How to Play Word Ladder

By Jaques of London · Est. 1795 · Updated 2026-08-17

Word Ladder is a pen-and-paper word puzzle in which players move from one word to another by altering a single letter at each step, with every intermediate word needing to be a genuine, correctly spelled word. The start and target words are the same length, and the challenge is to find the shortest possible chain between them.

People return to it because the rules take ten seconds to explain yet a well-chosen pair of words can occupy a sharp mind for a long while. It needs nothing beyond paper and a pen, making it a natural choice for journeys, waiting rooms, or a quiet evening at the kitchen table.

A little history

Word Ladder is widely documented as the invention of Lewis Carroll, who called it Doublets and published the puzzle in the magazine Vanity Fair in 1879. Carroll devised it on Christmas Day 1877, according to his own diary, as an amusement for two young girls. The name Word Ladder came into common use later and is now the more familiar term, though the rules Carroll set down remain essentially unchanged.

Setting up

1. Each player takes a sheet of paper and a pen or pencil.
2. Agree on a word length to use throughout the session. Four or five letters suits most players; three letters is easier, six or more is demanding.
3. One player (or an agreed referee) selects the start word and the target word, both of the chosen length, and announces them to all players.
4. Both words are written at the top of each player's sheet: the start word on the left and the target word on the right.
5. Set a time limit if desired, for example ten minutes per puzzle, or agree to play without a clock.

How to play

1. Write the start word on your paper. This is the first rung of your ladder.
2. On the next line, write a new word that differs from the word above by exactly one letter. That one letter may be changed to any other letter; you may not add a letter, remove a letter, or rearrange letters.
3. The new word must be a real word in standard use. Proper nouns, abbreviations, and hyphenated words are not permitted unless players agree otherwise before the puzzle begins.
4. Continue writing new words, one per line, each differing from the line above by exactly one letter, working towards the target word.
5. The ladder is complete when you write the target word as a valid one-letter change from the line above it.
6. In a two-player game, both players work simultaneously and independently on their own sheets. Neither player may look at the other's ladder until both have finished or time is called.
7. When you complete the ladder, call out so the other player knows you have finished. Both players then reveal and verify their ladders.
8. Verification: read each step aloud, confirm that each word is real and that exactly one letter changed. If a step is found to be invalid, that ladder is disqualified or the player must correct it and their step count is adjusted accordingly, as agreed before play.

Winning and scoring

The player who completes a valid ladder in the fewest steps wins the puzzle. A step is counted as each word written below the start word, including the target word itself. If both players reach the same step count, the puzzle is a draw. Over a session of several puzzles, keep a running tally: one point per puzzle won, half a point each for a draw. The player with the most points at the end of the session wins overall. In solo play, the aim is simply to complete each puzzle in as few steps as possible and to better your own previous score on the same pair of words.

The fine points

The most common dispute is whether a word is valid. The standard ruling is that any word found in a major general dictionary counts, and players should agree which dictionary acts as arbiter before the first puzzle starts. Slang, dialect words, and archaic terms are excluded unless specifically permitted. If a disputed word appears in the agreed dictionary, it stands.

A subtler edge case arises when a player's ladder contains a valid step sequence but the final word is one step too early or late, meaning the target word was not actually reached. This disqualifies the ladder entirely; a ladder must end on the exact target word as a single-letter change from the preceding word. Reaching a near-synonym or a word that sounds like the target is not sufficient.

How to win more often

• Work from both ends at once: sketch possible words leading away from the start and possible words that could precede the target, then look for a meeting point in the middle.
• Identify bottleneck letters early. If the start word contains an unusual letter that does not appear in the target, plan how to replace it before it traps you.
• Favour common vowel-rich words in the middle of your ladder as they offer more single-letter options for your next step.
• Avoid changing letters back to an earlier state. Cycling wastes steps and rarely helps; if you find yourself reversing a previous change, back up and try a different path.
• With four-letter words, the theoretical minimum for many classic pairs is four to six steps. If your ladder is growing much longer, restart from the target and work backwards to find a shorter route.

Variations

Timed Race

Both players race to be the first to complete any valid ladder, regardless of step count. Speed is rewarded rather than efficiency. This suits players who find the optimisation aspect frustrating and prefer a livelier game.

Collaborative Ladder

Players work together on a single shared sheet, alternating who writes each step. Both must agree that a proposed word is valid before it is written down. The shared aim is to reach the target in the fewest combined steps. This version plays well with a mixed age group.

Letter Addition and Removal

A more demanding variant allows players to add or remove one letter at each step as well as swapping one, provided the result is a real word. This opens up routes between words of different lengths and considerably increases the complexity of the puzzle. Agree a maximum word length to prevent ladders from growing unwieldy.

Referee Mode

A third person acts as puzzle setter and referee for two competing players. The referee chooses pairs of words graded by difficulty, verifies all disputed steps using the agreed dictionary, and awards points across a set of five or ten puzzles. This works well in a classroom or family setting where one person wants to observe rather than compete.

Word Ladder: frequently asked questions