Written by: Abby Young
What started as a game for his wife, Brooklyn native Josh Wardle has watched his small project become a worldwide phenomenon. Although brief, the history of Wordle has affected every days’ puzzle and the success of Wardle and his family.
What’s Wordle?
Software engineer Josh Wardle created Wordle for his partner, Palak Shah, who simply wanted a new challenge in the word games she loved during the pandemic. Wardle decided to take this on as his own project, researching 5-letter words and then filtering through which words Shah knew. After getting rid of every word that was too difficult to guess or a variant of another word (plurals, past tense, etc.), Wardle had a complete word list to make his game from. The final step was the name creation, which pays tribute to the creator’s last name.
Success for Wardle’s Wordle
After the creation of the game, the couple played together and sent their results to their family group chat, which hooked their entire extended families. As the group’s excitement for one new word every day increased, Wardle decided to open the game for public use in October, 2021. Word of mouth and the communication of the Internet moved quickly, gaining around 300,000 players per day by January, 2022. The impressive factor in this is the lack of advertisement. There was no formal ad campaign, branding, or invitation from Wardle or any affiliates. He simply created the game to give some fun to his partner.. and thousands of others. The Internet traction prompted buyers to enter the market, eventually being sold to the New York Times.
What’s next?
Wardle has been intentional about making the game as accessible and casual as possible. He has been clear about not wanting to monetize Wordle, and has been disappointed to see others making money off of an idea that was intended to be exciting and communal. The social aspect of the game continues through social media and other online platforms, still with no hint of advertisement or campaign. The lack of monetary entry to the game or financial advancement of it has left players continuously content with the flow and environment. Although the New York Times has recently bought the rights and online domain, they shouldn’t try to capitalize on the growth and sustaining popularity. People will continue to be in virtual Wordle groups, send their families their daily spread, and be hopeful to see if they can get tomorrow’s Wordle in under 6 guesses.