Learn to Play La Parola del Giorno

First time with La Parola del Giorno? Discover the rules, learn what the colors mean and try the best strategies to solve it in as few tries as possible.

The rules: start playing right away

Every day a secret 5-letter word is waiting for you. You have 6 tries to guess it. After each try, the colors tell you how close you are:

• Green: the letter is in the word and in the correct position. Don't move it.
• Yellow: the letter is part of the word, but it's not in that position. Try placing it elsewhere on your next try.
• Gray: the letter is not in the secret word. Rule it out completely.

Your first try: give it a go

1. Choose a smart first word. Start with a word that has a variety of vowels and frequent consonants. Try AIUTO, REGIA, STELO or BRANO.
2. Type the word and press Enter. The five tiles change color right away: find out which letters are right, which to move and which to drop.
3. Read the colors before your next try. Don't rush: each try should build on the information you got from the previous ones.
4. Repeat until you guess it! Each try narrows the possibilities. Can you find the word before the sixth try?

Want to win in 3 tries or fewer?

The best players combine logic, vocabulary and knowledge of Italian patterns. Try these techniques:

• Use two complementary opening words. If your first word was AIUTO (covers A, I, U, O + T), try DENSE as your second: it adds D, E, N, S — four new letters among the most frequent.
• Memorize the common endings in Italian. Many 5-letter words end in -ATO, -ARE, -ENTE, -ANDO, -ITO. Recognizing these patterns gives you an edge.
• Think in word families. If you have a green E in the second position and a green O at the end (_E__O), think of words like VENGO, VERSO or PESCO. Run through the consonants that could complete the pattern.
• Don't reuse the gray letters. It sounds obvious, but in the heat of the moment it's a common mistake. The on-screen keyboard helps you remember which letters you've already ruled out.
• Watch out for doubles. Words like MAMMA, CARRO or BELLO contain a doubled consonant. If you have a green letter and nothing seems to work, consider that it might appear twice.

Quirks of the game in Italian

Unlike English word games, La Parola del Giorno includes accented vowels and other quirks of the Italian language. Here are some specific tips:

• Accented vowels (à, è, ì, ò, ù) behave as distinct letters in the game. METRO and METRÒ are different words, and the game treats them as such.
• Italian is rich in double consonants. Words like PALLA, GATTO or ROSSO are very common, so you always have to consider that possibility.
• The vocabulary includes conjugated verbs (like SALTA, VIENE, PORTA), not just infinitives.

When does the word change?

The word changes every day at 6:00 in the morning (Rome time). Every player gets the same word, which lets you compare results and share them.

Share your result without spoilers

At the end of the game (whether you win or lose), you can copy your result as colored squares and share it on WhatsApp, Twitter or any social network. The format shows how many tries you needed without revealing the word, so your friends can try it themselves.

The mindset of a good player

Players who regularly solve it in three or four tries don't necessarily have a bigger vocabulary than everyone else. What sets them apart is method. They treat their early tries as questions, not as guesses. Every word they enter is meant to gather information — which letters are there, which aren't, where they are — and only from the second or third try on do they focus on the actual solution.

This distinction is key. Players who try to guess right away risk wasting tries on unlikely words. Those who gather information before drawing conclusions reach the solution with more confidence and less anxiety. It's an approach that works in any logic game, but in an Italian word game it shows especially clearly, because the regularity of the language rewards those who reason in patterns.

Another important thing is patience. When you reach the fifth try with two or three plausible words in mind, the temptation is to take a guess. Instead, pause for a moment. Go back over the colors you've got, think about which letter combinations are still compatible, and choose the word that eliminates the most alternatives. Even when it seems impossible, the solution is almost always reachable — you just can't be in a hurry.

The regularity of Italian: a concrete advantage

Italian is a phonetic language: each letter almost always corresponds to the same sound. That means that, unlike English — where COUGH, THROUGH and THOUGH are spelled similarly but pronounced completely differently — in Italian the spelling faithfully reflects the pronunciation. For the player, this predictability is a powerful weapon.

In Italian, C before A, O, U is pronounced /k/ (CASA, CORDA, CUBO). Before E or I it becomes /tʃ/ (CENA, CIAO): to get the /k/ sound before E or I you write CH (CHIESA, CHILO). The same goes for G: GA, GO, GU give a hard /g/, while GE, GI give /dʒ/ — for a hard /g/ before E or I you write GH (GHIRO, GHETTO). This transparency lets you reason about words even without ever having seen them written: if you pronounce them in your head and they make sense, they probably exist in the dictionary.

Accented vowels follow the same logic. If a word ends with the stress on the A, it's almost certainly spelled with -À: CITTÀ, ANDRÀ, VERRÀ. This consistency makes the game especially satisfying: the rules are clear, and those who know them play better.