“It’s something that encourages you to spend three minutes a day, and that’s it. Like, it doesn’t want any more of your time than that.”
– Josh Wardle¹⁾

Wordle is a web-based word game developed by Josh Wardle for him and his partner in 2021. It presumably began on June 19, 2021,²⁾ though it wasn't public until late October 2021,³⁾ and wasn't viral on Twitter until a “share result” button⁴⁾ was added in December 2021.⁵⁾⁶⁾

Then on January 31, 2022, The New York Times Company acquired Wordle for a few million U.S. dollars⁷⁾ and claimed that it'd initially remain free, though they plan to integrate it into their mobile app to drive up subscriptions⁸⁾ which concerned people.^9)10)11) It officially moved on February 11, 2022,¹²⁾ then switched to a new stat tracking system around June 22, 2022.

It's a simple game where you get six guesses to figure out the daily¹³⁾ five-letter word. With each guess, the blocks will normally change colors, showing you green (🟩) and yellow (🟨) blocks which hint at what the solution could be. As a side note, it should be noted that Wordle uses American English despite the origins¹⁴⁾ and letters can appear more than once.

There has actually been subtle differences in Wordle's code over time, not just between the transition from Josh Wardle's personal website to The New York Times. The data has been presented in a chart below:

• Absurdle - @qntm
  An absurd Wordle where your first guess is always wrong, but you have infinite guesses.
• Cookie☆ Wordle - @nsata_pr
  The Cookie☆-themed wordle where you have to guess the actress names in TDN Notation.¹⁵⁾
• Dordle - @zarawesome
  A challenging Wordle where you have to uncover 2 puzzles with only 7 guesses.
  • Quordle - @quordle
    An even more challenging Wordle where you have to uncover 4 puzzles with only 9 guesses.
  • Octordle
    8 puzzles with 13 guesses. And yes, there's Sedecordle/Sedordle. We get it already.
• Heardle - @heardle_app
  A musical intro guessing game that pulls from a “long list of popularly streamed artists”.
  • Touhou Heardle - @mugumugu_
    A musical intro guessing game that pulls from the Touhou Project discography. Unused included.
• Hello Wordl - @chordbug
  It's a customizable Wordle where you set how many letters you work with, only 6 guesses.
• Letterle - @edjeff
  This is a Wordle parody where you guess the random 1 out of 26 letters as the page gets longer.
• Lewdle - @garywhitta, @leah, @theadamvision
  A rude Wordle where you have to guess a profane, vulgar, or obscene five-letter word.
• Pokedle [JA/EN/ES/RU/KO/ZH] - @chuprod
  A comprehensive, multi-language Pokémon-themed Wordle. It uses a different palette, empty spaces are allowed, number of guesses will vary, and Pokémon up to Gen 7 are included.
  • Pokemon Wordle [JA] - @giga_yadoran
    In Japan, this is the Pokémon-themed Wordle that caught on. Empty spaces allowed.
  • Squirdle [EN] - @fireblend
    This is not Wordle. This is just a weird Pokémon-themed guessing game inspired by Wordle.
• Squabble - @ottomated_
  A multiplayer Wordle you can play with friends. It's very fast-paced, so try to keep 2-3 words in mind.
• Sweardle - @stuarthoughton
  A vulgar Wordle where you guess a profane four-letter word with 4 guesses in hard mode.
• Worldle - @teuteuf
  A world-themed Wordle where you simply guess the country's silhouette. Look up “Worldle 46”.

• The win messages in order: Genius → Magnificent → Impressive → Splendid → Great → Whew.
• “Wordle” has been mistyped as “Worlde” many times in the making of this article.
• In the past, “Wordle” was Jonathan Feinberg's word cloud tool,¹⁶⁾¹⁷⁾ located at “wordle.net” from 2008 to 2020. The tool presumably died,¹⁸⁾ though Feinberg does “love” the new Wordle.¹⁹⁾

• Wordle - The official page for Wordle on The New York Times website.
  • @powerlanguish on Twitter - The creator of Wordle. He's also a known Reddit admin.
• Wordle2Townscaper - A tool for converting results into Townscaper buildings.
• Worldes of the World - An extremely comprehensive list of Wordle adaptions and clones.