Do you have to pay to play Wordle soon? NYT may have the answer

One of the most popular games online right now is Wordle. Yes, the grey and yellow boxes you can see all over Twitter are basically people sharing their results from a word puzzle game that has gotten everyone trying their hand at it once a day. Right now, either you are playing Wordle or you are busy muting the word on social media, either way, you cannot escape it.

Created by Brooklyn-based software engineer Josh Wardle for his girlfriend, Wordle has almost the whole of Twitter checking in. And social media regulars are not the only ones who’ve seen merit in exercising their guesswork and word knowledge once a day, the game was brought over by The New York Times (NYT) recently for an undisclosed seven-figure sum.

What has gotten people addicted to the game is the “smart fun” of it all. The game rules are not complex, the results are easy to share and show off, and also, since you can play only once a day, it’s not going to eat up into your daily routine.

The world of Wordle “gelled with the three pillars of The Times’ gaming philosophy, as Jonathan Knight, General Manager of Games at NYT, told Business Insider. The game feels human-made, playing it is time well spent, and it is “smart-fun”.

This same philosophy is reflected in the other games that the NYT hosts on its platform - the Spelling Bee, the crosswords, a simple matching game called Tiles, and a join-the-dots game called Vertex, etc. What’s important here though is the fact that all of these games are behind the paywall. If you are not a subscriber, you cannot play them.

One of the main USPs of Wordle has been the fact that it is free-to-play. And with NYT buying the game, most people are understandably concerned about whether it is going to be put behind the paywall as well.

Knight told BI that “for now” Wordle will be kept free since The Times is “committed to continuing what makes this game magical”. However, the paper “does plan to find ways to introduce its existing games to the Wordle community”.

There is no guessing exactly how the paper plans to introduce games that are behind its paywall to millions players who thronged a free game, so we’ll have to wait and watch. What seems mighty likely though is that NYT might keep Wordle free, for now, and then put it behind a paywall like all its other games.

Wordle is important for The Times as it helps the paper with its “core business goal” of building out “non-news products” to attract newer audiences. Games is central to this strategy. According to reports, the paper said it has accumulated 1 million subscriptions for the standalone Games product that is a part of its all-access subscription package.

"We have a big ambition to grow our Games audience, and we see it as a really big opportunity. Games are a diversion from news, and the news can be brutal sometimes,” Knight said.

Also, there is another very successful narrative in the making as far simple, small puzzles, and even hyper-casual games are concerned. As per App Annie reports, hyper-casual games like Bridge Race, Hair Challenge, and Project Makeover topped the list of downloads in 2021. So while there is a rush towards the metaverse, Web 3.0, and connected immersive digital experiences, a much-needed relief comes from the “nostalgic love of quite simple products and interactions” like Wordle, as media analyst Douglas McCabe pointed out.

Also, word games are one of the most competitive categories in mobile, as Co-founder of games studio Viker, Dan Beasley said. The Internet has a profusion of word games, many of them very similar to Wordle (you can check out a list here), but most of them are plagued with ads and/or in-app purchases. Putting it behind the paywall, if and when it comes to that, will keep that clutter away allowing players to enjoy the OG stock experience of it all.

Knight believes Wordle has a staying power. "I think many people will be obsessed with Wordle a year from now, and many people will play it for most of the rest of their lives," he said.

So imagine this, you play Wordle for free, for a year, at least. You are now obsessed and invested. And then NYT puts it behind its paywall. What would you do?

Also Read: Absurdle, Sweardle, BTS: The many spin-offs of Wordle

Also Read: The game that’s everywhere: What is Wordle and how do you play it?