How to play LinkedIn Pinpoint

LinkedIn Pinpoint feeds you words one after another — five at most — and every one of them fits the same hidden category. Your job is to name that category, and the fewer words you needed to see, the better you score. A single word is almost never enough to be sure, so each new reveal is a chance to narrow your guess.

That makes Pinpoint a game of nerve as much as of reasoning: guessing early scores well if you are right, and costs you an attempt if you are not. There is nothing to learn before your first puzzle, so if you enjoy word association, or the way a game of twenty questions narrows down, you will be at home here straight away.

The rules

1. Every puzzle has one category that all of its words belong to.
2. The words are revealed one at a time, up to five of them.
3. You may guess the category at any point, without waiting for the rest.
4. A wrong guess uses up one of your attempts.
5. The fewer words you needed, the better your score.

How a game goes, step by step

1. Read the first word as a hypothesis, not an answer. Dozens of categories could contain it, so note the two or three that come to mind and wait for the next one.
2. Take the second word and keep only the categories that fit both of them. This is usually where a wide field narrows to a handful.
3. Hold your guess until the second or third word unless you are certain. One word is too broad to pin anything down, and by the fifth the category is almost too obvious to enjoy.
4. When a new word looks unrelated to the others, treat that as the real clue. It usually means the category is narrower than your first instinct: a shared sound, a shared origin, or a subset of the idea you had in mind.
5. Commit as soon as one category explains every word you have seen, and phrase it as plainly as you can.

Three tips for your first games

• The third word tends to do the heavy lifting. If the first two could point anywhere, waiting for one more reveal costs you less than a wrong guess does.
• Say the words out loud. A category built on how words sound, or on a smaller word hiding inside each of them, is much easier to hear than to see.
• Read the words as clues rather than as a list. The question is never what one word means on its own, only what all of them have in common.

Ready for more? Read the Pinpoint strategy guide