A new NYT Wordle puzzle appears at midnight each day for your time zone – which means that some people are always playing ‘today’s game’ while others are playing ‘yesterday’s’. If you’re looking for Monday’s puzzle instead then click here.
It’s time for your guide to today’s Wordle answer, featuring my commentary on the latest puzzle, plus a selection of hints designed to help you keep your streak going.
Don’t think you need any clues for Wordle today? No problem, just skip to my daily column. But remember: failure in this game is only ever six guesses away.
Want more word-based fun? TechRadar’s Quordle today page contains hints and answers for that game, and you can also take a look at our NYT Strands today and NYT Connections today pages for our verdict on two of the New York Times’ other brainteasers.
SPOILER WARNING: Today’s Wordle answer and hints are below, so don’t read on if you don’t want to see them.
Wordle hints (game #1382) – clue #1 – Vowels
How many vowels does today’s Wordle have?
• Wordle today has vowels in two places*.
* Note that by vowel we mean the five standard vowels (A, E, I, O, U), not Y (which is sometimes counted as a vowel too).
Wordle hints (game #1382) – clue #2 – first letter
What letter does today’s Wordle begin with?
• The first letter in today’s Wordle answer is J.
J is the least common letter overall in Wordle, but is only the fourth least likely starting letter. That’s because it begins 20 out of the 27 answers it appears in (Y, Z and X are all less common starting letters).
Wordle hints (game #1382) – clue #3 – repeated letters
Does today’s Wordle have any repeated letters?
• There are repeated letters in today’s Wordle.
Repeated letters are quite common in the game, with 748 of the 2,309 Wordle answers containing one. However, it’s still more likely that a Wordle doesn’t have one.
Wordle hints (game #1382) – clue #4 – ending letter
What letter does today’s Wordle end with?
• The last letter in today’s Wordle is L.
L is a really common letter to find at the end of a Wordle. There are 155 games that finish with an L, and it ranks as the fifth most likely letter there.
Wordle hints (game #1382) – clue #5 – last chance
Still looking for more Wordle hints today? Here’s an extra one for game #1382.
- Today’s Wordle answer is a precious gem.
If you just want to know today’s Wordle answer now, simply scroll down – but I’d always recommend trying to solve it on your own first. We’ve got lots of Wordle tips and tricks to help you, including a guide to the best Wordle start words.
If you don’t want to know today’s answer then DO NOT SCROLL ANY FURTHER BECAUSE IT IS PRINTED BELOW. So don’t say you weren’t warned!
Today’s Wordle answer (game #1382)
- NYT average score: 4.6
- My score: 4
- WordleBot’s score: 4
- My start word performance: WRACK (59 remaining answers)
- WordleBot’s start word performance: CRANE (273)
Today’s Wordle answer (game #1382) is… JEWEL.
Oof! Wordle not tough enough for you lately, even with QUOTA and BOOTY in successive games? Well, try JEWEL for size.
Like QUOTA, it begins with an uncommon letter – in this case J, the least common in the entire game. And like BOOTY, it contains a repeated letter, E in this case. But it also has a relatively rare W in the middle, plus more than a passing resemblance to the likes of BEVEL, REVEL, LEVEL, REBEL, BEZEL, REPEL and others.
Put all that together and you have an average score of 4.6. Or, in other words, a very difficult Wordle indeed.
I was therefore very fortunate to play WRACK on my first guess today. This gave me the W right away, and cut the possible answers list to 59 – a far better result than WordleBot got with CRANE (273).
I deliberated for what seemed like hours over what to play next. I figured that W may well go after an S or T, and so nearly played SWINE or SWIPE before ultimately choosing TWINE.
This was a decent choice – but not fantastic, and it only cut my options to an unlucky 13. I didn’t find anywhere near that many myself – I had BELOW, and ELBOW (which I knew was a past Wordle answer), and VOWEL and JEWEL.
Many of the others were not true misses on my part, though – WordleBot included lots of ED words such as MOWED and VOWED, and they’re unlikely to ever be solutions.
Based on the words I’d found, BELOW was guaranteed to give me the answer on the fourth guess.
And though I had missed a couple of genuine options (namely DOWEL and BOWEL), it did indeed point me in the right direction; with the W still yellow and the B and O ruled out, JEWEL was the only possible solution.
