Sorry for ruining Wordle for you

April 14, 2024 12:51 PM

What if your Wordle strategy was to always start with the same 4 words, all with unique letters? That would use 20 letters, with the exception, of J, K, Q, V, X, Z. Slate's "The Fastest Wordle Winning Strategy Ever" (archive).

(Figuring that one way for Wordle to foil this strategy would be for the word to include three letters from J, K, Q, V, X, Z. Showing the incompetence of ChatGPT, I asked it "from the list of the letters j k q v x z, i want a list of 5 letter words that contain 3 or more of those letters", it listed one 4-letter word, eighteen 5-letter words with only two of those letters, and only one correct word, "JAZZY". When I complained, ChatGPT replied, "You're correct, and I apologize for the oversight.")

posted by ShooBoo (71 comments total)

People keep pretending hard mode doesn't exist.
posted by keep_evolving at 12:56 PM on April 14 [44 favorites]

I use GROUP. STEAD, and FILMY and I keep telling myself I can do better so I'm glad someone else has done the work. This is definitely the cognitively easiest strategy!
posted by LSK at 12:58 PM on April 14 [2 favorites]

It’s boring, but PIOUS and TEARY, always lead to Wordle in 3 or 4 for me.
posted by rh at 12:59 PM on April 14 [6 favorites]

This was my wordle strategy for as long as I played wordle. I didn't use those words. I used other words but I don't remember what they were so I don't know if they were equally efficient or less so.

I am all for word puzzles as data analysis problems. I found a list of english 5 letter words and used it to figure out the optimal list of words to solve Kilordle in 34 guesses, by figuring out the words that would maximize "each relevant letter in each relevant position". I have an idea for how to modify this to solve it in even fewer, but I made the system in excel and lack the excel skill to program what I'm thinking.
posted by If only I had a penguin... at 1:00 PM on April 14 [1 favorite]

People keep pretending hard mode doesn't exist.

Also that Wordle is about "winning" or "optimizing" rather than "fun."
posted by chavenet at 1:05 PM on April 14 [39 favorites]

I only do it for Quordle, but AROSE TUNIC GLYPH and AROSE LUCID NYMPH do a pretty good job of narrowing the space of choices.
posted by tavella at 1:07 PM on April 14 [4 favorites]

Well this is interesting, though now for me. I play Hard Mode, so couldn't do this anyway, and my target is to get it in 3 or 4 tries. Also, "BUMFS" is nothing, as far as I can tell, so no, I'm not entering that (not just to be snarky, I mean. As I understand it, there's a list of words that Wordle will accept that is significantly greater than the list of words that it will actually pull answers from. "BUMFS," whatever the hell it is, is never going to be the correct answer.

This is also why I recently changed my opening word from "STARE" to "LATER." Wordle (again, by my understanding) doesn't use plural nouns as answers, which cuts down quite a bit on the "S" usage. It's still a valuable letter to know, but not as much as "L" is.
posted by Navelgazer at 1:08 PM on April 14 [5 favorites]

I always start with STERN CLAIM DOUGH.
posted by adamrice at 1:09 PM on April 14

I switched to hard mode very quickly because this strat seemed the logical end game of easy mode. Then I made the mistake of reading the source, and found the word table, and that was the end for long enough that it was the end.
posted by inpHilltr8r at 1:12 PM on April 14

YEAST FLOUR
posted by unknowncommand at 1:12 PM on April 14 [4 favorites]

People keep pretending hard mode doesn't exist.

What's really annoying is when the official wordlebot judges you for playing in hard mode.
posted by advil at 1:16 PM on April 14 [5 favorites]

I use hard mode, and always start with SLATE. My goal is to get through RSTLNE as quickly as possible. So if SLATE doesn't work, I'll try BRUIN. If both of those are no-hitters it gets a little tricker. Otherwise I proceed based on what matched from the most recent word. My stats are:\

1 - 0
2 - 23
3 - 146
4 - 175
5 - 112
6 - 23

Current streak is 175.
posted by grumpybear69 at 1:21 PM on April 14 [4 favorites]

Another Wordle complaint (and clearly a bug in my opinion). If you play in a new time zone, you lose your streak.
posted by ShooBoo at 1:25 PM on April 14 [3 favorites]

"BUMFS," whatever the hell it is, is never going to be the correct answer.

