How to Play Languagle
It's like Wordle, but you guess a language. Every day you'll see a phrase written in its own script, and you've got six guesses to work out what language it is. Every guess gives you a clue: how close you are, and an arrow pointing to where the answer is mostly spoken.
The rules
Type a language into the guess box and submit it. If you're stuck, pick a country first. That cuts the list down to languages spoken there, and it doesn't use up a guess. Only language guesses count towards your six.
Reading the clues
Each guess lights up five blocks. The first four measure the distance between your guess's home country and the answer's home country:
- Zero blocks lit: over 8,000km away, roughly the distance from London to Tokyo.
- One block: within 8,000km, so at least the right side of the world, like Paris to New York.
- Two blocks: within 4,000km, the right region, like Madrid to Istanbul.
- Three blocks: within 1,500km, the right neighbourhood, like Paris to Berlin.
- Four blocks: the right country, but the wrong language.
- Five blocks: correct. That is the exact language, and the game ends.
Next to the blocks you'll see the distance in km and an arrow. The arrow points from your guess towards the answer, so if it points north-east, your next guess should be north-east of your last one.
Distances are measured between capital cities, or the biggest city when a language's home is a region and not a whole country.
Because languages are compared by their primary home country, a guess can occasionally look odd right after using the country filter. Filter to Belgium and German will show up in the list, since it really is spoken there, but the guess row and its distance still measure from Germany, German's primary home.
When your guess is a close relative
A handful of answers are one specific variety of a larger language, such as Egyptian Arabic alongside Arabic, or Swiss German alongside German. Guess a relative of the answer and the row will say Same family instead of showing a distance. It means the answer is another variety of that language, so try its relatives next. Don't cross the whole language off.
Playing previous days
Once you've finished a puzzle, a day picker appears above the phrase. Use the arrows to go back and play any day you missed. You can also just read the answers in the archive.
You can't replay a day you've already finished. It opens the board as you left it. Past days don't count towards your streak either, because the streak is about coming back every day.
Sharing your result
When you're done, tap Copy results. Then go to any chat and paste it. It sends your score as coloured blocks, plus a link to the game, so your mates can have a go.
Where the phrases come from
There are 591 phrases across 182 languages, each one sourced and written in its own script, not converted into the Latin alphabet. You get a different one every day, so it keeps moving around the world.