List of categories

Over its history, Wheel of Fortune has used a great variety of categories for its puzzles. According to the rule sheet from the first board game in 1975, the first eight categories were Event, Fictional Character, Landmark, Person, Phrase, Place, Thing and Title; an old version of the show's website said that Wheel began with just six. The former's lack of plural forms suggests that they were not used in the earliest days, although Things and People were used in the Second Edition.

Not counting plural forms, there are currently 39 categories, and two others that are possibly retired.

Current Categories

 * Around the House: Introduced on September 6, 1999 as a more specific subset of Thing. For its first season of use, its category strip had a drawing of a house.
 * Before & After: Introduced on February 27, 1989. Consists of two phrases, names, etc. combined by a word that ends the first and starts the second (e.g., WHEEL OF FORTUNE COOKIE, which combines "Wheel of Fortune" and "fortune cookie"). Perhaps to make the answer structure more obvious, most Before & After puzzles in the late 2000s have the connecting word on its own line if possible.
 * College Life: Introduced on October 24, 2005 and used only during College Weeks, resulting in extremely sporadic usage.
 * Event(s): Often includes an -ING ending, much like What Are You Doing? (see below), which is essentially a subset of this category. Some early-1990s puzzles stretched the definition, most notably UNDER HOUSE ARREST and SLIPPED ON A BANANA PEEL which are more logically Phrase instead of Event (although SLIPPING ON A BANANA PEEL would fit). The stretching continued in the 2000s, by which nearly any gerund (e.g., SCRUBBING, FROWNING, and SINGING OFF-KEY) was called Event.
 * Family: Introduced by December 22, 1989 (Family Week), although Pat Sajak's comments suggest it debuted earlier that week. The puzzle is the name of two or more famous people who are closely related, or rarely the name of a well-known family (e.g., THE NEVILLE BROTHERS).
 * Fictional Character(s): A self-explanatory category, believed to be one of the original six.
 * Fictional Family: Introduced on November 30, 2007 as a subset of the above two. Probably the rarest non-plural category, to the point where Pat joked on October 27, 2011 that it had been used just eight times, only to be told after the Bonus Round that he was right.
 * Fictional Place: A subset of Place, known to have been used since at least May 30, 1995. Despite its longevity, it has been very rarely used.
 * Fun & Games: Introduced on September 6, 2004. The first known category to be introduced in a Toss-Up.
 * Food & Drink: Introduced on September 10, 2003 as On the Menu, and renamed on September 11, 2006 (the Season 24 premiere) most likely to be all-inclusive for foods and drinks that would not necessarily be found on a restaurant menu. Some food-and-drink puzzles in Seasons 21-23 were categorized as Thing or Around the House, or shoehorned into On the Menu (most egregiously BIG GULP on October 25, 2005).
 * Headline: Apparently introduced in Season 14, and very rarely used. Until September 2000, its category strip had a drawing of a rolled-up newspaper.
 * Husband & Wife: Introduced in Season 7, sometime between September 11 and December 15, 1989. Initially, it spelled out the word AND even though the show had begun using ampersands.
 * In the Kitchen: Introduced on September 27, 2005 as a subset of Around the House, albeit very rarely used since Season 27.
 * Landmark: Used for specific buildings, monuments, and other man-made structures. Despite being an original category, it is used rarely enough that Pat often mentions how rarely it is used.
 * Living Thing(s): Introduced on March 14, 2001. The category includes animals, plants, etc.
 * Movie Quote and TV Quote: Subsets of Quotation. Debuted on September 29 and October 3, 2011, respectively, although no mention was made on either episode of these being new categories.
 * Occupation(s): Known to have been used since at least March 27, 1979.
 * On the Map: Introduced on April 14, 1999 as a more specific subset of Place.
 * Person and People: Until the introduction of Proper Name in Season 14, proper names of famous people were included in this category. Previously, contestants were reminded by the host that "'Person/People' does not always mean 'proper name(s)'", something that Pat often forgot to do.
