Hangman - Play Free Online | Wipzu
About Hangman
Hangman is the word-guessing game that has been played on paper, chalkboards, and school notepads for well over a century. A secret word is shown as a row of blank dashes — one per letter. Guess a letter: if it appears in the word, it fills in every position it occupies. If it doesn't appear, one part of the gallows figure is drawn. Complete the word before the figure is complete; exhaust your six wrong guesses first and you lose.
The first documented description of a Hangman-like game appears in Alice Bertha Gomme's 1894 collection 'Traditional Games of England, Scotland, and Ireland.' The gallows and hanging imagery became standard in schoolyard play by the early 1900s. The game persists into the digital era because its core tension — every wrong guess is permanent and cannot be undone — remains effective across any medium.
This browser version uses a clickable A–Z alphabet. Tap any letter to guess it. Correct guesses fill in the blanks; wrong guesses add to the drawing. Six wrong guesses are allowed — one per body part of the standard figure — and the word is revealed at the end of every round whether you win or lose.
The core skill is letter frequency intuition. E appears in approximately 11% of all English words and is the single best opening guess for words of six letters or longer. T follows at 9.1%, then A, O, I, N, S, R, H. A player who always opens with E, then moves through the other high-frequency letters, wins meaningfully more games than one who guesses randomly — not by luck but by extracting maximum information from the fewest guesses.
Key Features
- Clickable A–Z alphabet keyboard — no physical keyboard required, works on any device
- Classic 6-wrong-guess limit with a progressively drawn gallows figure
- Word revealed at the end of each round whether you win or lose — useful for learning unfamiliar words
- Letter frequency strategy is the core skill: E is the statistically optimal first guess for most word lengths
- One of the oldest surviving word puzzle formats — first documented in print in 1894
- Built in HTML/CSS/JavaScript — instant play, no setup
Controls
How to Play
- 1A hidden word is shown as blank dashes — one dash per letter. Your job is to reveal the word before the hangman figure is complete.
- 2Click a letter from the A–Z display to guess it. If it appears in the word, it fills in every blank where it occurs.
- 3If the letter is not in the word, one part of the hangman figure is added. Six wrong guesses complete the figure and end the game.
- 4Reveal every letter in the word before making six wrong guesses to win.
- 5The full word is shown at the end of every round — win or lose — so you can learn any word you didn't know.
Tips & Tricks
- Start with E for any word 6 letters or longer — E appears in ~11% of English words and gives the most information per guess. For 5-letter words, S is slightly more frequent. For very short words (3–4 letters), open with A instead.
- After your opening vowel result, guess the remaining common vowels next: A, I, O, U. Knowing the vowel skeleton — even just _ A _ _ E — immediately reduces the candidate space far more than guessing individual consonants.
- Once 1–2 vowels are placed, shift to high-frequency consonants: R, S, T, N, L, C. The seven letters E, A, R, S, T, N, L together account for the majority of letters in most English words.
- Look for common endings before guessing blindly. If the last letter is blank, try N (words ending in -N) then G (ending in -NG). If a visible vowel is second-to-last, the ending could be -ER, -ED, -ES, -EL, or -EN — each suggests a next consonant to test.
- Save rare letters (J, Q, X, Z, K) for last. These are the least likely to appear and guessing them early wastes precious wrong-guess budget. Only reach for them when the pattern is nearly complete and you're choosing between specific options.
Game Info
FAQ
E — it appears in approximately 11% of English words and is the optimal opener for words 6 letters and longer. For 5-letter words, S is slightly more frequent. For very short words (3–4 letters), start with A.
Six — one for each part of the standard hangman figure: head, body, left arm, right arm, left leg, right leg.
Words with rare letters and few standard vowels: JAZZ (J and Z both rare), QUIZ (Q and Z, one vowel), RHYTHM (no standard vowels — Y acts as the only vowel), LYNX (Y as vowel, X at end), and GYPSY (Y appears twice as the only vowel). Short words with uncommon letters are disproportionately difficult because each wrong guess costs more when you have fewer letters to reveal.
For medium and long words (6+ letters), guessing common vowels early (E, A, I, O, U) is sound strategy — they appear in almost every word and reveal the skeleton quickly. For short words, vowels are less reliable because short words have a higher proportion of single-vowel or vowel-light constructions.
The earliest record of a similar game appears in Alice Bertha Gomme's 1894 collection of traditional British games. The gallows and hanging imagery became standard in schoolyard versions by the early 1900s, though origins are described as obscure by word-game historians.