WordStrands — Daily Word Puzzle for Reddit
Trace. Discover. Compete. A new daily word game built natively on Reddit.
🧵 What is WordStrands?
Every day, Reddit drops a fresh puzzle: a grid of letters and a cryptic clue. Your job? Drag your finger through adjacent letters to uncover hidden themed words and one special megaword that ties them all together.
Same puzzle for everyone. One shot per day. Fastest time wins.
Think word search meets Wordle — but instead of typing, you're tracing paths through a letter grid, racing the clock, and competing with the entire subreddit on a live leaderboard.
🎮 How to Play
- Read the clue — A cryptic hint like "Rise and shine!" points you toward the day's theme
- Trace words — Drag through adjacent letters (any direction, including diagonals) to spell words
- Find all theme words + the megaword — The puzzle is solved when every themed word and the megaword are found
- Earn hints by exploring — Trace any valid 4+ letter English word (even if it's not a theme word) and you earn progress toward hints. Three bonus words = one hint that reveals the first and last letter of an unfound word
- Beat the clock — Your completion time goes straight to the daily leaderboard. No hint penalty — time is the only thing that matters
🏆 Leaderboards & Competition
Daily Leaderboard
Ranked purely by solve time. See where you stand against today's players the moment you finish. Top 50 displayed. Your rank is included in your shareable result.
Yesterday's Recap (Automated Daily Post)
Every morning, an automated recap post drops in the subreddit with yesterday's top 10 fastest times, total player count, average solve time, and the longest active streaks. The theme is revealed behind a spoiler tag so latecomers aren't spoiled. This creates a second piece of daily content that drives discussion and keeps the community buzzing.
World Leaderboard
Cumulative points based on daily rankings (rank 1 = 100 pts, rank 2 = 99 pts, etc.). Rewards consistency over one-off performances. The players who show up every day climb to the top.
Streaks
The backend tracks consecutive days played. Your streak is displayed on your results screen and featured in the daily recap. Missing a day resets it to zero — a simple but powerful reason to come back tomorrow.
📱 Built for Reddit, Built for Mobile
- Portrait-first design — Optimized for thumb-friendly one-handed play on mobile
- Touch-drag tracing — The core interaction is dragging through letters, which feels natural and satisfying on a touchscreen
- Play in-feed or expanded — Works as a compact splash view in the Reddit feed or as a full-screen experience
- No extra app needed — Your Reddit account is your player account. Open the post, play, done.
- Share results as comments — One tap generates a spoiler-free emoji result with your time, hint count, rank, and streak that posts directly to the thread
Share format:
🧵 WordStrands #12 ⏱️ 1:47
🔵🔵🔵🔵🔵🟡
💡 0 hints | 🏆 #3 today | 🔥 5-day streak
🔁 Recurring Daily Content
WordStrands is fully automated:
- Midnight UTC — A scheduler creates a new interactive game post with the day's puzzle and clue
- 00:05 UTC — A second scheduler posts yesterday's recap with leaderboard, stats, and streak leaders
- Puzzle rotation — Puzzles cycle from a curated pool. Same puzzle for everyone, same grid, same theme — so every time on the leaderboard is directly comparable
Two posts hit the subreddit every day with zero manual work. Install the app and it runs forever.
💬 Why It's Reddit-y
WordStrands is designed to generate the kind of discussion Reddit thrives on:
- "How did you get it in under a minute?!" — Speed comparisons drive competitive comments
- "The megaword was the last thing I found" — Strategy discussion: megaword first vs. theme words first
- "Today's clue was way too cryptic" — Difficulty debates after every puzzle
- "I almost lost my 14-day streak" — Streak anxiety creates daily engagement stories
- Yesterday's recap post — A natural discussion thread where the community reacts to the results, debates difficulty, and celebrates top performers
The daily puzzle gives everyone a shared experience. The leaderboard gives them something to talk about. The recap gives them a place to talk about it.
🛠️ Tech Stack
| Layer | Technology |
|---|---|
| Platform | Reddit Devvit (Custom Posts, Redis, Scheduler, Reddit API) |
| Frontend | React 19, Tailwind CSS 4, Vite |
| Backend | Node.js serverless (Devvit), Hono, REST API |
| Data | Curated puzzle definitions with paths, ENABLE word list (4+ letters) for validation |
| Leaderboards | Redis sorted sets for daily rankings, cumulative world points, and streak tracking |
| Automation | Devvit scheduler with cron jobs for daily puzzle and recap posts |
🎯 Prize Category Fit
| Category | Why WordStrands Fits |
|---|---|
| Best Daily Game | One puzzle per day, automated posting, leaderboards, streaks, recap posts — the full daily game package |
| Best Mobile Game Play | Portrait-first, touch-drag tracing designed specifically for mobile, no keyboard needed |
| Best Use of User Contributions | Players generate engagement through comments, share results, and the community's daily discussion drives the experience |
🎬 TL;DR
WordStrands is a daily word puzzle where you trace paths through a letter grid to find themed words and a megaword. Compete on time-based leaderboards, maintain your streak, and share spoiler-free results in the comments. Fully automated — new puzzle and yesterday's recap post drop every day at midnight. Built natively on Reddit with Devvit. Fast to play, easy to learn, impossible to play just once.
Built With
- devvit
- react
- typescript
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