 * Phrase: Known to be one of the original six, and possibly the most frequent category.
 * Place(s): Until the introduction of On the Map in Season 17, specific geographical locations were included in this category.
 * Proper Name(s): Apparently introduced on September 6, 1996. May also refer to the name of a sports team, college, or (far more rarely) business.
 * Quotation: Known to have been used since at least March 15, 1978. From 1992-96, players received a $1,000 bonus for identifying the work (play, book, etc.) that provided the quotation; the question was originally signaled by four low-pitched beeps and asked by Charlie O'Donnell, but by September 1995 Pat asked the question and the "$3,000 bonus" (see below) chimes were used.
 * Rhyme Time: Introduced in September 1998. The puzzle is a phrase with a rhyme in it, or far less commonly, a single word with rhyming syllables (such as HODGEPODGE).
 * Same Letter: Introduced on September 15, 2010. At least three Same Letter answers have had ampersands in them.
 * Same Name: Introduced on September 6, 1988. This puzzle includes two names, phrases, etc. that end in the same word (e.g., ARETHA & BENJAMIN FRANKLIN or SEWING & SLOT MACHINE). From about 1992-96, it sometimes used three "names" (e.g., SEWING SLOT & VENDING MACHINE). Originally, AND was spelled out, but after nearly every contestant called N-D-A first, the word was replaced by an ampersand on July 18, 1989. Starting in the late 2000s, Same Name sporadically reverts to spelling AND, although there does not seem to be any sort of pattern.
 * Show Biz: Introduced in September or October 1996 (definitely by October 7) and, until September 2000, its category strip included a drawing of two crossed spotlight beams. For the week of November 12, 2007, the category was temporarily renamed for People magazine with that magazine's logo used in the category strip, and the puzzles themselves had to do with articles found in the magazine.
 * Song/Artist: Originally Artist/Song, and known to have been used since at least April 26, 1993. The current form (e.g., LIVE LIKE YOU WERE DYING BY TIM MCGRAW) debuted by April 30, 1996, although the show alternated between the two until December 30, 2008 before settling on Song/Artist.
 * Song Lyrics: Introduced in the early 2000s, probably Season 19.
 * Star & Role: Introduced on July 17, 1989 (Bob Goen's first daytime episode) as Person/Fictional Character, the puzzle lists an actor/actress and a character they are known for portraying (e.g., BILL COSBY AS CLIFF HUXTABLE); this may also include celebrity voice-acting roles. The original name was only used for three months, with the rename on October 16. It was most likely renamed to make it inclusive for actors/actresses portraying real-life people, as the nighttime puzzle GEORGE C SCOTT AS PATTON was categorized as People shortly before the category was renamed.
 * Thing(s): Possibly the category that has been split up the most. Around the House, Food & Drink, In the Kitchen, and Living Thing are all unarguable subsets.
 * Title: Three specific subsets (Movie Title, Song Title, and TV Title) were introduced in Season 23 ("TV" on September 12, "Movie" on September 19, "Song" on October 13). As a result, Title itself has become increasingly sporadic. On rare occasions, TV Title refers to a network instead of a TV show. Interestingly, there are only two known instances of any form of Title being pluralized.
 * Title/Author: (e.g., THE PEARL BY JOHN STEINBECK) A subset of Title, known to have been used since at least October 28, 1991 although Pat's comments there suggest it being introduced in Season 8. Similarly to Song/Artist, this was sometimes inverted as Author/Title from at least March 4, 1996 through February 25, 2008; since then, only Title/Author has been used. In both this category and Song/Artist, Pat reads the slash as "and".
 * What Are You Doing?: Introduced on September 12, 2007 and guarantees that an -ING ending will be somewhere in the answer, although three puzzles in mid-Season 26 did not have one, as did a fourth in Season 29. The category was most likely created to prevent oddities, as several Event(s) puzzles in the 2000s had considerably stretched the definition.
 * What's That Song?: Introduced on September 16, 2010, it was only used four times in Season 28 and once in Season 29. The puzzle is a song lyric, and a $3,000 bonus (see below) is awarded for identifying the song's title.

