How to play
- Read the wordOne everyday noun appears. It waits for your answer.
- SEEN or NEWPress SEEN if it appeared earlier this run, NEW if it is the first time.
- Right call, one pointEach correct call scores a point and brings the next word.
- Three strikesA wrong call costs a strike, not points. The third strike ends the run.
What this test measures
You make one call per word. Has it appeared earlier in this run, or not? There is no timer, so the score measures judgment, not speed.
Psychologists call this recognition memory. It means deciding whether something in front of you matches something you already stored. That is a different job from recall, because you never have to come up with a word from nothing.
That is why the first minutes of a run feel almost insultingly easy. It gets hard later, and it happens in every run.
It is not a vocabulary test. We kept the pool to 200 everyday nouns on purpose. A word that sends you to a dictionary would start measuring your reading instead of your memory.
What counts as a good score
The badge on your result follows this table. No published norm exists for this task, so the table is a rough scale. We based it on the scores this format usually produces.
| Correct calls | Badge | What it means |
|---|---|---|
| 120 or more | Superhuman | The words ran out of ways to fool you. |
| 80-119 | Pro tier | The pile of past words never got to you. |
| 45-79 | Skilled | Confident calls deep into the pile. A strong run. |
| 18-44 | Standard | You held on until the words started to blur together. |
| 17 or fewer | Needs practice | If every word looked familiar, that is the trap working. |
Real scores recorded on this site
So far, 152 runs of this test have been recorded here. Computers and phones score quite differently, so each gets its own table.
Computer (mouse)
| Range | Share |
|---|---|
| 120 or more · Superhuman | |
| 80-119 · Pro tier | |
| 45-79 · Skilled | |
| 18-44 · Standard | |
| 17 or fewer · Needs practice |
Phone (touch)
| Range | Share |
|---|---|
| 120 or more · Superhuman | |
| 80-119 · Pro tier | |
| 45-79 · Skilled | |
| 18-44 · Standard | |
| 17 or fewer · Needs practice |
Every finished run counts, so someone who plays five times adds five runs. The numbers are recounted every day, and a device table shows up once it passes 30 runs. Last updated: 2 Nov 2026.
Why the words start to blur
The trap in this test is not forgetting. It is remembering too much. By the fiftieth word your head holds a long pile of everyday nouns, and every new word has to be checked against all of it.
Similar items in memory compete with each other. Researchers call this interference, and this test is built almost entirely out of it.
That is why the pool is plain on purpose: kitchen things, weather, fruit. Common words have plenty of look-alikes. "Did I see spoon, or was that fork?" is the exact moment the test is designed to create.
Around four in ten words are repeats, drawn from anywhere in your run. The word from two screens ago and the one from three minutes back are equally likely. The same word never appears twice in a row, because that would test nothing.
The rules that keep the score honest
Your score is the number of correct calls before the third strike. That is the whole formula. Nothing is weighted and nothing decays, so one slip late in a long run does not erase it. Your personal records stay in this browser, and the leaderboard asks only for a nickname.
Which word repeats, and when, is shuffled fresh each run and decided at random as you go. So you cannot memorize a pattern. In the Daily challenge everyone gets the same order, so scores are compared on the same run.
Two ways to be wrong
The scoreboard counts every miss the same, but inside a run the two mistakes feel very different.
Calling a new word SEEN is a false alarm, and it is interference at work. The word looks like the crowd already in your head, and the feeling of familiarity turns out to be easy to fake.
Calling a repeat NEW usually happens with a word that slid past on its first visit, while your attention was still on the previous call.
Notice which mistake you make more often, and you know what to fix. Each tip below targets one of them.
What actually raises the score
Make first visits vivid
Stop trying to hold the whole list. When a word first appears, picture the umbrella or put the carrot somewhere silly.
Pause on new words
If you keep calling repeats NEW, your first impressions are too thin. Give each new word half a second of real attention.
Distrust the glow
If you keep calling new words SEEN, you trust familiarity too much. Before pressing SEEN, check that you can remember when you saw it.
Do not guess patterns
The repeat schedule is random and owes you nothing. Thinking "a repeat must be due" is not a strategy. Judge each word on its own.
All tests
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- Number Memory TestA number flashes, then you type it back. One digit longer each round.
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- Visual Memory TestSquares flash all at once. Find every one, in any order.
- Chimp TestNumbers flash, then hide. Click them in order.
- Verbal Memory TestWords appear one at a time. Call each one SEEN or NEW.
- Color Match TestOne tile is a slightly different shade. The gap shrinks every level.
- Focus TestFind 1 to 25 on a scrambled grid, in order, as fast as you can.
- Stroop TestPick the color of the ink, not the word it spells.
- 10 Second ChallengeThe clock hides after 3 seconds. Stop it at exactly 10.00.
- Typing Speed TestCopy the sentence for 30 seconds. Only correct letters count.
- F1 Reaction TestGo the instant the five red lights go out, like a real Formula 1 start.