I was fully with you on this but then I looked it up. While the plural form seems redundant, this word is truly one of the greats!

bumf
[ buhmf ]
noun British.

1. Slang. toilet paper.

2. memoranda, official notices, or the like.

ORIGIN OF BUMF

1885–90; short for bumfodder. See bum, fodder

posted by trig at 1:28 PM on April 14 [11 favorites]

I use ADIEU and STOMP. I can almost always get in three or four.
posted by teleri025 at 1:38 PM on April 14 [3 favorites]

I have a similar strategy for Quordle and Duotrigordle, but that seems unnecessary for Wordle. I usually solve the Worldle in three or four guesses, and that strategy guarantees it will take at least five. To me, this qualifies as overthinking the Wordle.
posted by ArbitraryAndCapricious at 1:39 PM on April 14

Every morning, I run a sort of diagnostics test on my brain and eyes and fingers by solving Wordle, Connections, Strands, and two or three mini crosswords.

For Wordle, I always just start with some five-letter word and see what happens. If I have a strategy, it's kinda soft, like try to get some common letters in there. Audio and yeast are pretty good, but I don't have a favorite first word. Anything more than that would start to feel like actual work.
posted by pracowity at 1:46 PM on April 14 [17 favorites]

I think of anything more than two guesses to be a loss, so that strategy would be even more demoralizing than wordle already is.
posted by surlyben at 1:54 PM on April 14

FEAST
PRONG
MILKY

Almost always 3 or 4
posted by tzikeh at 1:56 PM on April 14 [1 favorite]

I wouldn't use this strategy in normal Wordle-type games, but the Quordle site has a head-to-head version called Victordle Duel where this is perfect.

My wife usually beats me at whatever version of Wordle we might play, but we tried this one and she couldn't figure out how I was solving them so fast. It's because I enter the same three or four words as fast as possible, while she was still trying to minimize the number of guesses. In this one it's speed, not number of tries that matters.
posted by Sophocles at 2:01 PM on April 14 [1 favorite]

I play hard mode and usually start with STALE or BEAUS or the previous day's word if I am getting bored.
posted by joannemerriam at 2:03 PM on April 14 [2 favorites]

I asked it "from the list of the letters j k q v x z, i want a list of 5 letter words that contain 3 or more of those letters", it listed one 4-letter word, eighteen 5-letter words with only two of those letters, and only one correct word, "JAZZY"

Someone linked here to a wordle-style game that, instead of having a pre-chosen word, chose after you guessed, trying to foil you. So, you guess, say, WATER, and the game eliminates from the winning options every word with a W, A, T, E, or R in it. It only gives you a letter when it can't eliminate other words with that letter. Then you guess again, say with JUMPS, and it begrudgingly goes, "OK, I can't elminate all the Js, I'll give you the J."

I found that I actually had to be careful not to end up in a position where I'd eliminated so many letters that JAZZY was the only remaining word in its dictionary. All roads led to JAZZY.
posted by Well I never at 2:12 PM on April 14 [7 favorites]

This strategy is interesting to me because it reflects a goal of finishing the puzzle as quickly as possible, as measured by time. But to the extent that I measure my Wordle prowess, I do it by number of guesses, and don't care how much time I spend between guesses considering various options. If I've got three letters in the right place and no obvious answer, I'm happy to spend however long methodically plugging the remaining letters into the first blank and seeing if that reveals an answer to me.
posted by Well I never at 2:15 PM on April 14 [4 favorites]

Well apparently you now need a free account to see stats and be judged by the Wordle bot. I play in hard mode, and if I get it in 5 guesses I am struggling. And how did Dove get it in 2 guesses 4 times; I would think that pretty unlikely with his method.

2 of my favorite starting words are “aisle” and “raise”. A good combination of vowels and RSTLNE letters.
posted by TedW at 2:33 PM on April 14 [1 favorite]

SLANT PRICE DOUGH is my go-to.

Given the letter frequency ranking of EARIOTNSLCUDPMHGBFYWKVXZJQ, these words put more of the most frequent letters up first.

You'd wait until the 3rd guess to use E? G and H are way down the list and you use them first? This is odd. Unless you're deliberately looking for odd duck words perhaps?
posted by JoeZydeco at 2:35 PM on April 14 [1 favorite]

I remember wordle back when it was a fun hobby project by a couple who had time on their hands and a love of words. Now it seems to just be a series of lawsuits against people who make their own games.

