How to Play Wordlio — The Complete Beginner's Guide

5 min read · Updated April 2026

Wordlio is a free daily word game available at wordlio.fun. Every day at midnight, a new 5-letter word is revealed — and everyone in the world gets the same word. Your job is to guess it in 6 tries or fewer.

It sounds simple. It is. That's the point. But underneath the simplicity there's real strategy — and that's what keeps people coming back every day.

The Basic Rules

• You have 6 attempts to guess a hidden 5-letter word.
• Each guess must be a real English word — random letters won't work.
• Type your word and press ENTER to submit.
• After each guess, the tiles change colour to tell you how close you were.
• A new word drops every day at midnight. One word, worldwide.

What the Colours Mean

This is the key to Wordlio. After you submit a guess, each letter gets coloured:

Green — Right letter, right position. That letter is in the answer exactly where you put it.

W is in the word and it's the first letter.

Yellow — Right letter, wrong position. The letter is in the word, but it belongs somewhere else.

I is in the word, but not in position 2.

Grey — The letter is not in the word at all. Eliminate it.

U does not appear anywhere in today's word.

Your First Guess Matters Most

Because your first guess has no information to go on, you want to cover as much ground as possible. The goal is to reveal greens and yellows that tell you the shape of the word.

Strong starting words contain common letters — E, A, R, I, O, T, N, S — and no repeated letters. Words like CRANE, AROSE, SLATE, and RAISE are popular for this reason. You're not trying to guess the word on turn 1 — you're gathering information.

Working With What You Know

After each guess, use the colours to eliminate and position letters:

• Greens are locked — keep that letter in that position in all future guesses.
• Yellows must be moved — put that letter somewhere else in your next guess.
• Greys are out — don't use those letters again.

The worst thing you can do is ignore a grey letter and use it again. It wastes a guess. The keyboard at the bottom of the game turns grey, yellow, or green to remind you which letters are still in play.

The Streak

Wordlio tracks your win streak — how many days in a row you've solved the word. The streak resets if you miss a day or fail to guess the word. Your all-time best streak is also saved.

The streak is stored locally in your browser, so it follows you on the same device without needing an account.

Country vs Country Leaderboard

When you first visit Wordlio, you'll be asked which country you're from. This adds you to your country's team on the global leaderboard. Rankings are calculated by average guesses — the lower the better.

If your country collectively solves the word in fewer guesses than everyone else, you top the rankings for that day. It's a team sport.

Practice Mode

Already done today's word and want more? Practice Mode gives you 2 extra words per day. Same game mechanics — different word, no streak impact, no leaderboard. Good for warming up or trying new starting strategies.

Challenge a Friend

The challenge feature lets you pick any word and send a unique link to a friend. They have 6 tries to guess your word. It's a great way to test each other or introduce someone new to the game.

Also on Wordlio: Numbly (daily Sudoku), Quizly (daily trivia), and Speedly (typing test). One combined streak for all four.