Medium Just Launched a Game, and the Product Thinking Is Better Than the Puzzle

Inside Good Words, the new beta feature turning Medium’s sidebar into a shared word game, plus a few tips to actually score well.

I logged into Medium this week and found something new in the sidebar. A tab called Games, with a yellow “Beta!” tag next to it.

A writing platform. With a games tab. So here is my take on it, and on the one game inside it right now.

What it actually is?

The game is called Good Words. It’s basically Boggle, built for Medium’s crowd.

You get a 5x5 grid of letters. Build words by joining letters that touch each other, even diagonally. Every word needs at least four letters, and you can’t reuse the same letter twice in one word. A “Qu” tile stands in for both letters.

You can tap the tiles, or just type the word. Type it, and the matching letters light up green on the board as you go, so you can see your path.

Stuck? Hit the space bar and the whole board spins a quarter turn. Small trick, but it genuinely helps you spot words you were missing.

Each round runs for three minutes. After that, there’s a short break where Medium shows you the definitions of good words you missed. The dictionary and word list are both open source, so this cost Medium almost nothing to build.

The scoring rewards patience, not speed

Here’s the interesting bit. The points aren’t linear:

• 4 letters: 1 point
• 5 letters: 2 points
• 6 letters: 4 points
• 7 letters: 8 points
• 8 letters: 15 points
• 9 letters: 25 points
• 10 letters: 40 points
• 11+ letters: 60 points

In my first round, I found “fang.” Four letters, one point. The whole time, there was a clue sitting below the board: a seven letter word for “the age between 40 and 50,” worth 8 points on its own. One good long word beats eight short ones put together.

That’s on purpose. It nudges you to slow down and actually look at the board, instead of tapping out every tiny word you can find.

5 tips if you want to actually score well

1. Ignore the short, easy words at first. Scan the whole board for one long word before you touch anything.
2. Look for common prefixes and suffixes, like ING, ER, RE, or UN. They often unlock a longer word hiding in plain sight.
3. Use the space bar to rotate the board once or twice. Your eyes get used to one angle fast, and a fresh angle reveals words you skipped.
4. Read the bonus clue early. It tells you the word length and the meaning, which narrows down what you’re hunting for.
5. Play the full three minutes. Most people stop scanning too early, right when the longer words start showing up.

Everyone plays the same board, together

Here’s what surprised me. It’s not a solo puzzle with a leaderboard bolted on. A new board goes live every three and a half minutes, and everyone on that page at that moment plays the exact same board as you. You’ll see a few small avatars up top and a live count, something like “4 people here.”

The leaderboard updates as people find words, and you can flip it between “This round” and “Last 24 hours.” Your own name gets highlighted, so you can always find yourself without scrolling.

You’re not playing against friends. You’re playing against whoever happens to be online with you right then. Lower pressure, and a much bigger pool of people to show up in.

Why Medium is doing this?

Publishers have been adding games for a couple of years now. The New York Times has said readers who play games stick around as subscribers longer than readers who only read articles. Time launched its own Games section this year. The logic is simple: articles bring people in, games bring them back daily.

I design point systems and leaderboards for a living, for a health app, so I notice things like this. What stands out isn’t the puzzle itself. Boggle clones are everywhere. It’s the pacing. Three minutes of play, then a short break. That small win now, bigger win later pattern is the same one behind Duolingo streaks.

Medium’s real bet isn’t “people like word games.” It’s “five minutes a day builds a habit,” even on days you have nothing to write and nothing new to read.

If Good Words works, expect more games to follow. A leaderboard was never really about the game. It’s about whether you come back tomorrow.

If this was useful, follow me here on Medium for more like it, and find me on LinkedIn and X for the shorter takes in between.

Medium Just Launched a Game, and the Product Thinking Is Better Than the Puzzle was originally published in Bootcamp on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.