I'm not sure how these word choices help you in court, honestly.
posted by rum-soaked space hobo at 2:38 PM on April 14 [2 favorites]

I start with a different word everyday (today: FLANK) in hard mode. This is fun. Do it whatever the fun way is.
posted by Galvanic at 2:39 PM on April 14 [12 favorites]

Using the same four words to start sounds like a great way to reduce a fun past-time to work. Sorry, I don't care to play WORKLE.
posted by SPrintF at 2:50 PM on April 14 [14 favorites]

I play TRUE wordle, where you get only one guess and if you don't get it right you have to wait and try again tomorrow.
posted by Pickman's Next Top Model at 2:58 PM on April 14 [10 favorites]

The most enjoyment I get out of Wordle is coming up with an opening word. I do whatever strikes my fancy, today it was BEAST. I got it in 1, once; the word was POINT.
posted by vunder at 3:03 PM on April 14 [4 favorites]

What's really annoying is when the official wordlebot judges you for playing in hard mode.

What do you mean? I play in hard mode and do the wordlebot every time.

My personal wordlebot complaint is when I get it down to two words, I pick the correct one, and it says my guess was worth 96 points but the wrong one--which it picked--was worth 99. I assume it's jealousy, because otherwise it doesn't make sense.
posted by mark k at 3:06 PM on April 14 [3 favorites]

I find it interesting to think of what an adversarial Wordle word chooser would do to try to thwart this strategy. I did some looking around with the aid of a Scrabble word finder site.

For one, there's the J/K combo, which covers JOKER, JOKEY, JOKES, JUKED, JACKS, JERKS, JERKY, JANKY and JUNKY.

Some more words with two of the unused letters, none of them obscure or with an S at the end:

QUACK, WALTZ, JEWEL, EVOKE, KNAVE, VOWED

So far I've only found one that has three letter slots unused, if they really wanted to stick it to you:

JAZZY
posted by JHarris at 3:12 PM on April 14

AROSE, THING, LUCKY. If this gives almost nothing, DWARF.
posted by Marky at 3:29 PM on April 14 [1 favorite]

I use Bud Grace’s method. So far it has worked quite well for me.
posted by fimbulvetr at 4:13 PM on April 14

As an aside, those of you who've grown bored of Wordle or would like a more interesting logic challenge might enjoy Lirdle, which is like Wordle except that exactly one of the letter-coloring responses to each of your moves is a lie.
posted by rifflesby at 4:23 PM on April 14 [2 favorites]

I only played long enough to get a 69-day streak and then quit, but my strategy of "FUDGE BLITZ VROWS NYMPH JACKY" contained 24 unique letters in hits first 24 characters, and, though ultimately non-exhaustively useful, being weak to certain ambiguities (PUREE vs RUPEE, IIRC?), got me a 69-day streak of very fast solves, all with precisely six guesses.

"Guess the Wordle in 6 tries" is the rule, after all, not "in 6 tries or less." :)
posted by Earthtopus at 4:27 PM on April 14 [2 favorites]

You have to enter real words.
posted by pracowity at 4:37 PM on April 14

STARE
COUGH
VINYL

You can also use BOUGH or DOUGH if you feel a lil crazy today.
posted by nushustu at 4:38 PM on April 14 [1 favorite]

I play Duotrigordle daily, and use audio, shelf, crypt as starting words and that seems to work OK. I do get a bit bored using the same words, so I'll try some of these and see if they work any better. I do focus on solving quickly rather than minimising guesses, so maybe there are different ideal words for those two strategies.
posted by dg at 4:39 PM on April 14 [1 favorite]

The last one of these I played was Redactle, specifically this one. It was the first time seeing the game, and I got the answer immediately.

I then retired from these games completely.
posted by dumbland at 4:50 PM on April 14

Do they check what you type in against a dictionary?

Yes. If you enter BUNOB, it'll shake its letters at you.
posted by SPrintF at 5:09 PM on April 14

I consider it a win if I get the word in 2 or 3. 4 is a push and 5 or 6 means I'm allowed to go back to bed for an hour. Openers are slate or coupe but occasionally a group of friends will try a shared opening word and compare solutions.

Also hard mode or go home.
posted by cmfletcher at 5:11 PM on April 14 [2 favorites]

When I played duotrigordle, I always started with SHORE LINER since then I'd imagine a little boat, sailing away.
posted by Pitachu at 5:36 PM on April 14 [1 favorite]

Every morning, I run a sort of diagnostics test on my brain and eyes and fingers by solving Wordle, Connections, Strands, and two or three mini crosswords.

