How the terms fit together
A daily flight is made of seven prompts. Each answer you give is matched against a list and receives a score from our fixed ratings, based on obviousness and word frequency. The score places the answer in a band with a verdict name, from Tarmac to Vacuum. Your seven scores add up to a total out of 700, which becomes an altitude. If you finish the flight on its own date, your streak grows. The percentile shows how your total compares with other players on that date, once enough people have played. Everything else is detail.
Altitude
Your total score shown as a height. 700 points is 100 km, the edge of space. The climb is curved, so the last stretch takes the most.
Archive
The list of past daily flights, free to play once per date. Archive flights never count towards a streak.
Assisted
A flight played with More time switched on. Shared results mark it as assisted.
Cloud break, Contrail, Jet stream, Updraft
Verdict names for answers in the middle and upper score bands. See the scoring page for the exact ranges.
Daily flight
The seven prompts everyone gets on the same date. The date changes at midnight US Eastern time.
Grounded
The result when the clock runs out before you answer. It scores zero.
Niche prompt
A prompt that needs specialist knowledge and is kept out of the daily and Unlimited modes.
Obviousness
Our estimate of how likely a person is to say an answer first for a prompt. It carries about three quarters of a score.
Percentile
The share of that date’s flights you beat, shown once enough flights have been counted.
Prompt
A question such as “Name a fruit”. A daily flight has seven.
Rarity
How unlikely an answer is, from our fixed ratings. It is never based on what other players typed.
Streak
The number of days in a row you finished the daily on its own date.
Summit
The one chosen answer for a prompt that is real, correct and almost never said. It scores exactly 100; every other answer is capped at 90.
Tarmac
The lowest verdict: the answer everyone says. It scores close to zero.
Twist
A prompt with an extra condition, such as “an orange fruit or vegetable”.
Unlimited
A mode of five random prompts per round, as many rounds as you like.
Vacuum
The top verdict, for answers scoring 90 or more: almost nobody says them.
Word frequency
How often a word appears in everyday writing, measured by the open-source wordfreq project. It carries about a quarter of a score for prompts where it makes sense.
If a term is missing, tell us and we will add it.