What is Sutom?
Sutom is a free daily French word game, put online on 8 January 2022 by Jonathan Magano, who coded it live on his Twitch channel. The name is "Motus" spelled backwards: it brings to the web the rules of the TV game show that ran on the French channels Antenne 2 and then France 2 from 1990 to 2019, hosted by Thierry Beccaro.
English-speaking readers may know the format under another name: Motus was the French adaptation of the American show Lingo. The idea is simple: a French word to find in six tries, with the first letter given. Sutom's words are at least six letters long. A letter in the right spot turns red, a letter present elsewhere is circled in yellow, and an absent letter stays on blue, just like on TV.
Why French speakers love it
Sutom arrived a few weeks after Wordle took off, just as French speakers were looking for an equivalent in their own language. It won that audience for three reasons:
- The Motus heritage: the colour code, the free first letter and the long words speak to generations of TV viewers.
- The French language: you play with your own vocabulary, its double consonants and its word endings, not an English dictionary.
- The shared ritual: one word a day, the same for everyone, with results you can share without spoiling anything.
The games below keep these ingredients, each in its own way. None of them is a copy of Sutom: they are SIWA games that share part of its mechanics.
Comparison: what each SIWA game shares with Sutom
| SIWA game | In common with Sutom | What changes |
|---|---|---|
| Tusmo | Daily word, 6 tries, first letter given | 5 to 8 letters, green and orange |
| Prefixo | Words built from imposed letters | Five words, one shared prefix, definitions |
| Motamo | First letter given, French words | A chain of five words from definitions |
| Decrypto | Right spot, wrong spot or absent | A 5-digit code, no vocabulary |
Tusmo: the closest thing to Sutom
Tusmo follows the loop you already know. The word of the day comes with its length, from 5 to 8 letters, and its first letter. Each guess must have the right length and start with that letter, then every letter is marked: green in the right spot, orange if it is elsewhere in the word, grey if it is absent.
A few differences matter to a Sutom regular. Words can be 5 letters long, whereas Sutom starts at 6. The keyboard has no accents: É, È or Ê are typed as a plain E. Green letters stay locked from one guess to the next, so you can focus on the empty slots.
Above all, a game is never lost halfway. Six tries count towards your score; after that, you choose between carrying on in free play, without points, or revealing the word. A joker also reveals a letter when you are stuck, at the cost of a few points.
For variety: Prefixo, Motamo and Decrypto
Prefixo keeps the idea of a word that starts from known letters. A prefix appears (RE, SUR, ANTI or simply the start of a word) with five short definitions. Behind each one hides a French word that begins with those letters, and you know its length. A wrong guess shows which letters are already in the right spot.
Motamo also starts from a first letter. Five definitions describe five French words that form a chain: each word starts with the last letter of the previous one. It is a vocabulary game closer to crosswords, where every link you find gives you the first letter of the next.
Decrypto keeps Sutom's colour feedback, but with digits. The secret code has 5 digits from 0 to 9, repeats allowed, and each position is marked right spot, wrong spot or absent. Six tries count towards the score, then free play takes over, as in Tusmo. No French is needed here.
If you also play Wordle, our roundup of games like Wordle covers other variations from the same family, from colour feedback to semantic proximity.
A daily word routine
All these games switch to a new grid at midnight, in your local time, and give everyone the same grid that day. The daily leaderboard is therefore a fair comparison, much like the Sutom results people share with friends.
Today's grid needs no account. A free account keeps your streaks and opens the archives so you can catch up on a missed game. A simple routine: Tusmo to warm up your Motus reflexes, then Prefixo or Motamo for vocabulary, and Decrypto to finish with a bit of logic.