NYT Wordle today — answer and hints for game #1096, Wednesday, June 19
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 NYT Strands today and NYT Connections today pages for my 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 #1096) – 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 #1096) – clue #2 – first letter
What letter does today’s Wordle begin with?
• The first letter in today’s Wordle answer is T.
T is one of the most common starting letters in the game, beginning 149 of Wordle’s 2,309 answers. That gives it a ranking of fourth in the alphabet, behind only S, C and B.
Wordle hints (game #1096) – 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 #1096) – clue #4 – ending letter
What letter does today’s Wordle end with?
• The last letter in today’s Wordle is E.
E is the most common letter to end a Wordle answer by far. That’s one of the reasons why many of the best start words, including SLATE, CRANE, CRATE and STARE, all end with one.
Wordle hints (game #1096) – clue #5 – last chance
Still looking for more Wordle hints today? Here’s an extra one for game #1096.
- Today’s Wordle answer is brusque.
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 #1096)
- NYT average score: 3.8
- My score: 4
- WordleBot’s score: 3
- Best start word performance*: STARE (1 remaining answer)
- My start word performance: ROGER (150)
* From WordleBot’s Top 20 start words
Today’s Wordle answer (game #1096) is… TERSE.
If ever there was a Wordle to divide opinion, it’s this one. TERSE has an average score of 3.8, at the time of writing, but that doesn’t come close to telling the full story. And that story concerns start word performance.
Start words are of course a huge part of the game, but even the best ones don’t work every day. Today, however, 12 of WordleBot’s top 20 reduced the answers list to single figures. The pick of them was STARE, which today left only a single answer and therefore a guaranteed score of 2/6. But not far behind that came CARTE, LEAST and TASER with two, SLATE, TRACE, TRADE and TRICE at four, STALE at five, CARET at six, PARSE at seven and CRATE at eight.
Not all of those are commonly played openers, admittedly, but STARE is; it was the third most popular opener among Wordlers today, as it often is. SLATE is another one that many people begin with, plus, you can add the fact that ARISE left 10, RAISE left nine and IRATE six; all three were among the most frequently played today.
Many of the people beginning with those words will have scored a 2/6 or 3/6, then. But not everyone was so lucky. ADIEU, the most popular of all start words, left 228 options, while AUDIO (second on the list) left 245.
What you’ll have here, then, is a game where many people got low scores and many others got high ones. Because make no mistake, TERSE has the potential to be quite hard. The repeated E is obviously a complicating factor, as are the out-of-position R and S. Many people will have had three or four letters early on, but may well not have worked out where they each went.
That was the story of my game to an extent. My opener was ROGER; not a very lucky one, but it did give me a yellow R and E, while leaving 150 words. For the second guess I played it safe once again, and went for CRANE. This placed the E but not the R, and cut the words list to a dozen.
At this point I went into thinking mode and came up with a shortlist of nine: PURSE, VERSE, TERSE, THERE, WHERE, VERVE, SHIRE, SERVE and SPIRE. The ones I missed, according to the ‘bot, were EERIE, METRE and LITRE. I deliberated for ages about what to play in order to narrow down the options and guarantee a solve in four, and eventually came up with SHIRT. This would do the trick unless the answer was PURSE or VERVE, in which case it would leave a 50/50 – but I had an inkling that VERVE had been a past Wordle answer, so was prepared to take that risk (it had, in 2023). As it happens, so had THERE, WHERE, SHIRE, SPIRE and SERVE too, so really my answers list was a lot shorter than I thought. But hey, you can’t expect me to remember every previous answer.
WordleBot loved shirt, although it pointed out that HEIST would have been even better, because it wouldn’t have left any 50/50s at all. Still, that didn’t matter because the S and T both turned yellow, joining the still-yellow R, which meant the answer had to be TERSE. I played that next for my 4/6.
How did you do today? Send me an email and let me know.
Yesterday’s Wordle hints (game #1095)
In a different time zone where it’s still Tuesday? Don’t worry – I can give you some clues for Wordle #1095, 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 C.
C is a very common starting letter in Wordle – in fact, it’s the second most common of all, behind only S.
- 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 R.
R is a very common letter to end a Wordle answer – it’s actually the 4th most common there, behind E, Y and T.