This is my morning routine, in this order, and also understood each time to be a "diagnostics test."
posted by Navelgazer at 5:45 PM on April 14 [5 favorites]

Speaking of adversarial word choosers... Absurdle.
posted by aneel at 5:52 PM on April 14 [1 favorite]

SOARE THING CLOUD ....
posted by mbo at 5:55 PM on April 14 [1 favorite]

I only do it for Quordle, but AROSE TUNIC GLYPH and AROSE LUCID NYMPH do a pretty good job of narrowing the space of choices.

tavella, why save that for Quordle when it is clearly meant to be the start of a classical Grecian ode?

(This whole thread is a delight as a collection of found poetry, but that first one is also the best so far.)
posted by It is regrettable that at 6:11 PM on April 14 [4 favorites]

Wordle and the other games help me recover from nightmares, so I do them in the morning or if I wake up at night.

Anyway, for Wordle, it's always some random word, I don't think about effective it might be. After all, you'll almost never get it in one or two if you always start with adieu. I mostly aim for a satisfying feeling, rather than speed or number of guesses. For instance today's felt good though I guessed it in five, and it took ages. I started with NIGHT.

For Quordle, I start with HIPPY DREAM SOUND or GREAT HIPPY SOUND. It works very well most days, and then some times it doesn't.
posted by mumimor at 6:30 PM on April 14 [2 favorites]

I always start with RAISE so I get 3 vowels. If none of those vowels are used, I pick a word containing O & U.
posted by mike3k at 6:42 PM on April 14 [1 favorite]

Another Wordle complaint (and clearly a bug in my opinion). If you play in a new time zone, you lose your streak.

I just got back from a week in Paris and maintained my streak. I'm still not sure if it used local time for the puzzles, but whatever I was doing appears to have worked.
posted by It's Never Lurgi at 7:03 PM on April 14 [1 favorite]

> When I played duotrigordle, I always started with SHORE LINER since then I'd imagine a little boat, sailing away.

Er... I meant to say I start with COAST LINER. It'd been too long, but now I'm embarrassed that I misremembered and suggested that I used two words that so closely overlap.
posted by Pitachu at 7:51 PM on April 14

My starting word is TRANS, which ensures I'll never win on the first try.
posted by PresidentOfDinosaurs at 8:24 PM on April 14 [9 favorites]

I landed on the same strategy early on: I chose the words AWFUL BYTES GRIND CHOMP. Those use all the vowels, leaving the high-scoring Scrabble letters. I call it WordleCrack and it is, so far, undefeated. In August (hopefully) it will be 1024 wins to 0 defeats – in which case, I'll consider WordleCrack super-successful.
posted by McLir at 8:28 PM on April 14 [1 favorite]

I'm sure I'm not the only person whose house rule is to always start with yesterday's word.
posted by destrius at 10:23 PM on April 14 [1 favorite]


CRWTH
ODIUM
LANES


I always play hard mode, and always start with CRWTH. The second word is dependent on what I find in the first, but I like to keep my vowels open, at least starting out. Usually get it in 4 with more 3s than 5s. The very occasional 2.

This generally works for Quordle Sequence as well. I usually get it in 4,5,6,7
posted by flippant at 10:47 PM on April 14 [3 favorites]

Every morning I start with TEARS, COUGH and BLINK. Then I do the Wordle.
posted by Phanx at 11:18 PM on April 14 [17 favorites]

"why save that for Quordle when it is clearly meant to be the start of a classical Grecian ode?"

I admit, I do use them partly because they sound pretty, there's probably three word sequences that are more efficient.
posted by tavella at 11:41 PM on April 14 [2 favorites]

“AUDIO” has 4 vowels, and if it gets no hits at all my next word is “EVERY” … I like this because eliminating vowels seems like the best strategy to me.
posted by wabbittwax at 3:56 AM on April 15 [2 favorites]

My point in playing Wordle is to simply enjoy exercising my brain in figuring out words, and if I happen to get the word quickly, so much the better. Strategies designed to game the game remove every shred of fun for me.