Possibly-Retired Categories
Categories that were believed to have been retired, only to appear (possibly as a fluke) sometime later.


 * Best Seller: Introduced on September 8, 2004 and very rarely used. Its last two uses were February 8, 2007 and April 22, 2011.
 * Classic TV: Introduced in Season 14, and until September 2000 used a drawing of a console TV on its category strip. Although usually used for classic TV shows, it may also refer to characters or events from them (and in the late 1990s, sometimes used the format of Star & Role). Its last two uses were May 6, 2008 and April 2, 2010; further, the December 8, 2008 show had THE GOLDEN GIRLS categorized as TV Title, suggesting a movement to retire Classic TV.

Video Game Categories

 * Around 2002, the show's online game used Chain Reaction, based on the Bob Stewart series of the same name. Puzzles used four terms, one on each line, and the terms connected with the one above and/or below (e.g., CORDLESS TELEPHONE LINE SEGMENT).
 * The Wii, DS, and Facebook versions use Classic Movies. They also use Book Title instead of Best Seller, and inconsistently refer to TV Title as TV Show Title.

Retired Categories

 * The 20's through The 90's: Introduced in Season 10, and definitely by October 26, 1992, these puzzles included things and events related to the decade in question. For about their first season of use, the "decade" categories were followed by a $1,000 trivia question (asked by Charlie) related to the decade in question. Also, until the category strips were changed in September 1995, the names were written out as words instead of numbers (e.g., The Twenties). Interestingly, The 90's was actually used within the 1990s itself. From about 1999 onward, only The 70's onward were used, and their last known "regular" use was a stray The 70's puzzle on September 27, 2006; The 60's made a one-time return on April 6, 2011 as part of a special "recycled puzzles" episode in honor of Going Green Week.
 * Composer/Song: Used only once, in Round 3 on March 27, 1996; the answer was RAVEL'S BOLERO.
 * Foreign Word(s) and Foreign Phrase: Introduced in Season 9, though it is not known why the former had a "plural" form. They were last used early in Season 10; on September 14, 1992 (the last known appearance of Foreign Phrase), Pat explained that the answer MAZEL TOV has several acceptable Anglicized pronunciations, giving a very likely explanation for the short life of the "foreign" categories.
 * Nickname: Known to have been used since at least May 31, 1979 and as late as December 19, 1994. Given its very sporadic use in this timespan and a lack of any other pre-1988 episodes containing it, it has been extremely difficult to pinpoint the category's life; Nickname was likely not present in mid-1975, as it does not appear in either of the first two home games.
 * Person/Title: Known to have been used since at least August 31, 1989 and as late as October 26, 1995. A subset of Title, the puzzle listed an actor/actress and a work they are famous for (e.g., CANDICE BERGEN IN MURPHY BROWN); sometimes, "starring" or "stars" preceded the word "in". It was likely retired due to the introduction of Proper Name, although some Show Biz puzzles continue to use this format.
 * Rock On!: Introduced on October 25, 2005. Puzzles were themed to rock music in some way, most often referencing a rock act and/or song and sometimes taking the form of a Song/Artist puzzle. Charlie introduced the category in a deep voice, except for an episode where Pat deliberately introduced it in a deadpan voice (October 5, 2009), and its last two appearances (December 3, 2010 and February 9, 2011), where Charlie's introduction was overdubbed with Pat saying the name of the category.
 * Show/Song: Used only once sometime in Season 13, likely around March 27 (the only appearance of Composer/Song). The puzzle was likely SOUTH PACIFIC'S YOUNGER THAN SPRINGTIME; it is known that it involved South Pacific in some way, and this is the most well-known song that would fit on the puzzle board.
 * Slang: Introduced on September 7, 1992 and used until about June 19, 1995. Many of its puzzles were archaic or, in some cases, outright-fabricated terms (e.g., OFF THE BEAM). This category may have been retired due to a gradual shift away from shorter main game puzzles.

