How to play
Three or four minutes a day. Same Downword for everyone.
- The top word is given. Every word under it makes a common two-word phrase with the word above: PAPER → WEIGHT (paperweight), WEIGHT → LOSS (weight loss), LOSS → LEADER (loss leader) …
- Every word under the top shows its first letter and its length from the start, so you can reason out the chain before you type. Type the next word: right, and it drops in; wrong, and that's a miss — the next letter is shown, and you guess again.
- Stuck? Hint shows the next letter. Once every letter is showing, the word is given and you move on.
- Your score is misses plus hints. 0 is a perfect run. The share card has a dot for every letter of every word.
- paper
- weight
- loss
- leader
- board
- game
- show
- time
- zone
- out
Share card. One row per word, one dot per letter: 🟢 typed right · 🔴 shown after a miss · 🟠 shown by a hint (the top word is 🔵). The card never shows the words, so it's safe to post before your friends have played.
Streak. One finished daily per day (UTC) keeps it going. The archive and practice don't count toward it — or against it.
What counts as a phrase. Pairs a dictionary lists as one term: compound words, idioms, set expressions. Every pair is checked against Wiktionary's English multiword terms (CC BY-SA) or is a compound word in its own right. A new Downword is generated every day from that list.