← Back to today’s gamePUZZLE #214 · MAR 16, 2026

TICK to POOP.

5 moves. 11 equally short routes. Here is one way through.

  1. STARTtickYour starting word
  2. 01hickT → H
  3. 02hockI → O
  4. 03hookC → O
  5. 04hoopK → P
  6. 05poopH → P · Made it!

The first move matters.

TICK has 13 valid one-letter neighbors in this dictionary. 3 of them can begin a shortest path:

HICKLICKTOCK

Each of these leaves 4 moves to POOP. The other 10 neighbors are valid moves too, but cannot reach the target in the minimum from this starting word.

Follow the changes

The highlighted letter beside each step shows exactly which position changed. This historical solution uses the original puzzle’s dictionary and minimum move count. Other shortest routes can take different intermediate words.

Explore more past puzzles →
Explore shortest alternatives (11 total)

Showing 11 of 11 paths.

TICK → HICK → HOCK → HOOK → HOOP → POOP

TICK → LICK → LOCK → LOOK → LOOP → POOP

TICK → TOCK → BOCK → BOOK → BOOP → POOP

TICK → TOCK → COCK → COOK → COOP → POOP

TICK → TOCK → HOCK → HOOK → HOOP → POOP

TICK → TOCK → LOCK → LOOK → LOOP → POOP

TICK → TOCK → TOOK → BOOK → BOOP → POOP

TICK → TOCK → TOOK → COOK → COOP → POOP

TICK → TOCK → TOOK → HOOK → HOOP → POOP

TICK → TOCK → TOOK → LOOK → LOOP → POOP

TICK → TOCK → TOOK → TOOL → POOL → POOP