NYT Wordle today — answer and hints for game #1,041, Thursday, April 25
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? My Quordle today page contains hints and answers for that game, and you can also take a look at my new NYT Strands today page for my verdict on the New York Times’ latest brainteaser.
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 #1,041) – 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 #1,041) – clue #2 – first letter
What letter does today’s Wordle begin with?
• The first letter in today’s Wordle answer is I.
I is only the 19th most common starting letter in Wordle, and just 34 of the original 2,309 answers begin with it.
Wordle hints (game #1,041) – clue #3 – repeated letters
Does today’s Wordle have any repeated letters?
• There are no 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 #1,041) – clue #4 – ending letter
What letter does today’s Wordle end with?
• The last letter in today’s Wordle is O.
O is a middling ending letter. It ranks 12th in this regard, and finishes 58 Wordle answers in total.
Wordle hints (game #1,041) – clue #5 – last chance
Still looking for more Wordle hints today? Here’s an extra one for game #1,041.
- Today’s Wordle answer is at the start.
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 #1,041)
- NYT average score: 3.9
- My score: 3
- WordleBot’s score: 3
- Best start word performance*: SNARE (1 remaining answer)
- My start word performance: OAKEN (73)
* From WordleBot’s Top 20 start words
Today’s Wordle answer (game #1,041) is… INTRO.
For some reason I expected this to be a much, much easier game than yesterday’s OVERT (see below), but at the time of writing it has a higher average score of 3.9 compared to the previous day’s 3.8.
My hunch was based on the fact that OVERT contains a V, whereas INTRO has no uncommon letters at all, but evidently that wasn’t as big of a factor as I thought. There’s nothing particularly complicated about it, but maybe the fact that it starts and ends with vowels – which isn’t a common format – was enough to trip people up.
Start words were generally helpful; STARE, one of the most popular, left only nine possible answers and CRANE, WordleBot’s favorite, was at 18. Really, I’m at a loss to explain why it’s as high as 3.9.
It certainly didn’t cause me any real problems. My random opener was OAKEN, which WordleBot informed me was a “distinctive” guess. It wasn’t hugely successful though, giving me only two yellow letters and leaving 73 possible solutions. Fortunately I had a secret weapon on hand in the form of CRONY. This was a word I regularly used to play in the old days when I started with STARE, because it made a great second guess if the R turned yellow. My reasoning then was that if I knew E wasn’t at the end, it made sense to put a Y there instead, while covering off another common ending letter by including N.
Here, I knew the N didn’t end the answer, and that again there was no E. So Y was again a very likely ending letter, and if not that then maybe R. CRONY it was.
My reasoning was sound (I think), but way off the mark, because the Y turned gray. But no matter, the R did turn yellow, and I’d now cut my options to six.
I didn’t know that at the time, of course, because you can only use WordleBot once you’ve finished playing. But it wasn’t too hard to find those half-dozen options anyway: NORTH, MINOR, DONOR, HONOR, INTRO and NITRO were the ones I came up with, and they matched the ‘bot’s list too.
I ruled out NORTH right away, because I knew it had been a past Wordle answer (game #946 in January this year), which left five. None of those would guarantee a solve in four guesses, because all could leave me with a 50/50 between two final answers. So there was no real reason to choose one over the other; it was purely down to guesswork.
Ultimately I went with INTRO, because unlike HONOR and DONOR it didn’t contain a repeated letter, and unlike MINOR it didn’t contain a (slightly more) uncommon letter. NITRO would have made just as much sense, but I wasn’t convinced that would be an actual answer. So, INTRO it was.
I didn’t expect it to be correct, but I figured it would probably point the way to the actual answer. Instead, I got lucky and all five letters turned green for an unexpected 3/6.
How did you do today? Send me an email and let me know.
Yesterday’s Wordle hints (game #1,040)
In a different time zone where it’s still Wednesday? Don’t worry – I can give you some clues for Wordle #1,040, 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 O.
Vowels are generally less common than you’d expect at the start of a word, and O is only the 17th most likely letter to begin a Wordle answer.
- There were no 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 T.
T is a very common letter to end a Wordle answer – in fact only E and Y are more likely in that position.
Still looking for more Wordle hints? Here’s an extra one for game #1,040.
- Yesterday’s Wordle answer is open to view.
Yesterday’s Wordle answer (game #1,040)
- NYT average score: 3.8
- My score: 4
- WordleBot’s score: 4
- Best start word performance*: CARET (11 remaining answers)
- My start word performance: SPEAR (29)
* From WordleBot’s Top 20 start words
Yesterday’s Wordle answer (game #1,040) was… OVERT.
And so the Wordle rollercoaster continues on its up-and-down ride; from a 3.9 score for FACET last Thursday to a 3.0 for RAISE, then up again to 3.7 for LUCID, then a terrifying climb to JOLLY’s 5.4, a sudden plummet to 3.3 for LASER, and then another huge peak for ROVER (5.0) yesterday. All of which brings us to today’s OVERT… which is back down to 3.8. What a week, eh?
