The rare daily word game sweeping the globe. Find what's hidden in plain sight.
GHOST
Definition of GHOST
noun
A disembodied soul; a soul or spirit of a deceased person; a spirit appearing after death.
Wiktionary · CC BY-SA
Where it comes from
The noun is derived from Middle English gost, from Old English gāst, gǣst (“breath, spirit, soul, ghost”) (compare modern English Holy Ghost), from Proto-West Germanic *gaist, from Proto-Germanic *gaistaz, from Proto-Indo-European *ǵʰéysdos, from *ǵʰéysd- (“anger, agitation”). The h in the spelling appears in the Prologue to William Caxton’s Royal Book, printed in 1484, in a reference to the “Holy Ghoost”. It was likely influenced by Middle Dutch gheest, a common variant of geest. Both Caxton and his assistant Wynkyn de Worde had connections to the Low Countries. Doublet of geist. The adjective and verb are derived from the noun. The verb gained prominence in the 2010s.
Etymology via Wiktionary (CC BY-SA).
Word DNA
Line of descent
5 recorded generations before English.
Deepest traced root
19th
of 59 source languages in OUTLIER
0.6%
of traced words share this origin (450)
branch · 22.6% of traced words
How it is built
Same root, GHOST · 7 relatives in the game
OUTLIER scores every word on how unusual it is, and that number is not published. Working it out at the board is the game.
GHOST in OUTLIER
Players have found it on 69 boards so far. 155 players have found it across Outlier's history.
It first turned up on Day 1, 22 May 2026. The most recent board was Day 157, 24 October 2026. It was on the latest finished board.
First found by a player on Day 1, 22 May 2026.
Built from these letters
GHOST starts with G and ends with T. Sorted, its letters read GHOST - the shape to hunt for when the grid is scrambled. No letter is used twice, which makes it an isogram.
Same letters, different word
2 other words use exactly these letters. Worth knowing at the board: an anagram fits a grid the same way.
Words that start GHOST
Its neighbours in the OUTLIER dictionary - shortest first.
Also seen on Day 1
Could you have found GHOST?
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 1 - and most players walked straight past it.
Play today's OUTLIER