Minimum word length
6
Maximum word length
6
Dictionary Size
20K
Dictionary is based on the Spell Checking Oriented Word Lists (SCOWL) by Kevin Atkinson which is in turn based on several public domain and permissively-licensed word lists. Restriction to common words uses the Wiktionary frequency lists available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License. See the README files and Words.zig in the download for full details.
A secret word of the specified length (5 for easy; 6 for medium; 6-8 for hard) is chosen from the dictionary. Guess a word to be compared with the secret word. Each letter in the guess that matches the secret word will be highlighted in gold. If a sequence of letters in the guess matches the secret word, they will be highlighted as a single block. When you've guessed the secret word, all letters will be highlighted in green.
This guess shows that 'O' and 'N' are part of the word, but gives no other information about them.
This guess shows that while 'O', 'N', and 'E' are all part of the word, none are in that specific order. So possibilities like 'PHONE' or 'ONSET' can be eliminated.
This guess shows that 'EN' are in that exact order. Thinking about combinations like '???EN', '??EN?', '?EN??' 'EN???' (where 'OV' and 'VE' can't be part of the solution) leads to the solution.
If your guess can match in several ways, only one will be highlighted. The longest matching sequence takes priority. If both matches are of equal length, the left-most one takes priority.
For example, with the secret 'WORDS', the guess 'GUESS' will only show the first 'S' as matching (the 'S' in the secret cannot be matched twice). With the secret 'ENTER', the guess 'TENTS' will show 'TE' as matching instead of 'EN' (since 'TE' comes first in the guess).
The size of the secret word can be varied from 4 to 12 as either a fixed length or a minimum/maximum. Guesses that do not match the length of the secret may be enabled.
The dictionary the secret is chosen from may be restricted to the most common 10,000, 20,000 or 30,000 English words or the entire dictionary. (The full dictionary should only be used for an extreme challenge--it contains loan words, colloquialisms, and other non-standard words.)