And, now that NYT requires an account if you want to see your stats, there’s no point in caring about how many steps it takes one, anyway.
posted by Thorzdad at 4:14 AM on April 15 [6 favorites]

I always start with STAIN and BORED, and occasionally will go on to GUPPY if the first two don't cough up enough hits. Had no idea that BUMFS was a thing.
posted by Halloween Jack at 5:41 AM on April 15

tzikeh, FEAST was my starting word as well, until the day that it was also the solution, giving me a right-in-one win.
posted by Harald74 at 5:50 AM on April 15 [1 favorite]

SLATE BRICK POUND does me just fine most of the time.
posted by grubi at 6:31 AM on April 15

My point in playing Wordle is to simply enjoy exercising my brain in figuring out words, and if I happen to get the word quickly, so much the better. Strategies designed to game the game remove every shred of fun for me.

Yeah, I couldn't care less about "optimizing" my guesses. I start every run with the first word to pop into my head, avoiding words I've done before (or at least recently) and let my intuitive and deductive skills take the rest. Every time I hear about people's secret strategies for hacking the game I wanna yell SHUT UP NERD, because I feel like the real purpose of Wordle (and all daily puzzles) isn't to defeat them through silly-assed statistics and algorithms, but to use them to flex your own raw mental powers a little bit every day.
posted by Strange Interlude at 7:19 AM on April 15 [4 favorites]

I always play hard mode, and always start with CRWTH.

That sounds like a cry for help. We are here for you.
posted by It's Never Lurgi at 7:54 AM on April 15 [4 favorites]

The important thing for people analyzing based on word frequency is to realize that the ideal frequency isn't the frequency of letters in the English language, but the frequency of letters in the solution word set in wordle. I did this once (the list is in plaintext in the code) and from that the ideal first word was arose. There was another great second word but I forget what it was... It's been at least a year since I've done a wordle or quordle.

When I was getting the word in two or three guesses most of the time it got boring.
posted by Snowflake at 8:21 AM on April 15

And how did Dove get it in 2 guesses 4 times; I would think that pretty unlikely with his method.
At first, I checked my Wordle-solving program, and starting with LIGHT resulted in winning in two guesses 5% of the time, so Dove getting it 2% of the time seemed reasonable, but using this method they would have had to guess LIGHT-then-CANDY and getting CANDY right more than once would not have happened in the current game.

Given the letter frequency ranking of EARIOTNSLCUDPMHGBFYWKVXZJQ...
I don't understand why people keep using "...the frequency of the letters of the alphabet in English" when this is a closed system.
There are only 2309 words in the original NYT Wordle target list, and they are well documented.
(Disregarding the 4 (out of >1000) times a word outside that list was used)
The frequency list of those words is EAROTLISNCUYDHPMGBFKWVZXQJ
Or if you go by number of words with that letter, it's EAROTILSNUCYHDPGMBFKWVXZQJ

The idea of doing Wordle as a speed run does not resonate with me. I like the figuring out part, and when I've gotten a lucky two I feel a little dissatisfied.
But I'll try this method for Duotrigordle
posted by MtDewd at 8:53 AM on April 15 [2 favorites]

I do hard mode and whatever first 5-letter word pops into my head first, regardless of how optimized it is. Strategy kicks in on future guesses. It's a delight when like the other day I started with PLINK, hit two exact letter placements and a third letter, and then guessed the correct word on my second try.
posted by Pryde at 10:01 AM on April 15 [4 favorites]

I had to stick with the words I could remember.

BEACH
FLING
STUMP
WORDY

Gotta say, though, it's dispiriting to master a strategy and still fail at it.
posted by Flexagon at 5:00 PM on April 18

During the night or early morning, I woke up from a nightmare. I took up my phone and typed in TRASH. And got it in my second guess. This is why I like going with random words.
posted by mumimor at 11:04 PM on April 18 [1 favorite]

Wordle 1,035 1/6*

🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

(First time this has happened and I couldn’t resist!)
posted by TedW at 6:54 AM on April 19 [3 favorites]

As it happens, I was working on an Absurdle-like program of my own, and just finished it (as well as any program is 'finished') yesterday.
I was trying out LIGHT/CANDY/POWER/BUMFS in different orders, and in every case, after those four words, I only had 1 or 2 words left to choose from.
So this does look like an especially good set of words for Absurdle, as well as all the 2 or 4 or 6 or 32- simultaneous word game versions.

But for Wordle itself, I'm not trying to get it in 5 or 6.
posted by MtDewd at 8:08 AM on April 20