The rare daily word game sweeping the globe. Find what's hidden in plain sight.
LACK
Definition of LACK
noun
A deficiency or need (of something desirable or necessary); an absence, want, dearth.
Wiktionary · CC BY-SA
Where it comes from
From Middle English lack, lakke, lak, from Old English *læc (“deficiency, lack, want”), from Proto-West Germanic *lak, from Proto-Germanic *laką, *lakaz (“slackness”), from Proto-Germanic *lakaz (“limp, slack, loose, low”), related to *lak(k)ōną (“to blame, reproach”), from Proto-Indo-European *lok-néh₂-. Cognate with Saterland Frisian Lak (“lack”), Middle Low German lack, lak (“lack”), Dutch lak (“lack, deficiency, calumny”), Icelandic lakur (“lacking”). Related also to Middle Dutch laken (“to blame, lack”). Eclipsed non-native Middle English carence (“absence, lack”), from Old French carence.
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.
LACK in OUTLIER
Players have found it on 11 boards so far. 11 players have found it across Outlier's history.
It first turned up on Day 23, 12 June 2026. The most recent board was Day 102, 30 August 2026. Nobody has seen it on a board for 9 days.
First found by a player on Day 23, 12 June 2026.
Built from these letters
LACK starts with L and ends with K. Sorted, its letters read ACKL - 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 LACK
Its neighbours in the OUTLIER dictionary - shortest first.
Also seen on Day 23
Could you have found LACK?
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 23 - and most players walked straight past it.
Play today's OUTLIER