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How to use each Wordle guess
Wordle gives you six attempts to find a five-letter answer. After each guess, use the tiles to update a candidate pattern rather than simply reaching for another familiar word:
- Green: the letter is in the answer at that position. Keep it there in later guesses.
- Yellow: the letter is in the answer, but not at that position. Try it somewhere else.
- Gray: the letter is not in the answer, subject to an important repeated-letter caveat: when a guess contains a letter more times than the answer does, not every copy will receive a positive color.
Keep a short mental or written record of confirmed letters, excluded positions, and letters already ruled out. A yellow letter has to move; a green one has to stay. When several placements remain plausible, choose a guess that tests useful untried letters without violating what the tiles have established.
Watch for repeated letters
A nearly complete pattern can still be deceptive if the answer repeats a letter. For example, a green tile confirms that letter at one position, but does not by itself tell you whether another copy appears elsewhere. Likewise, a gray tile for a duplicate in your guess does not always mean the letter is absent altogether. Keep track of how many copies the feedback supports before eliminating a candidate.
#1 Best Overall
What is the best word to start Wordle?
There is no timeless, universally best opener. “Best” depends on what you want to optimize: testing informative letters, keeping the chance of an immediate solve, or using a word that is easy to remember and apply. A balanced word with distinct, common letters is a practical default because it can reveal useful information without committing to one narrow strategy.
A September 2, 2026 snapshot in Tom’s Guide’s Wordle start-word guide lists SLATE, CRANE, and TRACE among leading options, each with a score of 99 in its cited snapshot. Those rankings belong to that guide’s tool and method, not to a permanent property of the game. The article also reports that E, A, R, O, and T were the most frequent letters among eligible Wordle answers in its analysis—53.3%, 42.2%, 38.8%, 32.6%, and 31.6%, respectively. These are answer-list figures, not general-English letter frequencies.
Rank #2
Different analyses can favor different words because they answer different questions. Tom’s Guide discusses SOARE, ROATE, and RAISE in one analysis, and STARE under another approach. It notes that ROATE is not a possible answer in the list used for that analysis, so choosing it may help distinguish candidates while giving up the possibility of solving on the first guess. RAISE or STARE can preserve an immediate-solve possibility when they are eligible answers, but their value still depends on the candidate list and scoring method.
ADIEU versus a balanced opener
ADIEU is popular because it tests four vowels in one guess. That can be useful if early vowel information suits your approach, but it leaves fewer slots for common consonants. The New York Times reported that ADIEU was used by an average of 5% of users per day during its June 15–August 22, 2022 observation period. That measures popularity, not solving performance.
In the same 2022 article, the Times described WordleBot changing its favorite starter from CRANE to SLATE after changing how it modeled likely answers. Josh Katz, then a Times graphics editor, said, “I think either makes for a great starting word,” and “The difference between best and second-best is tiny.” The historical change is a useful reminder: a ranking can shift when the model or answer assumptions change. It is not evidence that one of those words must be best under today’s method.
What should you guess second?
Use the first row’s feedback to decide whether to refine a pattern or gather more information. If the opener reveals little, a second word with useful untested letters can narrow the field. If it gives you a yellow letter, move that letter to a plausible new position while checking other likely letters. Avoid repeating letters already ruled out unless you have a specific reason to test a duplicate.
Rank #4
Using a different set of letters on the second guess is common advice, and the Times discussed that approach in its 2022 account. It is not an absolute rule: once you have a promising pattern, a guess that tests candidate placements may be more useful than a word chosen only to maximize new letters.
Choose an opener for the goal you care about
| Approach | What it favors | Trade-off |
|---|---|---|
| Balanced common-letter word such as SLATE, CRANE, or TRACE | Testing familiar, high-value letters while retaining a possible answer candidate | Rankings reflect a particular tool or analysis and can change with the method or answer list. |
| Information-focused word such as ROATE in one published analysis | Distinguishing among remaining answers quickly | That analysis says ROATE is not an answer candidate in its list, so it cannot produce an immediate solve there. |
| Candidate-friendly word such as RAISE or STARE in cited analyses | Testing useful letters while preserving a chance that the guess is the answer | The best choice depends on the candidate list and scoring method. |
| Vowel-heavy word such as ADIEU | Checking several vowels early | It uses fewer slots for consonants; popularity does not establish greater effectiveness. |
Pick a starter you can use consistently, then let the feedback—not the word’s reputation—drive the rest of the solve. If you enjoy experimenting, rotate between a few styles and notice which one helps you reason clearly; a personal routine can be more useful than chasing a marginally different ranking.
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What simulations can—and cannot—tell you
A 2022 paper by Chao-Lin Liu tested strategies in a simulator across 2,315 answers. Its baseline averaged 4.078 guesses and failed in 1.77% of cases, where failure meant requiring more than six trials. The best result among the paper’s tested parameterized strategies averaged 3.674 guesses and failed in 0.65% of cases. These are results for that simulator, answer set, and strategy comparison—not human averages, guarantees, or a prediction of your own results. The paper is available at arXiv.
The Times’ 2022 account also described WordleBot using an approximate vocabulary of 4,500 relatively common English words in its updated probability approach. That figure describes the historical approach in that article; it should not be read as a statement of WordleBot’s current implementation.
Build a repeatable solving habit
- Start with a word you can remember. Prefer distinct letters that give you useful coverage, unless you have a deliberate alternative strategy.
- Translate the colors into constraints. Fix greens, relocate yellows, and record excluded letters and positions.
- Check for duplicate-letter possibilities. Do not eliminate a letter solely because one copy appeared gray when another copy received a positive color.
- Choose the next guess for a reason. Either test likely answer placements or use fresh, useful letters to distinguish candidates.
- Reassess after every row. A word that was a sensible information-gathering guess early on may be wasteful once the pattern is narrow.
Hard Mode can add a self-imposed challenge, but check the game’s current in-game instructions for its exact restrictions rather than relying on an old description.
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