How did you do today? Send me an email or let me know in the comments.
Yesterday’s Wordle hints (game #1381)
In a different time zone where it’s still Monday? Don’t worry – I can give you some clues for Wordle #1381, too.
- Wordle yesterday had vowels in two places.
* Note that by vowel we mean the five standard vowels (A, E, I, O, U), not Y (which is sometimes counted as a vowel too).
- The first letter in yesterday’s Wordle answer was B.
B is a very, very common starting letter in Wordle. In fact, it’s the third most common overall, behind only S and C.
- There were repeated letters in yesterday’s Wordle.
Repeated letters are quite common in the game, with 748 of the 2,309 Wordle answers containing one. However, it’s still more likely that a Wordle doesn’t have one.
- The last letter in yesterday’s Wordle was Y.
Y is the second most common ending letter in the game, behind only E. In total, 364 Wordle answers end with a Y.
Still looking for more Wordle hints? Here’s an extra one for game #1381.
- Yesterday’s Wordle answer is plunder, or something you might shake.
Yesterday’s Wordle answer (game #1381)
- NYT average score: 4.2
- My score: 5
- WordleBot’s score: 3
- My start word performance: FIGHT (288 remaining answers)
- WordleBot’s start word performance: CRANE (356)
Yesterday’s Wordle answer (game #1381) was… BOOTY.
While Sunday’s QUOTA was a difficult Wordle with a lower-than-expected average score due to a single start word skewing the statistics, Monday’s is simply a difficult Wordle, full stop.
It has an average score of 4.2, and features my least favorite of all Wordle formats: the dreaded OO. And, as if to prove that it’s my nemesis, it caused me to suffer my first 5/6 since LADLE more than two weeks ago.
Oh, how I do hate those double-Os. I never spot them early and always struggle to place letters either side of them. It’s becoming a bit of a cliche.
Still, I’m clearly not the only one to struggle yesterday – although annoyingly, the ‘Bot managed a three despite its opening CRANE leaving 356 possible solutions compared to the 288 left by my FIGHT.
WordleBot’s trick was to play SLOTH second time out, which left at most two words (BOOTY and FOOTY) and most likely just the one. In contrast, I followed up with STALE, and this was unlucky in leaving 24.
My third guess was TRUNK, which made sense at the time as T had already been ruled out in its most common position at the end of a word and therefore would surely go at the start. The other letters were all common apart from K, which is a regular visitor to the end of words and therefore not a bad choice given that I knew T, E and L would not be going there.
The problem was simply that I hadn’t considered enough words at this stage. I knew that TROOP, TRUNK, TRUCK, POTTY, PUTTY, DOTTY, NUTTY and TRUMP were all possibles, but had missed a dozen or so more including MOTTO, TUTOR, MOTOR, OUTDO, TUBBY and, yes, BOOTY. Maybe if I’d found some more I would have played something else; WordleBot suggested that TRUMP was the better bet.
Anyway, TRUNK was unsuccessful but did cut those 20-plus options down to a quartet of POTTY, DOTTY, BOOTY and MOTTO.
POTTY and DOTTY would guarantee a five at worst, the other two wouldn’t – so I played DOTTY then had to follow up with BOOTY for that five. Frustrating.
Wordle answers: The past 50
I’ve been playing Wordle every day for more than three years now and have tracked all of the previous answers so I can help you improve your game. Here are the last 50 solutions starting with yesterday’s answer, or check out my past Wordle answers page for the full list.
