The rare daily word game sweeping the globe. Find what's hidden in plain sight.
PHOENIX
Definition of PHOENIX
noun
A mythological bird, said to be the only one of its kind, which lives for 500 years and then dies by burning to ashes on a pyre of its own making, ignited by the sun. It then arises anew from the ashes.
Wiktionary · CC BY-SA
Where it comes from
From Old English and Old French fenix, from Medieval Latin phenix, from Latin phoenīx, from Ancient Greek φοῖνιξ (phoînix), from Egyptian (bnw, “grey heron”). Doublet of Bennu. The grey heron was venerated at Heliopolis and associated in Egypt with the cyclical renewal of life because the bird rises in flight at dawn and migrates back every year in the flood season to inhabit the Nile waters.
Etymology via Wiktionary (CC BY-SA).
Word DNA
Line of descent
4 recorded generations before English.
Deepest traced root
3rd
of 59 source languages in OUTLIER
12.2%
of traced words share this origin (9,517)
branch · 12.2% of traced words
How it is built
Same root, PHOENIX · 6 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.
PHOENIX in OUTLIER
Players have found it on 20 boards so far. 174 players have found it across Outlier's history.
It first turned up on Day 16, 5 June 2026. The most recent board was Day 157, 24 October 2026. It was on the latest finished board.
First ever to find it
on Day 16, 5 June 2026 - before anyone else in Outlier's history. See the Pioneers
Built from these letters
PHOENIX starts with P and ends with X. Sorted, its letters read EHINOPX - the shape to hunt for when the grid is scrambled. No letter is used twice, which makes it an isogram. It uses X - among the least common letters in written English.
Words that start PHOENI
Its neighbours in the OUTLIER dictionary - shortest first.
Also seen on Day 16
Could you have found PHOENIX?
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 16 - and most players walked straight past it.
Play today's OUTLIER