The rare daily word game sweeping the globe. Find what's hidden in plain sight.
PUTREFY
Definition of PUTREFY
verb
To fester or rot and exude a fetid stench.
Wiktionary · CC BY-SA
Other senses
PUTREFY carries 4 further meanings.
intransitive & transitive verb
To decay or cause to decay and have a foul odor. synonym: decay.
To render putrid; cause to decay with an offensive odor; cause to become fetid by rotting. See putrefaction.
To make carious or gangrenous.
To corrupt; make foul or offensive.
Where it comes from
From Middle French putréfier.
Etymology via Wiktionary (CC BY-SA).
Word DNA
Line of descent
- Middle French
- English
One recorded step before English.
Deepest traced root
13th
of 59 source languages in OUTLIER
1.1%
of traced words share this origin (828)
branch · 12.8% of traced words
How it is built
Same root, PUTREFY · 4 relatives in the game
PUTREFY in a sentence
“* Dead bodies quickly putrefy and so become a health hazard to the living.”
OUTLIER scores every word on how unusual it is, and that number is not published. Working it out at the board is the game.
PUTREFY in OUTLIER
Players have found it on 47 boards so far. 98 players have found it across Outlier's history.
It first turned up on Day 19, 8 June 2026. The most recent board was Day 158, 25 October 2026. Nobody has seen it on a board for 1 day.
First ever to find it
on Day 19, 8 June 2026 - before anyone else in Outlier's history. See the Pioneers
Built from these letters
PUTREFY starts with P and ends with Y. Sorted, its letters read EFPRTUY - the shape to hunt for when the grid is scrambled. No letter is used twice, which makes it an isogram.
Words that mean much the same
Near-synonyms of PUTREFY. Not interchangeable at the board - the grid decides that - but close in meaning.
Words that start PUTREF
Its neighbours in the OUTLIER dictionary - shortest first.
Also seen on Day 19
Could you have found PUTREFY?
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 19 - and most players walked straight past it.
Play today's OUTLIER