Nerdle: The Wordle for Maths fans. How to play and other rules here

Since its instant hit after launching, Wordle has found a number of spin-offs which commonly add another layer, mainly thematic or a more challenging one. The math based game Nerdle has started to make some buzz owing to its reliance upon numbers and equation to find the right solution. 

British data scientist, Richard Mann, launched the numbers version of the viral puzzle game after his 14-year-old daughter said she wished there was a Wordle equivalent for “maths nerds”.

This math-based puzzle can be fun if you are a fan of arithmetic calculations and solving for ‘x’ is your hobby. 

What is Nerdle?

According to the creator Richard Mann, Nerdle is the “Wordle equivalent for maths fans”.

The aim of the game is to guess the Nerdle in six tries, by guessing the “word” that fills the eight tiles.

After each guess, the colour of the tiles will change to show how close your guess is to the right answer. Green means the number is correct and in the right place. Purple means it’s in the solution but in the wrong place. Black means it’s not in the word.

Wordle has become a world phenomenon as one of the internet’s most popular online games. But what if you just kind of hate that it revolves around letters? Maybe if the same concept was applied to mathematics you would be more interested. Well, you’re in luck.

There is a new variation of Wordle called Nerdle, a variation of the popular word-puzzle game. Nerdle is a numbers-based game in which players arrange different series of numbers to complete the puzzle, similar to Wordle.

How to play 

On the website there is also mini Nerdle version and there’s an opportunity to create your own Nerdle game to share with others.

You can play Nerdle at nerdlegame.com

In a post on LinkedIn Richard Mann wrote: “As if nerding out on the maths in the game itself wasn’t enough to keep me out of mischief, watching our little game being played in 53 countries by day 5 and up to 800 users an hour has been absolutely fascinating.”

Rules 

-There are eight “letters”

-A “letter” is one of 0123456789+-*/=

-A “word” must be a calculation that is mathematically correct so must have one “=”

-The number to the right of the “=” is just a number

-Standard order of operations applies, so calculate * and / before + and –

-Order matters. If the answer is 10+20=30, then 20+10=30 isn’t close enough.