Alphabetics

Alphabetics is the bonus round of Password Plus. The celebrity gives the contestant clues for ten passwords, arranged alphabetically (hence the name) from, for example, the letter "A" to the letter "J". Each correct password nets the contestant $100. Should the contestant get all ten, he or she wins $5,000! Should the celebrity give an illegal clue—the password or a form thereof, a two-word clue or a hyphenate, or (in later episodes) a direct opposite—the jackpot is reduced by a fifth of its value ($5,000 down to $4,000; $10,000 down to $8,000; $15,000 down to $12,000; etc.). For a brief time, each illegal clue decreased the jackpot by $2,500. In the final season, the jackpot began at $5,000 and increased that much every time it was not won, up to a maximum of $50,000. The highest it reached was $35,000, won by Terri Edler in 1982. This jackpot format would remain when the series was revived by NBC in 1984, as Super Password, and the bonus round would be renamed The Super Password End Game. The quickest Alphabetics win took 29 seconds. The record was set by Joanna Gleason in 1981. Betty White would tie it the same year. However, on the opposite end of the spectrum, Gina Hecht and her contestant got no words correct in 1980.

In the beginning, the Alphabetics board was located at the entrance were the show's logo doubled as a gate and the words were listed downward; it was later moved to a wall behind a set of doors, so that it wouldn't be in the way of the show's logo that closed the entrance. Allen Ludden called it "The Alphabetics Wall." Also the words were zigzagged down the board.