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Oxford Word of the Year

Order by the year Oxford named each one its Word of the Year. You place all 28 cards on one timeline, one at a time. You start with three lives, and ten right in a row wins a lost one back.

Oxford Word of the Year
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Order by the year Oxford named each one its Word of the Year. Drag or tap it onto the line
Word of the Year
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Word of the Year
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28
Cards
3
Lives per run
release years and dates
Ordered by
Cards only
Card reveal

How the Oxford Word of the Year timeline game works

Each card is a word or phrase that Oxford's dictionary team picked as its Word of the Year, and you order them by the year it won. Under the word you get a brief definition, which is handy if the term has faded from use. The timeline opens with one winner in place and its year showing. Slot each new word into the gap where you think it fits. Guess right and the year is shown; guess wrong and the word moves to its true year, but you're a life down from your three.

The picks track what people were talking about: money worries, climate, politics, internet slang and a single emoji. In the early years Oxford often chose separate winners for Britain and America, so some pairs land side by side. British slang and catchphrases can be hard to place if you didn't grow up with them. Words for technology are the real trap, because the thing itself may feel old while its name only got the honor later.

Want a longer game? On the deck tree you can tick this deck alongside any other one measured in release years and dates, and they shuffle into a single timeline together.

What's in the deck

Here are 28 of the 28 cards you might be dealt. Their values stay hidden until you place them.

  • chav British slang for a brash, loutish young person
  • sudoku Number-placement logic puzzle
  • podcast Downloadable audio show
  • bovvered Slang for bothered, from a comedy catchphrase
  • carbon-neutral Offsetting all the carbon you emit
  • carbon footprint Total greenhouse gases a person or thing produces
  • locavore Someone who eats locally grown food
  • credit crunch Sudden shortage of bank lending
  • hypermiling Driving to squeeze out the best fuel economy
  • simples Meerkat ad catchphrase meaning easy
  • unfriend Remove someone from your social network friends
  • big society Political idea of handing power to communities
  • refudiate Sarah Palin's blend of refute and repudiate
  • squeezed middle Middle earners hit by rising costs and cuts
  • omnishambles A situation mismanaged in every possible way
  • GIF Looping animated image, also used as a verb
  • selfie Photo you take of yourself
  • vape Inhale from an electronic cigarette
  • 😂 Face with Tears of Joy An emoji, laughing so hard it cries
  • post-truth When feelings outweigh facts in shaping opinion
  • youthquake Big change driven by young people
  • toxic Poisonous, stretched to workplaces and relationships
  • climate emergency Urgent action needed to halt climate change
  • vax Short for vaccine or vaccination
  • goblin mode Unapologetically lazy, slovenly behavior
  • rizz Charm, the knack for attracting a partner
  • brain rot Mental fog from too much trivial online content
  • rage bait Online content made to provoke anger

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