nytimes.com/games/wordle/index.html

Playing Wordle has become a soothing part of my daily routine. Playing in the app you can build a streak. Like so you can invite this intellectual stimulus into your habits. Thankfully, the app never bothers telling you that you are losing it with threatening reminders (yeah, I’m looking at you, Duolingo). It’s low effort and yet it adds a little oomph to my day.

Lately, I’ve found myself asking my sister and boyfriend ‘have you played Wordle today’ a lot. Probably more than I ask them what they ate that day. Since I’ve been swamped with exams, I deleted Instagram and TikTok off my phone, but the NYT games app has stayed. Intrigued by this “rational” source of serotonin I wandered off into the world of games such as this one. I’ve never been a person who has games on their phone, to my younger nieces and nephews’ great disappointment, but I think the simplicity has drawn me into this routine. The games that have a similar concept as Wordle share this nature of being small, quick, communal yet personal, and daily there with a new solve. And that is exactly what you have as follows: a list of other games like Wordle, if you are looking to expand your pastime puzzling routine.

Connections

We must start the list off with another free gem that is available in the NYT games app – Connections. Almost brand new, the game was launched in June 2023 and immediately became the second most played game after Wordle.

While a bit different from Wordle, Connections still has a daily variety, guesses, and fun colors accompanying it, just as its sibling game does. The game consists of sixteen squares filled with one word each. Each square/word needs to be assembled into a group of four. The four categories have different colors, yellow being the clues most straightforward and purple being the trickiest. The categories vary but are often more advanced than simply “words that start with S”. The examples given in the instructions distinguishes clearly how easy and advanced these categories can get. An example of a yellow category is that the words bass, flounder, salmon, and trout all would fit into the category “FISH”. An example of a purple category is that the words ant, drill, island, and opal all would all work in the combination “FIRE ___”.

Screenshot of one days Connections grid (16/12/23). Matilda Forss / PRESSET.

Screenshot of the same Connections grid’s answers (16/12/23). Matilda Forss / PRESSET.

While it is a bit more complicated, and definitely has more personality than Wordle, it is a game that draws you in. And don’t fear googling words when playing! Connections often uses homonyms or tries to trick you into leaning one way with your grouping, blinding you from other interpretations.

Connections has been a serious favorite of mine since it launched. After playing Wordle a certain number of times you master it, but the randomness of categories in Connections keeps you on your toes. I would recommend this to anyone who thinks they are both book and street smart.

Try the game here: https://www.nytimes.com/games/connections.

Globle

Now, this one is a bit different, but the premise is the same. Everyday there is a “Mystery Country”. Your goal is to guess what country this is in as few guesses as possible. For every incorrect guess you are given, in kilometers, the clue of how distant you are to the correct country. The “hotter” you are to the right answer, the darker red the countries appear once you’ve guessed them. It also lets you know when you are adjacent to the Mystery Country and, thankfully, helps you with spelling.

Screenshot of the Globle instructions page. Matilda Forss / PRESSET.

While this game may seem like one only the most geography interested people play, it really isn’t. I like to apply the same logic to Globle that I apply to Connections and googling. If you are absolutely stuck, having no idea what country is adjacent to Morocco – taking a quick peak at a map is not cheating, but only going to make you better at the game, and at geography, in the long run.

In all these games, on the rarest of occasions, you’ll get the right answers on the first try. And that is a wonderful feeling – I will never, for that reason, forget Denmark, the first country I successfully guessed on the first try!

Try the game here: https://globle-game.com.

Flagle

Continuing on the geography trail we have Flagle. Now, this one I can agree is a bit more niche. To preface I should perhaps declare that the rest of this list are all a bit more niche. But what are we if not creatures who collect fun and random things to do! What else was the internet invented for? I digress but my point stands: the nicheness of games like these are their beauty, not their fault.

Likeso, Flagle, is a perfect entrypoint into the “I want to play more daily guessing games” mindset. In this game you try to guess the flag of the day. Just like in Wordle, you have six attempts. Here, the flag of the day is split up into six squares, and each time you make a guess a portion of the correct flag is revealed to you. In guessing a country, you are also given a geographical clue. This clue shows you how far away the country you guessed is in kilometers, just like Globle, and it gives you an arrow, pointing you in the direction of the target country.

Screenshot of a Flagle guess (16/12/23). Matilda Forss / PRESSET.

The game also gives you an alphabetized list of options to guess if you have no idea, or are hopeless in your darndest effort guessing, what flag you have before yourself. I’m personally still very bad at flags, but oh the joy it gives me when I then get one right!

Try the game here: https://www.flagle.io.

Travle

The last daily geography themed game on this list is Travle. In Travle your goal is to travel from a Start Country, shown in pink, to the End Country, shown in blue. Your objective is to do so in as few guesses, i.e. to guess an as streamlined route as possible between the two countries. Your guesses can be “optimal, pretty good, not great, or complete detours”.

Since the nature of this game is a bit different you have nine guesses and the option to use three hints. These hints are “show next country outline”, “show all country outlines” and “show country initials” since what you start with are two countries and a blank canvas.

Since the project of the game is to move from point A to point B there are some exceptions outlined by the creators, such as: “Ireland connects to the United Kingdom and Indonesia joins the mainland via Malaysia” and “Russia doesn't connect to Poland via Kaliningrad, and Spain doesn't connect to Morocco via Ceuta or Melilla”. Tunnels and bridges count, exclaves and remote territories don’t. A new route is released daily at midnight and each Saturday there’s a bonus route as well. The game even recently celebrated its one year anniversary and in doing so launched a practice mode where you can play unlimited Travle puzzles.

Just like many of the other games, if played regularly, Travle can also offer you statistics of your guesses overtime – a fun way to see how much, or little, you progress in learning the trick of the guessing game trade.

Try the game here: https://imois.in/games/travle/.

Heardle

And as the final game on this list, we have Heardle. It is exactly what it sounds and seems like – a Wordle-inspired game where you get six guesses to hear and guess what the song of the day is. The first clip of the song that you’re played is two seconds long, and after that they are increasingly longer fragments. After your first guess you can either guess the artist or skip one round in order to hear more of the song.

Screenshot of a Heardle guess (12/12/23). Matilda Forss / PRESSET.

This spin off Wordle game uses music from a catalog of the most downloaded songs throughout the last decade. Like in Flagle and Travle you can either guess the song or pick one from the options you are supplied with. This feature can be great when it comes to music since it sometimes might be easier to remember an artist, or a word from the title, than the full name of the song.

This site is not entirely as established or sophisticated as Wordle, in that it sometimes leaves in some applause from the live recordings of a song or has some problems recognizing correct guesses. But it is fun and different, and it even has categories to choose from if you specifically want to guess the 70s or Taylor Swift song of the day. It really is a game for people who have a mixed music taste and a sharp ear.

Try the game here: https://heardlegame.co.

Finally, if this list piqued your interest, there is also a more extensive one of -le games (games inspired by Wordle) here: https://legames.link. I want to be clear that I do not play all of these games obsessively but that they have sneaked their way into my life. They make you feel confident when you guess the word, flag, country, categories, or song of the day. And then you are on with your little day.

Maybe this is just the first sign of me becoming a grandma, this new progression towards puzzles? I am quite fine with that. I think it can be quite the compliment to have something grandma-esque about oneself. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I will be off trying to understand if words such as cloud, fog, mist, and haze have something in common or not. That’s about what I’ve been doing all day, that and settling in for what I am sure to be a long and interesting road before retirement.

Wordle and other «poisons»