"Bonus" Categories
From 1990-2008, the show had categories which offered the contestant a bonus for answering a question related to the puzzle. Initially worth $500, they increased to $1,000 in Season 13, $2,000 in Season 14, and $3,000 in Season 17.

If a contestant did not give a correct response to the "bonus" answer, it was initially offered to the next contestant(s) in line until someone gave a correct answer (the only exception to this, for reasons unknown, was Megaword). Beginning in September 1995, only the contestant who solved the puzzle was allowed to guess.

From 1990-92, a light saxophone sting was used if a contestant gave the right answer. Later on, the puzzle-solve cue was used instead. This line of categories was phased out gradually in the late 2000s, with Where Are We? being the last to retire in November 2008 before Season 28 brought back the line with What's That Song?

Another notable feature of some of the "bonus" categories is that those using three "segmented" answers (e.g. the three answers in a Fill In the Blank, or the three "clues" in a Where Are We? puzzle) is that, if one of the "segments" required two lines, its second line would be indicated by a hanging indent.

As mentioned above, Quotation and the "decade" categories also offered bonus questions, but these were always available only to the contestant who solved the puzzle, and through about mid-1995 were asked by Charlie instead. From about late 1992 to late 2004, some other "regular" categories were sometimes followed by trivia questions related to the answer (rarely, multiple-choice); the practice last appeared on November 22, 2004 with the Headline U.S. SWIMMER MICHAEL PHELPS RULES THE POOL AT OLYMPICS, but returned on November 8, 2011 with the Movie Quote I'LL GET YOU MY PRETTY AND YOUR LITTLE DOG TOO!


