Hangman is the simplest word game there is: one hidden word, twenty-six letters, and a figure that fills in each time you are wrong. This version runs in the browser, needs no download, and gives you a daily word everyone else is solving too.
How to play hangman
The page picks a word and hides it behind a row of underscores. One underscore stands for one letter, so you know the length before you guess anything. Uncover every letter before the drawing is complete.
- Guess one letter at a time, with the A–Z keyboard on screen or your own keyboard. Numbers, punctuation and repeated guesses are ignored.
- A correct letter turns green and appears everywhere it occurs. Two S's in the word are both revealed by one guess.
- A wrong letter turns red and adds a part to the figure: head, body, left arm, right arm, left leg, right leg.
- Six wrong guesses end the game. The sixth part completes the figure and the word is revealed.
- You win by revealing every letter before the sixth mistake. The status line reports your final count and the share button copies a spoiler-free result.
There is no timer and no penalty for thinking. A letter you have already tried is disabled the moment it is used, so a double tap cannot cost a second life. Daily mode gives everyone the same word for the date, using US Eastern midnight as the rollover; endless mode picks a random word from the theme you choose. The bank is limited to common words of four to ten letters, so losing feels like a bad guess rather than an unfair vocabulary test.
The best letters to guess first
Letter frequency is the closest thing hangman has to a solved opening. The figures below come from this site's own 12,478-word five-letter list, counting how often each letter appears across every word in that list.
- E — 10.32% of letters
- S — 10.30%
- A — 9.20%
- O — 6.81%
- R — 6.45%
- I — 5.76%
- L — 5.24%
- T — 5.14%
S is more useful than its rank suggests. It is the most common first letter, starting 12.19% of five-letter words, and the most common last letter by a wide margin: 30.49% of them end in S. That is largely plurals and third-person verbs, which is why an early S so often lights up the final square.
A practical opening is E, then S, then A, then O, then R. E is the most likely hit and it is a vowel, so it exposes the shape of the word. S comes next because it combines a near-top frequency with the strongest position signal. A and O follow as the remaining high-value vowels, and R is the best consonant left.
These numbers describe five-letter words, because that is the list they were measured on. This game also uses words of four to ten letters, so treat the ranking as a strong starting order rather than a guarantee at every length.
Where the game came from
Hangman is a Victorian parlour game, commonly dated to the 19th century. It belongs to the same family of paper-and-pencil games played in drawing rooms and later classrooms: cheap, portable, and understandable in one sentence. Nobody owns it. The rules and the name are in the public domain, which is why every school, puzzle book and website can make its own version.
The six-part gallows is a convention rather than a rule. Different countries and generations have drawn the figure in different orders, and some versions keep a tally instead of a picture. The six-part version is the one that stuck in schools, and it is used here because it makes the remaining guesses easy to count.
Strategy that actually works
Most hangman advice is a list of best letters with no explanation, which is why it stops helping after three guesses. Every guess buys information, and the information you need changes as the board fills.
Start frequency-first, then switch to structure. E and S are likelier than anything else, so play them. Once two or three letters are showing, stop guessing by frequency alone and read the pattern: E in fourth position with no other vowels is a different problem from a word that starts with E.
Count the vowels. Almost every English word contains a vowel, and many contain two or three. If E, A, O and I have all missed, the word is probably short, borrowed, or built around U or Y. That is useful, but only if you track the vowels you have eliminated.
Use endings, then rares. After S, T, H, R and N are the next consonants to try because they complete common clusters such as TH, TR, ST and NG. If the last square is still blank after S, an -ING or -ED ending is less likely and a short singular noun is more likely. Save J, Q, X and Z for the endgame, when a hit solves the word and a miss still eliminates a lot of space.
Do not repeat a wrong letter. This version prevents it, but the habit matters in paper play. A repeated wrong letter is the most common wasted turn among beginners: it feels safe because it is familiar, and it tells you nothing. Scan the revealed pattern before each guess, and use the theme as a clue — a Countries word ending in A is more likely to be a place name than a random noun.
Frequently asked questions
Is the hangman game free to play?
Yes. The game runs entirely in your browser, with no account, no download and no limit on how many words you play. There is no timer and nothing to install; the page and the word list are all you need.
How many wrong guesses do I get?
Six. Each wrong letter adds one part to the gallows figure: head, body, left arm, right arm, left leg, right leg. The sixth wrong letter ends the game and reveals the word. A correct letter never costs a guess, however many times it appears in the word.
Is the daily hangman the same for everyone?
Yes. The daily word is chosen from the date in US Eastern time, so every player on the same calendar day gets the same word and theme. It changes at midnight Eastern, which is the boundary the rest of this site uses, and it is not affected by your own time zone.
Can I play hangman on a phone?
Yes. The A to Z keyboard is real buttons sized for a thumb, so the game works without a physical keyboard. On a desktop you can click the same buttons or simply type a letter, and both inputs update the same game.
Does guessing the same letter twice cost a turn?
No. Once a letter has been guessed its button is disabled and coloured, and pressing that key again is ignored. This version never charges you twice for the same letter, so a repeated guess is a no-op rather than a wasted life.
What word lists does the game use?
Six themes: Animals, Countries, Food, Sports, School and Nature. Each contains around fifty common words of four to ten letters. Endless mode lets you pick a theme or mix them all; daily mode picks the theme for you so that everyone playing that day sees the same puzzle.