Build your network. Bridge the gap.

Form English words horizontally or vertically on a 13 × 13 board. You have eight letters. Select rack letters and tap board squares, or use keyboard arrows to choose a square and type letters. New tiles must lie in one straight line, without gaps; existing tiles can fill gaps. Submit commits the whole move. Recall returns unsubmitted tiles. Shuffle only changes rack order.

Starting & connecting

New games use rules 1.1: your blue opening word must include A1 (upper-left); the computer’s red opening must include M13 (lower-right). Read words left to right or top to bottom. Older saved games retain their original A7/M7 starts, shown in their player panels. Each later word must connect to your own network by crossing an existing letter or touching it orthogonally. Every horizontal and vertical word newly formed must be valid, including crossing words. Diagonal connections do not count. Existing letters cannot be moved or replaced.

The first move that joins the occupied networks earns +75 once. After that bridge, both players may extend the combined network. A bridge must be formed with legal words; merely touching diagonally does not count.

Scoring & winning

Each new tile earns 10 points, plus the printed letter values for every newly formed word. Crossing words score their letter totals separately. Ten symmetrical bonus squares award +25 or +50 once, when covered by a new tile. The first bridge adds +75. Target: 500 points. A round ends after both players have taken the same number of turns; highest score then wins. Ties are draws. A full board, six consecutive passes, or 40 complete rounds also ends the game at the highest score.

Turns & difficult racks

Each human turn lasts 60 seconds once it becomes available in the foreground. While the computer thinks, no human countdown runs. If you leave, your current deadline still expires once; the next human turn waits for your return before its clock starts. Expiration automatically passes that turn. Pass earns no points and refreshes your rack if eight replacement tiles remain. Replaced letters return to your own bag after the draw. The same rules apply to the computer. Unsubmitted placement is temporary; committed moves are saved on the server. Refreshing never resets the server deadline.

The starter is randomized. Blue starts upper-left and red lower-right. Opening racks are identical and chosen with 2–4 vowels (up to 100 shuffle attempts), starting squares and bonuses are mirrored, and both players have identical tile inventories with independently shuffled later draws. Each side has its own identical 98-tile inventory. Later draws are unconditioned: no rack repair, hidden redraw, or computer-only advantage. Rare J, Q, X and Z appear once per side; K appears once. Pass offers the same rack exchange to either side. No blanks or wildcards are used. A=1, B=3, C=3, D=2, E=1, F=4, G=2, H=4, I=1, J=8, K=5, L=1, M=3, N=1, O=1, P=3, Q=10, R=1, S=1, T=1, U=1, V=4, W=4, X=8, Y=4, Z=10.

Family word list

Both players use the same fixed common-American-English list derived from the English Speller Database (SCOWL). Proper names, abbreviations, punctuation, profanity and conservatively excluded terms are not accepted. Not every English word is included. All crossing words are checked on the server. Invalid submissions explain the problem and do not end your turn.

Guest progress uses an essential cookie in this browser; clearing it removes access to those guest games. Signed-in progress belongs to your account. Other tabs share the same saved game. Network interruptions do not pause the turn. On an idle site, expiration is processed on the next request or scheduled WordPress task; late words are always rejected.

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