Traitors fans spot key clue over 'secret traitor' in show first

The Traitors fans believe they've uncovered a key clue in working out who the new 'Secret Traitor' is.

Yesterday saw the highly anticipated return of the iconic BBC game show, which shipped 22 people off to Scotland's Ardross Castle and left them to fight it out for the prize money under the watchful eye of Claudia Winkleman.

Four seasons - and a celebrity spin-off - in and you'd think we've all got a good understanding of what the rules are. Or at least we did, as last night's (1 January) episode saw Claudia introduce a huge new twist involving a 'Secret Traitor'.

Role of the 'Secret Traitor' in The Traitors explained

Unlike the three regular Traitors who meet each night to banish a Faithful and are known to viewers at home, the Secret Traitor remains a complete mystery.

"The Secret Traitor will work alone. Each night they will provide you with a murder shortlist. You can only murder one of the people that is on the murder shortlist," she told the contestants.

"You do not know who they are — but they know exactly who you are."

So in a nutshell, one of the perceived Faithfuls is secretly on the Traitors team and will provide a shortlist of people to 'murder' each night, a role which is hugely powerful as not only do they control who runs the risk of being murdered, but they also prevent themselves from being booted from the competition in this manner.

However, the role does not protect them from being banished at the nightly roundtable. As for the regular Traitors, they are Hugo, Rachel and Stephen.

Who is the Secret Traitor?

We don't know the answer to that one, otherwise it wouldn't be much of a secret.

However, this hasn't stopped fans from putting their best guess forward, with several viewers combing over the episode for any crumb of a clue.

Several viewers believe they've already found a key piece of evidence after seeing the note of the first three Faithfuls facing banishment.

On X, one person shared a photo of the doomed Faithfuls' names written on a list and suggested that fans could crack the mystery by keeping an eye out for a simple spelling mistake.

"Let’s all see who spells Netty’s name wrong at the roundtable #TheTraitors," they wrote, noting that whoever had written the list had spelt Netty as 'Nettie'.

Let’s all see who spells Netty’s name wrong at the roundtable #TheTraitors pic.twitter.com/iM2znNAgAL

— Samantha Bartlett (@sammyloubelle) January 1, 2026

"That writing is quite distinctive, might be quite easy to spot," replied one person, while others pointed out that the 'z' at the end of Maz's name was also distinctive.

"That's assuming they nominate them at the round table," added a second person. "I'd say their general font looks quite unique. How they write the T's, capital letters etc."

However, not everyone was convinced by the handwriting clue, with several others pointing out that the Secret Traitor may have deliberately chosen to write that way to disguise their actual handwriting.

Of course, this doesn't discount production having written the names down for the Secret Traitor, which could very well be the case.

"All this assumes it's the secret traitor who does the writing, rather than production," pointed out one sceptical viewer, as another added: "No chance it'll be their writing. Too easy to spot at the Round Table."

Which, in that case, means we're all back to the drawing board.

Meanwhile, other views looked to episode one's coffin task - which saw any contestant with a coffin placed next to their gravestone at risk of murder - as a possible way to uncover the Secret Traitor's identity.

"So if a coffin goes in the grave of the secret traitor then they’re not going to be up for the chop, so then the traitors (and viewers) will discover the secret traitor," one person wrote, while a second added: "Wouldn’t the shortlist soon give away the secret traitor in the long term if they aren’t putting their name down?"