Outlier

Outlier deals the same 5-by-5 grid, 25 letters, to everyone on the same day, and gives you ten attempts to form words of at least four letters. The score rewards rarity rather than length: the more a word is found by other players, the less it scores, and the ranking is based on a rarity scale that goes up to 1,000.

1. Read the grid's 25 letters as a pool, not as a path: the rule shown under the grid specifies that letters do not need to touch.
2. Form a real word of at least four letters, without using any letter more times than it appears in the grid.
3. Type it into the input field and confirm with SUBMIT, then repeat: the counter counts down from ten.
4. The LOCK IN button sits next to the WORDS LEFT counter.

Outlier turns the point counter of word games inside out: here, finding what everyone else finds is useless. That pushes you to rummage through the depths of your vocabulary rather than optimize a path, and the fact that the grid is identical for everyone gives real meaning to the leaderboard. The Live lobby mode, with its one-minute rounds, turns the same mechanic into a speed game.

The scoring table is given by the official panel with two examples of four-letter words: one commonplace credited 24 points and another rare one credited 81.

Outlier Daily

A single grid for the entire planet, published each day at noon Eastern Time, ten attempts, playable at any time during the day and ranked against other players.

Outlier Live (beta)

Lobby games, private by invitation or open to anyone. The same grid for the whole lobby, ten rounds of sixty seconds, and the rarest word wins the round.

Grid types

The game notes that boards don't all have the same character: days very rich in words, Decoy grids that are more welcoming than they look, and Mystery days whose nature you only learn once the game is over. The name of the day's word set is shown above the grid.

• Length is not the metric: the official panel contrasts two four-letter words, the one everyone finds scoring much less than the one most players miss. Look for the oddity, not the long word.
• Letters do not need to be adjacent, which removes any tracing work: treat the 25 letters like a bag and focus on vocabulary.
• Count duplicates before submitting: a word is rejected if it uses a letter more often than it appears in the grid, and that's the constraint that trips up most double-letter words.