Did you know that Wordle turned one year old in October? It feels like we’ve been playing it for a lot longer than that, doesn’t it?
And of all the possible daily rituals I’d manage to stick with for an entire year, I certainly didn’t have “web-based word game” on my bingo card this time. Yet, here we are.
Whether you’re still a fan of Wordle, or you’ve never played it before (you should), I’ve come up with what I believe to be three dynamite tips to ensure victory on the regular.
The best first word is “RAISE”
I am . . . not young, so if this memory is lost on you, I understand. Way back when Wheel of Fortune first hit the airwaves, the contestant who got to the final round was able to choose five consonants and one vowel to be applied to the final puzzle. Nowadays, they get additional letters, but back in my day, this was how the Wheel worked.
Almost invariably, contestants would choose R, S, T, L, N, and E. Every once in a while, some brave soul would swap P for N or maybe an A for E. To this day, for better or worse, I still consider those to be the most common letters to be guessed for word-based games.
This is a long-winded way of saying that by using “raise” as your first word, you get R and S in play, along with the three vowels A, I, and E. Vowels are key and, unlike Wheel of Fortune, you can guess more than one right away.
The best second word is “PLUTO”
In theory, Wordle doesn’t let you guess proper names, but “pluto” is fair game for some reason.
This is a great second word, and I advise you to guess it then regardless of the outcome of your first word.
Why? Because now we’ve got all vowels in play, plus R, S, T, L, and P out there. The only common letter we’re missing is N. Pretty decent for two guesses.
At this point, you should have a good idea of how the secret word is shaping up. The vowels, especially, are critical to get nailed down, and by guessing “raise” and “pluto” you’ve taken care of all of them.
The letter X is a great visual helper
Your guesses from here on out should be the first time you go off script, but by now you should have a clearer picture of what the word is likely to be.
However, it’s not uncommon to get to a point where you’ve exhausted just about every word combination possible, and you’re left wondering, What could it be?
In cases where you’ve got most or all of your correct letters in their rightful spots, I find it helps to use the letter X to fill in the blanks.
So in the above image, you can see I’ve got the A, I, and O in the right spots, I’ve guessed “avion” incorrectly, and I don’t have a lot of letters left that make any sense.
Pop an X in the second and fifth spots, and we can then start noodling what the other letters could possibly be.
In this case, there’s the happy accident that X happens to be the actual second letter, followed by M as the final letter to spell out “axiom”—a normally tough word, but we got it in four.
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