New York Times buys Wordle and keeps it available for free for now

The American newspaper New York Times buys the word game Wordle from its creator Josh Wardle. The newspaper pays more than a million dollars for the game, which resembles TV quiz Lingo.

The game will remain available for free after the purchase, the newspaper states. It is unknown whether this will remain so: The New York Times probably wants to lure more people to its own site with the purchase and to persuade them to take out a subscription. The newspaper pays a “low seven-digit fee” for the word game: seven-digit amounts are between $1 and 10 million, so it’s probably between $1 and 3 million.

New York developer Josh Wardle made Wordle some time ago for his own partner. Every day users can guess a word, with the software indicating which letters are correct and which letters are elsewhere in the word with each attempt. That system resembles that of TV game Lingo. Users can share their score in emojis via social media. There is only one word to guess per day.

The developer says that he is working with the newspaper to include streaks when the domain changes to that of the New York Times. It is still unknown when exactly that will happen. Wordle has been around since October last year. It is only a website and the version of Ward is not available as an app.