 * Clue: The puzzle described a specific object, with the bonus ($250 on the daytime show) awarded for identifying the object. Apparently introduced in October 1990, last used January 18, 2005. Until the introduction of Who Is It? and Where Are We?, Clue puzzles sometimes described people, fictional characters, or places as well.
 * Fill In the Blank: Debuted in Season 10, definitely by December 25, 1992. Interestingly, Fill In the Blank has actually been two different categories:
 * Initially, Fill In the Blank was an incomplete phrase that ended in a question mark (although, very rarely, it was in the middle instead); the contestant received a bonus for providing the exact missing portion of the phrase. Some contestants read the question marks as "blank" or "question mark" when solving, which was considered acceptable.
 * By January 1994, the "new" Fill In the Blank was introduced. This one was a word puzzle similar to Tribond, where the answer was three (sometimes four) phrases, names, etc. that had a missing common word, almost always at the beginning (e.g., ? DOE ? DEERE ? MCCAIN for answers of John Doe, John Deere and John McCain). It is known to have been retired by September 2002, as confirmed by this alt.tv.game-shows posting by a contestant.
 * Interestingly, the two versions overlapped until around November 4, 1994 (the last known instance of an "old-style" Fill In the Blank). On December 9, the "old style" Fill In the Blank was renamed Next Line Please (see below).
 * For some reason, both versions were simply called "Blank" on the category strips until those were redesigned in September 1995, although the Australian version used "Blank" into 2005.
 * Fill In the Number: A phrase with a missing number in it (e.g., ## TROMBONES LED THE BIG PARADE; the number is 76); debuted on April 7, 1998, last appeared April 28, 2004. Interestingly, the last Fill In the Number puzzle had two different numbers in it (# SCORE AND # YEARS AGO; the numbers are 4 and 7, respectively), when all other known instances had only one. As with Fill In the Blank, some contestants read the number signs as "blank" or "number" when solving, and at least one just said the number while solving (which was regarded as a correct answer).
 * Megaword: An eight- to thirteen-letter word, with the bonus given for using the word in a sentence. Debuted on September 20, 1994 and last seen April 7, 1995, with at least 23 playings during that time and only two known buzz-outs (HAPHAZARDLY sometime around October and COPACETIC on December 22). Megaword was likely retired for several reasons, the most obvious being Pat's clear dislike of it and the unusually high difficulty – many Megaword puzzles took an extremely long time to play due to their lack of common letters (an extreme example being OXIDIZED, which took 11 turns before any letters were revealed). Other times, it was obvious that players were unfamiliar with the word, leading to incorrect answers with only vowels remaining or, in at least one case (PRISTINELY), the entire answer revealed. The judging on sentences did not appear to hold much weight on the word being used in a proper context, although it is known that one given sentence ("None of the contestants knew what PROLIFERATION meant." in January 1995) was not accepted. Interestingly, Megaword is the only known "bonus" category to be used in a Speed-Up, which happened at least twice. It is also one of the few to appear in some official form after its retirement, as the 1996 Wheel of Fortune day-by-day calendar uses a Megaword puzzle of LABYRINTH on February 10.
 * Next Line Please: An incomplete phrase which the contestant received a bonus for completing. Unlike the "original" Fill In the Blank, puzzles did not end with a question mark. The category first appeared under this name on December 9, 1994 and was last used April 17, 2008.
 * Slogan: Debuted in Season 13 (definitely by February 9, 1996) as $1,000 Slogan, and renamed that September when the bonus value increased. The puzzle was a product's slogan, and the bonus question involved identifying the product (although there were three known puzzles {one a Toss-Up} with the product name in them). It is likely that at least some companies offered to have their products' slogans used as puzzles, leading to some unusually short answers in the mid-2000s. While Slogan last appeared on February 19, 2008, it was likely retired after its next-to-last aired appearance (January 30) where the puzzle EAT FRESH was solved "Subway, eat fresh" and ruled correct for both the puzzle answer and identification of the product. The Facebook game still uses Slogan, although it does not ask for the associated product.
 * What Are We Making?: The puzzle listed ingredients to a common food dish, which was then identified for the bonus. It was used only once, on October 23, 2007; the puzzle was HERSHEY BAR GRAHAM CRACKER GOOEY ROASTED MARSHMALLOW, which the contestant correctly identified as S'mores. Not counting the intentional one-shots listed below, this is the third known category to have been used only once.
 * Where Are We?: The puzzle gave three short clues to a specific place. Introduced in Season 10, last used November 28, 2008.
 * Who Is It?/Who Are They?: The puzzle gave a clue to a specific person or, far less often, a fictional character. Known to have been used from at least September or October 1995, last used April 23, 2008 (the plural version is known to have debuted by May 1998). Until at least February 1996, Who Is It? puzzles used three "clues" like Where Are We?
 * Who Said It?: Known to have been used since at least April 3, 1996. Identical to Quotation, but with a bonus for identifying the person most associated with the quotation. This is different from the bonus question associated with some Quotation puzzles in the 1990s and 2000s, in which Pat would ask for the work that provided the quotation. Last used October 27, 2006.

Intentional One-Shots
Besides the three categories listed above that were only used once, the show has used several unique categories:


 * 70's Song/Artists, 60's Event, etc.: During the week of December 27, 1999 (the first Retro Week), the category in Round 1 was appended with "60's" or "70's" to go with the "retro" theme. It is known that December 27 used "70's Song/Artists" and December 28 used "60's Event", so it is very likely that this theme was used throughout the week. The second Retro Week in 2001 did not do this.
 * Really Long Title: Used as a joke on April Fool's Day 1997, which had Pat and Vanna playing for charity. The answer was SUPERCALI-FRAGILISTIC-EXPIALIDOCIOUS, hyphenated in that fashion to fit on the board. Treated as a "bonus" category, the then-standard $2,000 was offered for identifying the musical that the word was from. Pat, who solved the puzzle, gave the correct answer of Mary Poppins.

Wheel 2000 Categories
Wheel 2000 used Person, Place, and Thing in the Bonus Round, but had a unique line of categories in the main game:


 * Above & Below: Puzzles related to Earth.
 * Book Soup: Puzzles related to literature, occasionally overlapping with V.I.P.'s.
 * Bright Ideas: Puzzles related to inventions.
 * Every Body: Puzzles related to body parts.
 * Globetrotter: Same as Place or On the Map.
 * It Adds Up: Puzzles related to mathematics.
 * Just Stuff: Same as Thing.
 * Lab Test: Puzzles related to science.
 * Made in the USA: Puzzles related to the United States.
 * Measure It (sometimes Measurement): Puzzles related to measures and the like. Apparently never chosen.
 * Paint by Numbers: Puzzles related to art.
 * Space Case: Puzzles related to outer space.
 * V.I.P.'s: Same as Proper Name.
 * Word Rap: Puzzles related to grammar and punctuation.

