Letter Lantern

What is Letter Lantern?

Letter Lantern is a daily word game. There's a hidden five letter word, you get six guesses, and after each guess a row of lanterns lights up to tell you how close you got. Everyone who plays on the same day gets the same word, so you can compare notes with friends (without spoiling it, please).

It's free, it runs in your browser on a phone, tablet or computer, and there's nothing to download. Your progress on today's word is saved, so you can close the tab halfway through and pick up later.

How to play

Type any real five letter word and press Enter. Each lantern in that row then lights up one of three ways:

• Gold: the letter is in the word and in the right spot.
• Teal: the letter is in the word, but somewhere else.
• Dark: the letter isn't in the word at all.

The on-screen keyboard keeps track too, coloring each key with the best result you've had for it. Use what you learn to make your next guess. Solve it within six rows and you win. Miss, and we show you the word.

Double letters follow the usual rule. If you guess a word with two of the same letter and the answer only has one, only one of your copies lights up. So a dark second copy doesn't mean the letter is missing, it means there's only one of it.

Guesses have to be real words from our list. If you type something that isn't, you'll see "Not in the word list" and the guess doesn't count against you.

Controls

• Phone or tablet: tap the letters on the on-screen keyboard, then ENTER. The backspace key deletes.
• Computer: type on your keyboard, press Enter to guess and Backspace to delete. Esc opens the pause menu.
• The lightbulb button at the top uses a firefly hint (Lantern Run and Big Lantern only).

Modes

Daily

One word for everyone, new every day at midnight UTC. There are no hints in the Daily, just you and six rows. When you finish, you get a little share grid of colored squares (no letters, so it's spoiler free) and a countdown to the next word.

Lantern Run

Solve word after word until you miss one. Each solved word scores 20 points for every unused row, plus 10 more in hard mode, so a solve in 2 guesses is worth 100 and a solve in 6 is worth 20. Solve a word in 3 guesses or fewer and you catch a firefly. You start the run with one and can hold up to three. Tapping a firefly lights a ghost letter in one spot you haven't found yet. Your run is saved if you leave, and it keeps going until a word beats you.

Big Lantern

The same game with a six letter word. You still get six tries, and one firefly to help. It's noticeably harder, because six letter words have more room for endings like ER, ED and NG to hide.

Hard mode

Flip the Hard mode switch on the title screen and every clue you find has to be used. A gold letter must stay in its spot in later guesses, and a teal letter must appear somewhere. The game will tell you if a guess breaks the rule, for example "2nd letter must be R". Hard mode adds a star to your Daily share and a bonus to your score.

Scoring, stats and leaderboards

So a Daily solved in 3 guesses is 400 points, and in 1 guess (it happens) is 600. Stats track games played, win rate, your day streak, your best win streak and a chart of how many guesses your wins take. If you're signed in, your Daily score and best Lantern Run go on the leaderboards.

The Lantern Book

Every word you solve, in any mode, counts toward new lantern designs. There are ten in all, from the round Paper Moon you start with, through River Drum (3 words), Plum Blossom (8), Starlight (15), Wave Rider (25), Firefly (40), Kite (60), Lotus (85) and Comet (120), up to the gilded Harvest Moon at 160 words. Tap any unlocked one in the Lantern Book to hang it on your board.

The best starting words

We looked at our own answer list to give you advice that actually fits this game, not just general theory. Here's what's in it:

• The most common letters across our answers are E, R, A, T, I, S, O, L and N, in roughly that order. E shows up in about half of all answers.
• Only a handful of answers are plurals. Lots of answers start with S (it's the most common first letter by a wide margin), but very few end in S.
• E is by far the most common last letter, followed by T, R and Y.
• Roughly three answers in ten have a repeated letter, so don't rule out doubles late in the game.

That points to openers built from E, R, A, T, I, S and O, with no repeated letters. Our favorites are STARE, IRATE, RAISE, ARISE and LATER. On average each of these lights up close to two of the answer's letters on the very first guess. STARE is our pick, since it puts S up front where it's most likely to be gold and E at the end where it's most likely to be gold.

If you like a two word opening, follow STARE with CLOUD. Together they test ten different letters, including all five vowels except I, and you'll usually have three or four letters found before you start guessing for real.

Avoid openers that end in S. You use up a guess on a spot that's almost never S in our list. Save plural-looking guesses for when you're stuck for ideas, not for your first row.

Tips and strategy

• Guess to learn, not to win, in the middle rows. If you know four letters and there are five words that could fit (say _OUND: ROUND, SOUND, MOUND, WOUND, FOUND), guessing them one by one can run you out of rows. Instead, in normal mode, guess a word that tests several of those first letters at once.
• Place teal letters on purpose. A teal T in spot one tells you T is in the word but not first. Next time, try it somewhere new so you learn its real home.
• Think in endings. Lots of five letter words end in E, Y, ER or ED shapes. If you have gold in the last spot, run through common patterns before random letters.
• Watch for doubles. If you're down to one or two missing letters and nothing fits, try a repeated letter. Words like ALLOW, AGREE and APPLE trip people up.
• Hard mode changes the opener plan. The two word STARE then CLOUD trick only works when your second guess doesn't have to reuse clues. In hard mode, pick your second word to include anything gold or teal from the first.
• In Lantern Run, spend fireflies early in a tough word, not on the last row. A known letter on row two saves you more guesses than one on row five.

If you like the daily rhythm, our Word Huddle grouping puzzle and Step Stones word ladder both have a shared daily puzzle too.

Questions