The rare daily word game sweeping the globe. Find what's hidden in plain sight.
SHOAL
Definition of SHOAL
adjective
Shallow.
Wiktionary · CC BY-SA
Where it comes from
From Middle English schold, scholde, from Old English sċeald (“shallow”), perhaps from Proto-Germanic *skalidaz, past participle of *skaljaną (“to go dry, dry up, become shallow”), from *skalaz (“parched, shallow”), from Proto-Indo-European *(s)kelh₁- (“to dry out”). Cognate with Low German Scholl (“shallow water”), German schal (“stale, flat, vapid”). Compare shallow.
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.
SHOAL in OUTLIER
Players have found it on 54 boards so far. 108 players have found it across Outlier's history.
It first turned up on Day 6, 27 May 2026. The most recent board was Day 102, 30 August 2026. It was on the latest finished board.
First ever to find it
on Day 18, 7 June 2026 - before anyone else in Outlier's history. See the Pioneers
Built from these letters
SHOAL starts with S and ends with L. Sorted, its letters read AHLOS - the shape to hunt for when the grid is scrambled. No letter is used twice, which makes it an isogram.
Same letters, different word
3 other words use exactly these letters. Worth knowing at the board: an anagram fits a grid the same way.
Words that start SHOAL
Its neighbours in the OUTLIER dictionary - shortest first.
Also seen on Day 6
Could you have found SHOAL?
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 6 - and most players walked straight past it.
Play today's OUTLIER