A word turns up with letters missing. Everyone fills the gaps on their own phone, and the ones who get there first take the most points.
It is the puzzle from the back of the newspaper, except now it is a race and there are eleven other people trying to beat you to it, whether they are next to you or two hundred miles away.
Hint: a feeling of intense happiness and well-being
What a player is looking at, mid-round.
What actually happens
Every phone shows the same gappy word and a box to type in: "F_NT_CH". The clock starts. Most of the room types FINTECH within three seconds. Somebody types FANTASH. Put the host view on a TV if you want the big-screen moment, or skip it entirely if you are on a call.
The three fastest correct answers bank 967, 921 and 884. A last-second save banks 528. Wrong guesses bank nothing. The next word is harder: "BL_ _CH_IN". The room thinks.
Five rounds in, the board has a plot. Marketing are running away with the pop culture set. Engineering are about to take it back on the technical one.
The rules
A word appears with one or more missing letters marked as '_'
Players see the word on their devices and type the missing letter(s)
Submit your answer before the countdown ends — speed matters!
Hints help you figure out the correct letter(s)
A live leaderboard tracks your score across all rounds
Be fast and accurate. Scoring is weighted by speed: instant answers score most, last-second saves score least, wrong answers score zero. The leaderboard updates after every round, and the highest total wins.
While you host
Once Missing letter is running, the scoring, the leaderboard, and the ending are handled. You get to be in the room instead of behind a spreadsheet.
Leaderboard
Round 6 of 10
Final podium
Engineering
8,240
Marketing
8,710
Ops
7,600
Final scores after ten rounds
A code goes on your screen. People point a camera at it, type a name, and they are in. No app, no accounts, no one asking what the wifi password is.
Answers are marked as they land and the board updates between rounds. You are not holding a clipboard, and nobody is arguing about who said it first.
Top three on the big screen at the end, and every player gets their own result card on their phone that they can save or send to the group chat.
The same session works with everyone around one table, everyone on a video call, or half and half. Nobody has to be in the right place to join in.
Where Missing letter shines
Onboarding
A People Ops lead builds a set from every acronym new joiners are expected to pick up, and runs it as the opening ten minutes of onboarding. By the end of the round the cohort has seen each one five times. It sticks in a way the internal wiki never manages.
Conference break
2:30pm on conference day. The session host runs Missing Letter built around the conference theme. Delegates who were quietly answering emails are now competing on the leaderboard, and the afternoon sessions get the attention the morning ones did not.
Classroom
A secondary school teacher builds a set from the term's vocabulary and plays it for the last fifteen minutes on a Friday. Students who never volunteer an answer are racing for the top of the board. The set gets saved and reused every Friday after that.
It already happened
Make it yours
The ready-made sets get you playing immediately. Writing your own is what makes a room lean in, and it takes about ten minutes in the Playground.
Blank out dishes, cocktails, and street names from around the corner. Locals get an edge and they come back for it.
The couple's names, the venue, the song for the first dance. It gives tables who do not know each other something to shout about.
This term's vocabulary, spelling list, or key terms. Fifteen minutes on a Friday and they will ask for it again.
Product names, feature names, competitor names. It is a surprisingly efficient way to get a new team fluent in the language.
How Missing Letter plays
Run a ready-made set with one tap. Build your own when the audience deserves something specific. Teams turn it into a huddle.
People point their camera at the code on your screen, type a name, and they are playing. Nothing to download, nothing to sign up for, and it works the same whether they are in the room with you or dialled in from three time zones away.
Best for: virtual sessions, hybrid offsites, and any crowd big enough that you want everyone answering at once.
Split the room into colour-coded teams. A team huddles, argues, and sends one answer. You can also let every member answer for their team if you would rather nobody sits out.
Best for: in-person offsites, weddings, and family gatherings, where you want people talking to each other instead of into their phones.
Open the Playground and type your own questions, or upload a spreadsheet of them. Your company's acronyms, the couple's first date, the group chat's running joke. Save the set and run it again whenever you need it.
Best for: facilitators, community managers, MCs, and brand teams who want the round to be about the people in the room.
Offline · Coming soon
For when you would rather nobody joined from a phone. Coming soon: a fastest-voice format you run from one device, and a one-team-at-a-time round where each team gets a word to crack before the next takes over.
Ready to run
Someone has already done the setup. Pick one, share the code, and you are hosting in a couple of minutes.
