The rare daily word game sweeping the globe. Find what's hidden in plain sight.
CARIOUS
Definition of CARIOUS
adjective
Having caries (bone or tooth decay); decayed, rotten.
Wiktionary · CC BY-SA
Where it comes from
From French carieux (“carious”), from carie (“decay (of bone or teeth)”) (from Latin cariēs (“rot, rottenness, corruption”), from careō (“to lack, be deprived of”), from Proto-Italic *kazēō (“to lack”), possibly from Proto-Indo-European *ḱes- (“to cut”).) + French -eux (“-ous”) (from Latin -ōsus (“full of, prone to”), from Old Latin -ōsos, ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *-went-, *-wont- + *-to-)).
Etymology via Wiktionary (CC BY-SA).
OUTLIER scores every word on how unusual it is, and that number is not published. Working it out at the board is the game.
CARIOUS in OUTLIER
Players have found it on 13 boards so far. 13 players have found it across Outlier's history.
It first turned up on Day 40, 29 June 2026. The most recent board was Day 97, 25 August 2026. Nobody has seen it on a board for 2 days.
First ever to find it
on Day 40, 29 June 2026 - before anyone else in Outlier's history. See the Pioneers
Built from these letters
CARIOUS starts with C and ends with S. Sorted, its letters read ACIORSU - the shape to hunt for when the grid is scrambled. No letter is used twice, which makes it an isogram.
Same letters, different word
One other word uses exactly these letters. Worth knowing at the board: an anagram fits a grid the same way.
Words that start CARIOU
Its neighbours in the OUTLIER dictionary - shortest first.
Also seen on Day 40
Could you have found CARIOUS?
OUTLIER is a daily word game. One grid, the same grid for everybody, and the words nobody else spots are the ones that pay. This word was on Day 40 - and most players walked straight past it.
Play today's OUTLIER