There are different ways in which you can optimally play Wordle.

There are different ways in which you can optimally play Wordle. Image: Canva

Wordle: The best guesses to use for your daily word challenge

According to different algorithms and Wordle fanatics, there are different ways that you can ‘unwordle’ a Wordle.

There are different ways in which you can optimally play Wordle.

There are different ways in which you can optimally play Wordle. Image: Canva

As Wordle became possibly the first viral moment of 2022, many players of the highly addictive game wonder what are the best guesses that they could use for their daily word challenge.

What are the best guesses to use for Wordle?

According to Inverse, Josh Wardle’s daily word game prompted plenty of intrigue from those in scientific communities, asking whether it is possible for an algorithm to determine the absolute best starter word for any situation.

While the answer to this remains fairly complex, the publication highlights different algorithms from different sources.

The optimal first guess in Wordle

A person by the name Tyler Glaie made an algorithm to dissect Wordle’s known list of 2 315 possible answers and 12 972 potential guesses by assigning each word with a hypothetical score. In this case, SOARE returned the highest score of all potential guesses, while ROATE was able to get to solutions the fastest. The word, RAISE was found to be the one that Glaiel’s algorithm found to be the single best outlet for potentially getting the correct Wordle in a single guess.

The best starter words

Mahmood Hikmet’s algorithm uses the most popular letters in the solutions are deemed the best starter words to guess. Some of Hikmet’s best starter words according to his Unwordle tool designed to help you solve Wordle puzzles has a 99.3% success rate. It uses the strategy of only examining the list of answers to figure out the best possible starting guesses. These starting words are listed in order of their effectiveness.

  • SLATE
  • SAUCE
  • SLICE
  • SHALE
  • SAUTE
  • SHARE
  • SOOTY
  • SHINE
  • SUITE
  • RANE

How to Always Win at Wordle

Andrew Taylor’s “How to Always Win at Wordle” video offers a numerical score to each of the potential solutions, with the lowest score signifying the best solutions worth guessing.

  • REAIS: This was deemed Taylor’s very best starting word, with only 168 potential solutions having none of those letters in it.
  • BLAHS: This was noted to be Taylor’s best word for eliminating the most answers.
  • CENTU: This was Taylor’s word that was second most effective at eliminating words.
  • DOGGO: Taylor’s third-best word at eliminating potential answers.

Don’t ruin it for others

According to AFP, Twitter suspended a bot account on Wednesday, 27 January for spoiling the solution to the next day’s Wordle.

The Twitter profile @wordlinator wanted to ruin the fun for participants posting their scores on the social media site.

“The account was suspended for violating the Twitter Rules and the Automation Rules around sending unsolicited @mentions,” a Twitter spokesperson told AFP.

The bot account automatically responded to accounts posting their Wordle scores with messages such as “Guess what. People don’t care about your mediocre linguistic escapades. To teach you a lesson, tomorrow’s word is” — followed by the actual answer for the next day.

Twitter said it does not tolerate its platform being used to harass other users.