Wordle strategy

Play to shrink the list of possible answers, not to get lucky. A good opener tests the common letters in their common spots. After that, the biggest danger is a family like _IGHT, where ten words fit and you only have six guesses.

All the numbers here come from our set of 1,798 likely answers: everyday five-letter words, without plain plurals and past tenses, which Wordle rarely uses. It's our own list, not the official one, so treat the figures as close estimates.

Open with common letters

The letters that show up in the most answers are E (46%), A (43%), R (39%), O (30%), T (29%), I (29%). A first guess built from five of them will usually light up two or three tiles.

We scored some popular openers by how many answers you'd still have to choose from, on average, after seeing the colours:

Vowel-heavy openers look clever but do worse. ADIEU leaves about 100 answers, roughly twice as many as RAISE, because consonants like R, S and T narrow things down more than a fourth or fifth vowel does. Our top 25 openers, and the best second word for each, are on the best starting words page.

Know where letters like to sit

Position matters as much as the letter. S is the most common first letter (281 answers). E is the most common last letter (344), and Y comes second (220). About 19% of answers end in E and 12% in Y.

So if you have a yellow E, try it at the end before anywhere else. A yellow Y is very likely the last letter. Vowels mostly sit in spots two and three: A leads the second position and A the third. The full position table is on our letter frequency page.

Don't rule out repeated letters

596 of the 1,798 answers, about 33%, use a letter twice: think SPEED, APPLE or LEVEL. When you're down to a pattern that won't fit any word you can think of, try doubling one of your known letters. Wordle shows a repeat only when you guess the letter twice yourself, so a single green P never tells you there isn't a second one.

Watch for trap families

Some patterns have so many answers that guessing them one by one runs you out of turns:

• _IGHT: 10 answers (RIGHT, LIGHT, NIGHT, EIGHT, FIGHT, MIGHT, SIGHT, TIGHT, WIGHT, BIGHT)
• _OUND: 8 answers (FOUND, ROUND, SOUND, BOUND, WOUND, MOUND, POUND, HOUND)
• SHA_E: 7 answers (SHARE, SHAPE, SHADE, SHALE, SHAME, SHAKE, SHAVE)
• _ATCH: 6 answers (MATCH, WATCH, CATCH, PATCH, HATCH, BATCH)
• STA_E: 6 answers (STATE, STAGE, STAKE, STARE, STAVE, STALE)

Say you have _IGHT in two guesses. There are 10 candidates and four guesses left, so trying them in turn could fail. Spend one guess on a word that tests several of the missing first letters at once. TERMS checks T, E, R, M and S, which covers RIGHT, EIGHT, MIGHT, SIGHT, TIGHT in a single turn. Whatever lights up (or doesn't) leaves only a few options.

This only works in normal mode. In hard mode every green and yellow you've found must appear in later guesses, so TERMS isn't allowed. That's what makes _IGHT so punishing there. In hard mode, pick the candidate whose first letter shares the most with the other candidates' first letters, and accept that some days are luck.

Use your second guess for new letters

If the first guess gave you one or two yellows, it's tempting to move them around straight away. Usually it's better to play five fresh letters on guess two, then put everything together on guess three. You learn about ten letters in two turns instead of five.

When you're stuck

Enter your guesses and colours into the Wordle solver. It lists every answer that still fits, most likely first, so you know if you're down to two options or twenty. For practice without a daily limit, play our word guess game, or make a puzzle with your own secret word for a friend.

Wordle is owned by The New York Times. This guide and our tools aren't affiliated with it.