OVERT might cause a few people problems, but compared to ROVER and JOLLY it’s a cinch. It has an uncommon letter, V, but no repeats and no horrible ER ending. Plus, some of the best Wordle start words cut the options down considerably, which wasn’t the case yesterday.
CARET left only 11, but more relevant to the overall average was STARE, which left only 12 possible answers. As you probably know by now, STARE is hugely popular as a start word (which might be my fault, in part, given that it was my opener until the start of the year) and today it was used by 4% of Wordlers, all of whom will have been pretty happy.
I could only score a 4/6, despite a decent start myself thanks to my random opener SPEAR cutting the answers list to 29. Considering that yesterday I had 449, that’s not a terrible result.
Unfortunately, my second guess failed to capitalize on that promising beginning. I wanted to include the E in the fourth spot, despite it having turned green in the middle, because a repeated E was a possibility in the likes of CREED, CREEK, GREEN, GREED, FREED and REEDY, all of which were on my shortlist. CRIED enabled me to do that, while including three more common letters and playing R in its most likely position.
However, I was on the wrong track. The second E was not included, the R stayed stubbornly yellow, the C, I and D were all gray. I cut the answer list from 29 to 11, but a 4/6 was now the best I could realistically achieve.
I looked again at my shortlist, and came up with six that still worked: EVERY, LEERY, THERE, OVERT, WHERE, QUERY. The five I missed, according to WordleBot, were EMERY, EXERT, EVERT, TWERK and RHEUM (although I didn’t actually miss EXERT – I dismissed it as a past Wordle answer). Do I think any of those words are really possible solutions? EMERY probably is, TWERK is a maybe. I’d be surprised if RHEUM or EVERT are, though.
Anyway, with those six in mind I decided that THERE was the best option. It would guarantee me a 4/6 at worst, unless the answer was LEERY or EVERY – in which case I’d still face a 50/50 and might score a 5/6. But there was also the chance it might be right and I’d score a 3/6.
It was a good guess, and a lucky one; though it didn’t solve the Wordle, it did give me the yellow T that pointed the way to OVERT, so I played that next for an acceptable 4/6.
Wordle answers: The past 50
I’ve been playing Wordle every day for more than two 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 #1040, Wednesday 24 April: OVERT
- Wordle #1039, Tuesday 23 April: ROVER
- Wordle #1038, Monday 22 April: LASER
- Wordle #1037, Sunday 21 April: JOLLY
- Wordle #1036, Saturday 20 April: LUCID
- Wordle #1035, Friday 19 April: RAISE
- Wordle #1034, Thursday 18 April: FACET
- Wordle #1033, Wednesday 17 April: TITHE
- Wordle #1032, Tuesday 16 April: SHANK
- Wordle #1031, Monday 15 April: EQUIP
- Wordle #1030, Sunday 14 April: BLIMP
- Wordle #1029, Saturday 13 April: STEEL
- Wordle #1028, Friday 12 April: WHINY
- Wordle #1027, Thursday 11 April: LOUSE
- Wordle #1026, Wednesday 10 April: BROTH
- Wordle #1025, Tuesday 9 April: MERGE
- Wordle #1024, Monday 8 April: BREED
- Wordle #1023, Sunday 7 April: VOILA
- Wordle #1022, Saturday 6 April: FINCH
- Wordle #1021, Friday 5 April: WRIST
- Wordle #1020, Thursday 4 April: CLIMB
- Wordle #1019, Wednesday 3 April: PLAIT
- Wordle #1018, Tuesday 2 April: SERUM
- Wordle #1017, Monday 1 April: FROND
- Wordle #1016, Sunday 31 March: TABOO
- Wordle #1015, Saturday 30 March: FORCE
- Wordle #1014, Friday 29 March: REALM
- Wordle #1013, Thursday 28 March: SPEAK
- Wordle #1012, Wednesday 27 March: STUNG
- Wordle #1011, Tuesday 26 March: MAYOR
- Wordle #1010, Monday 25 March: SALLY
- Wordle #1009, Sunday 24 March: TOWEL
- Wordle #1008, Saturday 23 March: RISEN
- Wordle #1007, Friday 22 March: DECAY
- Wordle #1006, Thursday 21 March: SHADE
- Wordle #1005, Wednesday 20 March: LINGO
- Wordle #1004, Tuesday 19 March: ABIDE
- Wordle #1003, Monday 18 March: SPELT
- Wordle #1002, Sunday 17 March: SNORT
- Wordle #1001, Saturday 16 March: TOXIN
- Wordle #1000, Friday 15 March: ERUPT
- Wordle #999, Thursday 14 March: SINCE
- Wordle #998, Wednesday 13 March: LOCAL
- Wordle #997, Tuesday 12 March: HEAVE
- Wordle #996, Monday 11 March: PESKY
- Wordle #995, Sunday 10 March: GRASP
- Wordle #994, Saturday 9 March: CHEER
- Wordle #993, Friday 8 March: EARLY
- Wordle #992, Thursday 7 March: CLONE
- Wordle #991, Wednesday 6 March: TEARY
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.
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