Our own Jewish version of Wordle

Shalom has launched a Jewish version of the immensely popular online word game Wordle called Jewdle.

Like many other offshoots spawned by Wordle, Jewdle is in most respects the same as the original, with a few key differences.

Players must guess a six-letter word, rather than five-letter words. And all of the mystery words are – you guessed it – Jewish-themed.

“There are so many ‘Jewish’ words in common English use that there’s quite a wide variety of the types of possible words,” said Alon Meltzer, director of programs at Shalom, who came up with the idea to create the game after getting hooked on Wordle himself.

“Jewdle has words in English, Hebrew, Yiddish, even Aramaic – ranging from popular Yiddish slang to names of major texts or holidays to common Jewish expressions.”

The diverse word list was generated by the Shalom team, many of whom are dedicated Wordle players.

Another unique feature of Jewdle is that once the puzzle is solved, users can view a definition of the completed word.

An additional letter certainly adds an extra level of difficulty, but early feedback from beta testers is that it’s worth the challenge.

“We decided to do six letters instead of five because of the phonetic differences in writing out many Hebrew and Yiddish words,” Meltzer explained.

“You often need to use a ‘ch’ or ‘sch’ combination or an ‘ah’ suffix. Five letters was a bit too limiting.”

The idea behind Jewdle is mostly just to have fun with a dash of casual Jewish education thrown in.

Shalom runs events and programs aimed at joining Jewish concepts and content with community offerings that appeal to a secular demographic, and although online games are not the organisation’s usual shtick, Jewdle ties neatly into its mission to encourage Jewish engagement among young adults who are less affiliated.

“This seemed like a perfect way to create Jewish relevance within a very popular, secular context that so many people around the world are accessing right now,” said Meltzer.

“We hope that Jewdle becomes almost as popular as Wordle.”

Play Jewdle: jewdle.app