🪜 Word Ladder

Find the shortest path between two words, changing one letter at a time.

Try these popular pairs:

COLD → WARMHEAD → TAILLOVE → HATELEAD → GOLDBLACK → WHITECAT → DOG

How Word Ladders Work

  1. Enter a start word and an end word of the same length
  2. The solver finds the shortest path changing one letter at a time
  3. Every intermediate step must be a valid dictionary word
  4. Changed letters are highlighted in green at each step

About Word Ladders

Word ladders (also called doublets) were invented by Lewis Carroll in 1877. The goal is to transform one word into another by changing a single letter at each step, where every intermediate word must be a valid word. For example: CAT → COT → COG → DOG.