Main Game
Until about 1996, it was not uncommon for a category to be duplicated in the main game. The same category could often appear as many as four times in a single game, including a daytime game (November 9, 1983) where all four puzzles (counting the Bonus Round) were Phrase, and a late-1988 game where every puzzle except the Bonus Round was Thing. It is possible that the duplication was phased out to allow a better "spread" of categories throughout a game.

Perhaps in relation to the above, many games before 1996 had more than one "bonus" category, and there are only two known instances of one being duplicated: Clue was used twice on both November 23, 1992 and March 29, 1995, the latter of which is notable for being the only known game composed only of "bonus" categories (Megaword in Round 2, and Fill In the Blank in Round 3).

The last known instance of two "bonuses" being used is March 26, 1996, which had Clue in Round 2, and a Place in Round 4 of NEW HAVEN CONNECTICUT, followed by Pat asking the contestant which Ivy League university is based there. The decision to use no more than one per game may also be related to time constraints.

Bonus Round
Regardless of the category distribution, bonus puzzles have always been predominantly Phrase and Thing(s).

Rarely-Seen

 * Best Seller was used exactly once: JOY OF COOKING on December 2, 2005.
 * Classic TV has only two known appearances: MORK FROM ORK on May 4, 2004 and MIAMI VICE on February 21, 2006.
 * Fictional Place is only known to have been used once: UTOPIA on November 25, 2008.
 * Foreign Word(s) has at least two known appearances: May 6 and 8, 1992 (DEJA VU and BUENO, respectively). For no particular reason, the former was called Foreign Words despite the existence of Foreign Phrase.
 * In the Kitchen has only been used six times: HAND MIXER on January 30, 2006; JUICE BOX on February 16, 2006; BAKING DISH on May 10, 2006; BACKSPLASH on April 24, 2007; MIXING BOWL on September 10, 2007; and CLING WRAP on September 26, 2007.
 * Despite its relative obscurity, Nickname appeared at least twice in Season 6 alone: HOT LIPS and MOTOR CITY. It is possible that it appeared at other times.
 * Despite being present since at least mid-March 1978 (slightly predating the Star Bonus), there are only three known instances of Quotation being used: PEOPLE WHO NEED PEOPLE in October 1987, TWO IF BY SEA in September 1988, and LOVE THY NEIGHBOR in November 1991 (all nighttime).
 * Rhyme Time has only five known appearances: FINE WINE around December 2002; HODGEPODGE on December 23, 2005 (also one of the only known one-word Rhyme Time puzzles); SKY-HIGH on March 23, 2006; ZIP YOUR LIP on December 24, 2007; and TOUGH STUFF on May 2, 2011.
 * Over its three seasons, Slang often appeared multiple times per month, likely because it lent itself to short answers.
 * Interestingly, Song Lyrics has been used at least twice: WHEN THE BOUGH BREAKS on November 17, 2004 and I DID IT MY WAY on December 22, 2006.
 * For no particular reason, Title has not been used since December 7, 2005. None of the three subsets introduced in Season 23 have been used, either.

Never Used
Categories that have never been used in the Bonus Round include:
 * The "decade" categories – unknown.
 * Before & After, Family, Fictional Family, Headline, Husband & Wife, Person/Title, Same Name, Star & Role, Song/Artist, and Title/Author – all of these categories lend themselves to fairly long puzzles.
 * College Life – likely because bonus puzzles are not always themed to the week.
 * Rock On! – unknown, possibly related to Charlie's announcement of the category.
 * Same Letter – unknown, may be related to the show's tendency towards fewer categories in the Bonus Round starting in the mid-2000s.
 * And, of course, the "bonus" categories.