Canuckle - The Daily Canadian Word Game
Guess the Canadian word in six tries.
Canuckle works like the word games you already know, with one twist: every answer has a Canadian connection. A town, a snack, a bit of weather, a creature, or something you'd shout at a hockey game. Type a five-letter word, hit Enter, and the tiles tell you how close you are.
The rules
- Every guess must fill the row: five letters in Daily and Unlimited, however long the last name is in Celebrity. Type it with the on-screen keyboard or your real one, then press Enter.
- After each guess the tiles flip and change colour to show how close you were.
- You get six guesses. Solve it in fewer and your stats look better.
- The keyboard remembers what you've learned: keys turn red, gold, or grey to match the tiles.
- Any five-letter guess is accepted, but the answer always comes from the Canuckle word list.
What the colours mean
Red with a leaf
The letter is in the word and in exactly the right spot. T stays put. Beauty.
Gold
The letter is in the word, but somewhere else. A belongs in a different spot. Close, bud.
Grey
The letter isn't in the word at all. S can be crossed off. Sorry.
Repeated letters follow the same logic. If the answer has one O and you guess a word with two, only one of them can light up. The other goes grey so you know not to look for a second one.
Three ways to play
One word a day, and it's the same word for everyone from Victoria to St. John's. A new one arrives at midnight, local time. Your progress is saved, so you can start on the bus and finish at lunch. Solve it and your streak grows. Miss a day and it resets, so no pressure. Okay, a little pressure.
Finished the daily and still itching? Unlimited deals a fresh random word from the list every time you tap Next word. It keeps its own separate stats and streak, so warm up here as much as you like without touching your Daily record. Play Canuckle Unlimited.
A new famous Canadian every day. You're guessing the last name, so the grid stretches or shrinks to fit: DRAKE is five tiles, GRETZKY is seven. You start with a clue about who they are. Still stuck after three guesses? The first name is revealed. Six tries, same colours, own streak. Guess today's celebrity.
Switch between modes any time with the toggle at the top. Each mode keeps its own game in progress and its own stats.
Hard mode
Turn it on in Settings for an honest challenge. In hard mode, every hint you've uncovered has to be used in your next guess: red letters must stay in the same spot, and gold letters must appear somewhere in the word. No throwing away a guess just to test five new letters. Your subline will show Hard mode so you can prove it.
Stats, streaks, and sharing
The Stats button tracks games played, win percentage, current streak, and your best streak ever, plus a chart of how many guesses you usually need. When a game ends you'll get a spoiler-free result card: a grid of leaves, gold, and grey squares with no letters. Tap Copy result and paste it into the group chat. Nobody learns the word, everybody learns you got it in three.
A few tips from the rink
- Open with vowels. Canadian words love an O and an E. MOOSE, CANOE, and TOQUE cover a lot of ground in one go.
- Think like a Canadian. Places, weather, wildlife, food, and hockey. If a word feels like it belongs on a Tim's cup or a provincial licence plate, it's probably in the list.
- Trust the grey. A grey key means that letter is gone. Don't guess it again unless you enjoy suffering.
- Watch for doubles. GEESE, BANFF, MITTS. Repeated letters trip up more players than any spelling ever did.
- Stumped? Peek at the full word list under About. No shame in it. Well, a little.
Questions, eh?
Is Canuckle free?
Yes. No account, no app to install, no paywall. Open canuckle.net in any browser and play.
When does the new word come out?
At midnight in your local time zone. The puzzle number is the same for everyone, so your friend in Halifax gets the same word as you do in Vancouver, just a few hours earlier.
Are the answers really all Canadian?
Every answer has a Canadian connection: a place, a food, an animal, a bit of weather, a hockey term, a famous name or a piece of history. When the game ends you get a one-line note explaining the link.
Which guesses are accepted?
Any five letters. There is no dictionary check, so you can probe with vowels or throw in a hunch. The answer itself always comes from the Canuckle word list.
Can I play more than once a day?
The Daily word is one per day, but Canuckle Unlimited deals a new word whenever you like, and Celebrity gives you a second daily puzzle.