The 15 Easiest Wordle Words Ever, Ranked

The easiest Wordle answer so far is ACUTE. It was the answer on 26 December 2021 (#190) and again on 26 June 2026 (#1,833). Open with CRANE or SLATE on an ACUTE day and only two words still fit: ACUTE and SAUCE. ARISE, RAISE, ATONE and IRATE are next. They are easy for the same reasons. They use the most common Wordle letters, they have no repeated letters, and almost no other answer looks like them.

Below are the 15 easiest Wordle answers out of all 1,954 puzzles from 19 June 2021 to 24 October 2026. You'll also find the days when a famous starting word was the answer, and what makes a Wordle easy, so you can spot one coming.

The 15 easiest Wordle answers so far

We took every answer and played four of the most popular openers against it: CRANE, SLATE, ADIEU and STARE. "Words left" is how many possible answers still fit after that first guess, averaged over the four. The fewer words left, the easier the day. A typical Wordle leaves about 88.

We left out the four openers themselves (CRANE, SLATE and STARE were all answers once). If you open with the answer, the puzzle is over in one guess, which tells you nothing about the word.

#1: ACUTE

Open with CRANE on an ACUTE day and you get A green, C yellow and E green. Only ACUTE and SAUCE fit that pattern, so the worst case is a three-guess win. SLATE does the same job. ACUTE has no "trap family" either: no other Wordle answer is one letter away from it. It came back in 2026, after Wordle began repeating answers.

#2 and #3: ARISE and RAISE

These two use the same five letters, and both are popular starting words. Anyone who opens with them solved those days in one guess. For everyone else, A, R, I, S and E are among the most common letters in Wordle answers, so almost any sensible opener lit up three or four of them.

#4: ATONE

The neatest case in the list. If you opened with STARE on 14 June 2022, exactly one word fit your colours: ATONE. CRANE left only ALONE and ATONE. Players who started with ADIEU had a harder time (22 words left), which shows how much the opener matters on any given day.

#5: IRATE

IRATE is the strongest opener in our starting-word study, so it makes sense that it was an easy answer: its letters are exactly the ones most guesses test first. It was the answer on 4 July 2023.

The days a famous starting word was the answer

If you open with the same word every day, these were your lucky days. ADIEU, the most talked-about opener, has never been the answer.

Should you switch openers because one has already been used? Not any more. Since 2 February 2026 the New York Times has been reusing past answers, and TRACE has already come up twice. A word that was the answer once can be the answer again. See does Wordle repeat words for every repeat so far.

Why are some Wordle words so easy?

Every word on the list has the same four things going for it.

1. The most common letters, in the usual spots. A, E, R, T, S and I turn up in most Wordle answers, and most openers test them first. An E at the end, like ACUTE, ARISE and ATONE, turns green straight away for anyone who opens with SLATE, CRANE or STARE.
2. No repeated letters. None of the 15 easiest answers repeats a letter. Players rarely guess a double letter early, which is why words like VIVID end up on the hardest Wordle words list instead.
3. No trap family. A trap family is a group of answers that differ by one letter, like BATCH, CATCH, HATCH, LATCH, MATCH, PATCH and WATCH. When you have _ATCH with two guesses left, you are guessing, not solving. ACUTE, EMAIL and ARGUE have no family at all.
4. A word everyone knows. Letters only get you to a short list. You still need to think of the word. ACUTE, RAISE and TRADE are everyday words. Compare PIQUE or FOYER, where the letters are known but the word doesn't come to mind.

Here is how far apart the two ends are. After CRANE, an ACUTE day leaves 2 possible answers. A WATCH day leaves 29, and a LIGHT day leaves 287.

Is the easiest Wordle the one that felt easiest?

Not always. Our list measures the letters: how quickly a good first guess narrows things down. How a day feels also depends on whether the word comes to mind. When CLOTH was the answer (#260, 6 March 2022), players called it the easiest Wordle ever because so many got it in two. It doesn't make our top 15, but it is a short, everyday word with very common letters.

EMAIL is the opposite. The letters narrow it to about ten words, yet plenty of players don't think of EMAIL as a "Wordle word" and burn a guess on something else first. The easiest days are the ones where both line up: common letters and a word you'd say out loud every day.

Is there an easy mode in Wordle?

No. The New York Times version has Hard Mode, which makes you reuse every letter you have found, but there is no easier setting. You get five letters and six guesses every day. If you want a gentler game, you have a few options:

• Play 4-letter words. WordlyPlay's Wordle Unlimited has an Easy setting with 4-letter words and 7 guesses. It is a good fit for kids, beginners and warm-ups.
• Use an opener built from common letters. CRANE, SLATE and STARE turned the easy days on this list into two- and three-guess wins. Our best starting words guide compares the strongest ones.
• Practise the patterns. The more rounds you play, the faster you spot that _CUTE has only one possible answer while _ATCH has seven.

How we measured

We took all 1,954 daily answers from 19 June 2021 (#0) to 24 October 2026 (#1,953) from the New York Times' own puzzle data. For each answer we played CRANE, SLATE, ADIEU and STARE as the first guess and counted the possible answers that would still match the colours. The pool was the full list of about 2,500 words that can be Wordle answers. The score is the average over the four openers. A lower score means the first guess did more of the work. It measures the letters, not any one player's day.

Common questions