The rare daily word game sweeping the globe. Find what's hidden in plain sight.
WASTEL
Definition of WASTEL
noun
A kind of fine white bread or cake.
Wiktionary · CC BY-SA
Where it comes from
From Middle English wastel, from Old French wastel, gastel (> French gâteau), from Late Latin wastellum, from Frankish *wastil, perhaps from Proto-Germanic *wistiz (“sustenance, food”), from Proto-Indo-European *wes- (“to be”). Cognate with Middle High German wastel (“a kind of bread”). Compare Old High German wist (“food”) and Old English wist (“food”). Doublet of gateau.
Etymology via Wiktionary (CC BY-SA).
Word DNA
Line of descent
6 recorded generations before English.
Deepest traced root
2nd
of 59 source languages in OUTLIER
14.2%
of traced words share this origin (11,843)
How it is built
Its etymology also names Old English.
Every Proto-Indo-European word → · The Word DNA of OUTLIER →
OUTLIER scores every word on how unusual it is, and that number is not published. Working it out at the board is the game.
WASTEL in OUTLIER
Players have found it on 8 boards so far.
It first turned up on Day 57, 16 July 2026. The most recent board was Day 165, 1 November 2026. Nobody has seen it on a board for 3 days.
First ever to find it
on Day 74, 2 August 2026 - before anyone else in Outlier's history. See the Pioneers
Built from these letters
WASTEL starts with W and ends with L. Sorted, its letters read AELSTW - 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 WASTEL
Its neighbours in the OUTLIER dictionary - shortest first.
Also seen on Day 57
Could you have found WASTEL?
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 57 - and most players walked straight past it.
Play today's OUTLIER