Bird Silhouette Identification Game

How to play

1. Press Play today's Silhouette. You see a bird photo darkened to near-black with the colour stripped out.
2. Start typing a bird's name and pick from the suggestions. Your guess must be a species in our Birdedex.
3. Check the colour of your guess. Green is the right bird. Amber is the wrong bird from the right rarity tier. Grey is the wrong bird from a different tier.
4. Guess again. You have six guesses in total.
5. At the end the game names the bird and shows the full colour photo.

What the hints do

• After three wrong guesses: the rarity tier is revealed (Common, Uncommon, Rare or Epic) and the picture brightens a little.
• After five wrong guesses: the habitat is revealed and the picture brightens again, with a trace of colour.

A first-guess win earns 15 bonus points. After that it is 12, 10, 7, 5 and 3. Your first win unlocks the Silhouette solver badge, and the Share button copies a spoiler-free result to your clipboard.

How to identify birds by silhouette

Colour often fails in the field: at dusk, against a bright sky, at long range. Shape does not. Run through these seven checks and most British birds fall into a family before you see a feather.

• Size. Judge it against birds you know: House Sparrow, Blackbird, Wood Pigeon, Carrion Crow. "Bigger than a Blackbird, smaller than a pigeon" cuts the options fast.
• Shape. Compare head, body and tail. A Wren is a round ball with a short cocked tail. A Long-tailed Tit is a ball with a tail longer than its body. A Kingfisher is mostly head and bill.
• Posture. A Robin stands upright. A Pied Wagtail holds itself level and pumps its tail. A Grey Heron stands hunched with its neck drawn in.
• Bill. A Curlew has a long bill that curves down. An Avocet has a fine bill that curves up. A Hawfinch has a huge cone for cracking cherry stones.
• Tail. A Red Kite has a deep fork and twists it like a rudder. A Swallow trails two streamers. A Magpie has a long, wedge-shaped tail.
• Wing shape. A Swift is a narrow scythe. A Kestrel has pointed wings. A Sparrowhawk has short, broad, rounded wings and a long tail. A Buzzard has broad wings with fingered tips.
• Flight style. A Kestrel hovers on the spot. A Buzzard circles with its wings in a shallow V. A Sparrowhawk goes flap, flap, glide. A Great Spotted Woodpecker bounds along in deep dips.

Birds of prey are the classic silhouette ID problem, because you so often see them high overhead. Our UK raptors guide covers their shapes in more detail.

Tips for the daily quiz

• The picture is a darkened photo, not a cut-out. Find the outline against the background before you guess.
• Use your guesses to test rarity. Amber confirms the tier and grey rules it out.
• The pool leans towards familiar birds, so try the common answer before the scarce one.

When does the puzzle reset?

A new silhouette appears at midnight. For players in Britain that is midnight UK time: the game goes by the date on your device. Everyone gets the same silhouette on the same date. There is no archive, so a missed day is gone.