- Wordle #1381, Monday’s 31 March: BOOTY
- Wordle #1380, Sunday 30 March: QUOTA
- Wordle #1379, Saturday 29 March: SORRY
- Wordle #1378, Friday 28 March: VERSE
- Wordle #1377, Thursday 27 March: SHEET
- Wordle #1376, Wednesday 26 March: ELBOW
- Wordle #1375, Tuesday 25 March: SHELF
- Wordle #1374, Monday 24 March: ANGLE
- Wordle #1373, Sunday 23 March: DOPEY
- Wordle #1372, Saturday 22 March: AMBLE
- Wordle #1371, Friday 21 March: NUDGE
- Wordle #1370, Thursday 20 March: BASTE
- Wordle #1369, Wednesday 19 March: SPARK
- Wordle #1368, Tuesday 18 March: TIMER
- Wordle #1367, Monday 17 March: LASSO
- Wordle #1366, Sunday 16 March: STAMP
- Wordle #1365, Saturday 15 March: LADLE
- Wordle #1364, Friday 14 March: PIECE
- Wordle #1363, Thursday 13 March: CHASE
- Wordle #1362, Wednesday 12 March: MANGO
- Wordle #1361, Tuesday 11 March: TRACK
- Wordle #1360, Monday 10 March: SPITE
- Wordle #1359, Sunday 9 March: GREED
- Wordle #1358, Saturday 8 March: NAVEL
- Wordle #1357, Friday 7 March: TROOP
- Wordle #1356, Thursday 6 March: ALERT
- Wordle #1355, Wednesday 5 March: SCRUM
- Wordle #1354, Tuesday 4 March: CHECK
- Wordle #1353, Monday 3 March: SPEAR
- Wordle #1352, Sunday 2 March: DEITY
- Wordle #1351, Saturday 1 March: HOVER
- Wordle #1350, Friday 28 February: FUZZY
- Wordle #1349, Thursday 27 February: LODGE
- Wordle #1348, Wednesday 26 February: AWARD
- Wordle #1347, Tuesday 25 February: DRYER
- Wordle #1346, Monday 24 February: GLAND
- Wordle #1345, Sunday 23 February: OTTER
- Wordle #1344, Saturday 22 February: CREAM
- Wordle #1343, Friday 21 February: CLOVE
- Wordle #1342, Thursday 20 February: ROACH
- Wordle #1341, Wednesday 19 February: MADLY
- Wordle #1340, Tuesday 18 February: INDIE
- Wordle #1339, Monday 17 February: TRAIL
- Wordle #1338, Sunday 16 February: SUAVE
- Wordle #1337, Saturday 15 February: CROOK
- Wordle #1336, Friday 14 February: DITTY
- Wordle #1335, Thursday 13 February: RUMBA
- Wordle #1334, Wednesday 12 February: RAPID
- Wordle #1333, Tuesday 11 February: SCORE
- Wordle #1332, Monday 10 February: GOODY
- Wordle #1331, Sunday 9 February: BONUS
What is Wordle?
If you’re on this page then you almost certainly know what Wordle is already, and indeed have probably been playing it for a while. And even if you’ve not been playing it, you must surely have heard of it by now, because it’s the viral word game phenomenon that took the world by storm last year and is still going strong in 2024.
We’ve got a full guide to the game in our What is Wordle page, but if you just want a refresher then here are the basics.
What is Wordle?
Wordle challenges you to guess a new five-letter word each day. You get six guesses, with each one revealing a little more information. If one of the letters in your guess is in the answer and in the right place, it turns green. If it’s in the answer but in the wrong place, it turns yellow. And if it’s not in the answer at all it turns gray. Simple, eh?
It’s played online via the Wordle website or the New York Times’ Crossword app (iOS / Android), and is entirely free.
Crucially, the answer is the same for everyone each day, meaning that you’re competing against the rest of the world, rather than just against yourself or the game. The puzzle then resets each day at midnight in your local time, giving you a new challenge, and the chance to extend your streak.
What are the Wordle rules?
The rules of Wordle are pretty straightforward, but with a couple of curveballs thrown in for good measure.
1. Letters that are in the answer and in the right place turn green.
2. Letters that are in the answer but in the wrong place turn yellow.
3. Letters that are not in the answer turn gray.
4. Answers are never plural.
5. Letters can appear more than once. So if your guess includes two of one letter, they may both turn yellow, both turn green, or one could be yellow and the other green.
6. Each guess must be a valid word in Wordle’s dictionary. You can’t guess ABCDE, for instance.
7. You do not have to include correct letters in subsequent guesses unless you play on Hard mode.
8. You have six guesses to solve the Wordle.
9. You must complete the daily Wordle before midnight in your timezone.
10. All answers are drawn from Wordle’s list of 2,309 solutions. However…
11. Wordle will accept a wider pool of words as guesses – some 10,000 of them. For instance, you can guess a plural such as WORDS. It definitely won’t be right (see point 4 above), but Wordle will accept it as a guess.