JetPunk Word Search Puzzle Statistics - Updated to June 2022!
First published: Sunday June 12th, 2022
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Introduction
Time flies, and another month has passed since the last statistics blog! In this blog, I will share with you the latest word and letter stats for the puzzles in JetPunk's newest minigame, Daily Word Search, updated to June 12, 2022! Without further ado, let's get started!
Part 1: Word Stats
1. Overview
✓ From March 1 (#29) to June 12 (#132), there were 1,884 total words in all grids. There are now 18.1 words in the average grid, a slight increase from last month.
✓ The largest puzzles so far were puzzles #41 (Sun, Mar 13), #120 (Tue, May 31), and #132 (Sun, Jun 12), all with 30 words. Meanwhile, puzzle #89 (Sat, Apr 30) managed to remain as the smallest word search puzzle, with just 10 words.
✓ Overall, Sundays' puzzles had the most words (21.1 in average grid, up from 19.2 last month), whereas Mondays' puzzles had the fewest words (13.7 in average grid, a tiny increase compared to last month). These two days have been on opposite sides of the spectrum since April and will likely remain so in the future.
✓ For Saturdays (since April 9), the following countries have appeared at least three times: Italy (6), India (5), Oman (5), Ghana (4), Laos (4), Chile (3), Estonia (3), Iraq (3), Ireland (3), Mali (3), Samoa (3).
2. Highest & Lowest
As always, let's start with a list of the top 5 puzzles with the most and fewest words:
# | Puzzle | Day | Words |
---|---|---|---|
1 | 41 | Sunday | 30 |
1 | 120 | Tuesday | 30 |
1 | 132 | Sunday | 30 |
4 | 36 | Tuesday | 28 |
4 | 128 | Wednesday | 28 |
# | Puzzle | Day | Words |
---|---|---|---|
1 | 89 | Saturday | 10 |
2 | 6-way tie (42, 53, 56, 66, 105, 126) | 11 |
3. Average Words per Grid by Weekday
The following table summarizes the average number of words per grid for each weekday, as well as how they compare with last month:
Day | Avg. words/grid | Change |
---|---|---|
Monday | 13.7 | +0.1 |
Tuesday | 20.1 | +1.2 |
Wednesday | 19.5 | +1.0 |
Thursday | 17.2 | -1.2 |
Friday | 18.5 | 0.0 |
Saturday | 16.3 | -0.9 |
Sunday | 21.1 | +1.9 |
4. Measures of Spread
Now let's take a look at the variance (a measure of how spread out the data are) of the number of words in each weekday's puzzles, as well as how they compare with last month:
Day | Variance | Change |
---|---|---|
Monday | 12.3 | -2.6 |
Tuesday | 22.6 | +5.3 |
Wednesday | 17.8 | +2.3 |
Thursday | 14.0 | 0.0 |
Friday | 15.6 | -2.5 |
Saturday | 12.0 | -2.2 |
Sunday | 22.5 | +3.3 |
As you can see, Tuesdays' and Sundays' puzzles are now the most unpredictable ones in terms of the number of words in the grids, whereas Saturdays' puzzles are the most consistent.
Part 2: Letter Stats
0. Caveats
Before we dive into the stats for the letters, let me point out a few things:
- These data are for letters in the words, not the grids.
- Only words from April 9 onwards are included since that's when I started collecting data.
- For Sundays, the actual words are used instead of the clues.
1. Overview
✓ From April 9 (#68) to June 12 (#132), there were 1,168 total words in all puzzles (excluding the numbers in puzzle #81) made up of 7,193 individual letters. The average word length now stands at approximately 6.16 letters (only dropped slightly compared to last month), and there are now about 112.4 letters per puzzle (slightly increased from last month).
✓ Overall, Tuesdays' puzzles had the most letters in them (132.56 in average puzzle). Fridays' puzzles are now ranked second with a tiny gap of less than 0.1 letters, at 132.50 letters per puzzle. Mondays' puzzles, as always, had the fewest letters in them (72 in average puzzle).
✓ The puzzle with the most letters was puzzle #120 (Tue, May 31), with an amazing 209 letters! Meanwhile, the puzzle with the fewest letters was puzzle #126 (Mon, Jun 6), with just 53 letters (excluding puzzle #81, which was all numbers). Puzzle #89, which had just one more letter than #126, is now the second smallest puzzle in terms of the number of letters.
✓ The letters A and E have continued to dominate the word searches. Since April 9, they have appeared 877 and 756 times respectively. Just these two letters alone have accounted for nearly a quarter (or 22.7%, to be precise) of all letters in the puzzles' words!
2. Average Letters per Puzzle by Weekday
The following table summarizes the average number of letters per puzzle for each weekday, as well as how they compare with last month:
Day | Avg. letters/puzzle | Change |
---|---|---|
Monday | 72 | -1 |
Tuesday | 133 | +16 |
Wednesday | 106 | +16 |
Thursday | 122 | -23 |
Friday | 133 | -16 |
Saturday | 98 | -7 |
Sunday | 126 | +25 |
3. Table of Letter Occurrences and Percentages
The following is a detailed table summarizing the number of occurrences of each letter, as well as the percentage that each letter accounts for:
Letter | Occurrences | % of Total |
---|---|---|
A | 877 | 12.19 |
B | 156 | 2.17 |
C | 250 | 3.48 |
D | 260 | 3.61 |
E | 756 | 10.51 |
F | 70 | 0.97 |
G | 187 | 2.60 |
H | 189 | 2.63 |
I | 564 | 7.84 |
J | 25 | 0.35 |
K | 95 | 1.32 |
L | 399 | 5.55 |
M | 234 | 3.25 |
N | 525 | 7.30 |
O | 447 | 6.21 |
P | 173 | 2.41 |
Q | 15 | 0.21 |
R | 537 | 7.47 |
S | 491 | 6.83 |
T | 388 | 5.39 |
U | 252 | 3.50 |
V | 77 | 1.07 |
W | 91 | 1.27 |
X | 14 | 0.19 |
Y | 91 | 1.27 |
Z | 30 | 0.42 |
Total | 7,193 | 100.00 |
I didn't pay attention to the time I used, but I think an hour is probably enough to collect all these data, and I very much enjoyed the process.