Secret Word: the word game in English

Secret Word is five letters and six guesses, but the game is mostly decided by your first two words: they are not there to guess the answer, they are there to rule letters out. Understanding that is the difference between closing in five and closing in three.

Read the Secret Word guide: strategies and tips

The rules

There is a secret five-letter word and you have six guesses. Every guess must be a real word; once submitted, each letter is coloured:

• Green: the letter is there and in the right place.
• Yellow: the letter is in the word, but somewhere else.
• Grey: the letter is not in the word.

The keyboard below the grid is coloured along with the letters, so the ones you have eliminated stay visible without having to remember them.

On Pocket Games

Here Secret Word is played with five-letter words and six guesses, and the word changes every game: there is no word of the day, so you can play as often as you like. The dictionary follows the app’s language and has two lists: the answer always comes from the list of common words, while rarer words are also accepted as guesses.

• A word that is not in the dictionary is flagged in red under the grid and does not use up the guess.
• The keyboard is a QWERTY layout with the 26 letters, backspace on the left and ENTER on the right. On a computer you type on the physical keyboard: letters, Enter and Backspace.
• A game in progress is saved after every guess: from the start screen you pick it up with the Continue button, which shows how many guesses you have already used.
• The record is the fewest guesses you have solved a word in, shown next to the guess counter. If you are signed in with an account it is synced to your other devices.
• If you run out of guesses, the game shows you the word.

The first word

There is no point "trying to guess": the first word is a tool, and the right choice is the one covering as many frequent letters as possible. In English the most common letters are e, a, r, i, o, t, n, s, l, c, and most five-letter words have two vowels.

Good openers cover three vowels and two frequent consonants: AROSE, RAISE, IRATE, SLATE and CRANE are all solid, and all valid in the game’s dictionary. There is only one real rule: never repeat a letter in your opening word. TEETH looks fine and is not, because the E takes up two squares to tell you one thing.

The second word: this is where you win

This is the guess most people waste. After the first you have a couple of yellows or greens, and the temptation is to try a plausible word using all of them. That is nearly always a mistake.

If the first guess left a lot of letters still open, choose the second word to cover five new letters, ignoring the ones you have already found. Two words with no letters in common cover ten different letters: at that point you know almost everything, and the four remaining guesses are more than enough.

Move on to "plausible" words from the third guess, once the field has narrowed.

What to do with yellows

Yellow is the most valuable information and the most badly handled. It tells you two things: the letter is there, and it is not there. Putting it back in the same position on your next guess is pure waste, and it happens to everyone at least once a game.

If a letter is yellow in second position, try it in fourth or fifth, not third out of caution: moving it as far as possible is what maximises the information.

The traps of English

• Double letters. Words like sheep, jelly or comma have a repeated letter, and the repetition is never flagged explicitly. If you have ruled out every plausible letter and nothing fits, the answer is usually a double.
• The endings. English five-letter words very often end in -s, -y, -er or -ed. Pinning down the last letter early halves the field.
• The awkward letters. J, q, x and z trip people up, and so do the clusters: once you have an H, think CH, SH, TH and WH, because a lone H in the middle of a word is rare.

Frequently asked questions

Can I enter a made-up word to probe for letters?

No: the guess has to be a word in the dictionary. If it is not, a red warning appears and you can fix it without losing the guess. It is a limit that makes the game more interesting, because your probing word has to be chosen among real ones.

Is the word the same for everyone, like the famous daily word game?

No, each game picks a new one, so you can play as often as you like without waiting for tomorrow.

Are there hyphens or apostrophes?

No, just plain five-letter words with no punctuation: whatever you can type on the game’s keyboard.

Does my record survive a change of phone?

Yes, if you are signed in with an account: the fewest-guesses record is also saved online, and between two devices the lower one wins. Without an account it stays on the phone.

What happens if I change the app’s language mid-game?

The saved game carries on with the dictionary of the language it started in. The next game uses the new language.

More games to try

• Mathle
• Hangman
• Woven Words

See the full list of games, or open Pocket Games in your browser: they are free and you don’t need an account.