Still looking for more Wordle hints? Here’s an extra one for game #1095.
- Yesterday’s Wordle answer is to hide from view.
Yesterday’s Wordle answer (game #1095)
- NYT average score: 4.3
- My score: 4
- WordleBot’s score: 3
- Best start word performance*: CRATE (11 remaining answers)
- My start word performance: SQUIB (1,133)
* From WordleBot’s Top 20 start words
Yesterday’s Wordle answer (game #1095) was… COVER.
Guess what, Wordlers? Yes, it’s an ER answer! And you know what that means? Yes, it’s high-average-score time, complete with all the fun of lost streaks and much pulling out of hair and gnashing of teeth.
COVER is not horrendously difficult as ER words go. WordleBot says it has an average score of 4.3, which is high, yes, but not vertiginously so. It’s a little harder, supposedly, than VAULT and DETER last week, but easier than SWUNG, MANGA and HENCE. There’s no repeated letter to worry about, which is a blessing, but there is an uncommon letter in the form of V.
Or rather, there’s a relatively uncommon letter. As my analysis of every Wordle answer shows, V is the fifth least likely to appear in the game, ahead of only Z, X, Q and J, in that order. However, there’s a chasm-like gap between V and Z, with the former occurring 152 times in Wordle solutions, and the latter only 40.
You wouldn’t throw one into an answer with abandon like you might an R or T, then, but it should always be considered as a possible, particularly in the middle of an ER word. In fact – and here’s a remarkable statistic for you – V is the second most likely letter to appear in the middle of an ER answer. Seriously, there are 14 instances in which V crops up in the center of one of these words, behind only T (which appears 16 times). Given that there are 141 ER solutions, that means a V appears in the middle 10% of the time. Yes, I am lots of fun at parties…
When you also consider that the C at the start, O in second, E in fourth and R in fifth are all very common, you have several factors to mitigate the word’s inherent difficulty. But then again, it is an ER word, so it’s still tricky.
Your task will have been easier if your start word began with a C, obviously. CRANE left only 12 possibles, CRATE 11, and they were the pick of WordleBot’s top 20. But without that, you may have struggled. STARE, for instance, left 185 answers.
Oh how I would loved to have that kind of start myself – because my random word generator told me I had to play SQUIB. Oh dear. WordleBot said it was a “bold choice” and that it was “not what I would have picked”. No, me neither. And unsurprisingly, it didn’t fare well, leaving me with… ready for this… 1,133 possible solutions.
I didn’t think too hard about my second guess, playing CRANE as my best shot at rescuing things. And it did of course, cutting those 1,000-plus words down to a mere seven. That must be one of the biggest turnarounds I’ve ever enjoyed.
I drew up a shortlist, and came up with five: CHEER, COVER, COWER, CODER and CORER. WordleBot also had CORED (unlikely) and CLERK (very possible, I should have spotted it).
Of those five, I was fairly sure that CHEER had been a past Wordle answer, and was right – I didn’t check until after I’d finished, but it appeared in March this year. COWER was also a previous solution, but that was from July 2023 and I didn’t remember that. So I went with WORDY next, which would guarantee me a four: if the W changed color it would be COWER, if the R in the middle then CORER, if the D then CODER, and if the O without the others, it would be COVER.
The latter scenario is the one that played out, so I got my average-beating 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 #1095, Tuesday 18 June: COVER
- Wordle #1094, Monday 17 June: PRIOR
- Wordle #1093, Sunday 16 June: GRIND
- Wordle #1092, Saturday 15 June: PROUD
- Wordle #1091, Friday 14 June: VAULT
- Wordle #1090, Thursday 13 June: ANGST
- Wordle #1089, Wednesday 12 June: DETER
- Wordle #1088, Tuesday 11 June: SWUNG
- Wordle #1087, Monday 10 June: MANGA
- Wordle #1086, Sunday 9 June: CROWD
- Wordle #1085, Saturday 8 June: HENCE
- Wordle #1084, Friday 7 June: MELON
- Wordle #1083, Thursday 6 June: ETHER
- Wordle #1082, Wednesday 5 June: ORGAN
- Wordle #1081, Tuesday 4 June: GROOM
- Wordle #1080, Monday 3 June: STARK
- Wordle #1079, Sunday 2 June: BRAVO
- Wordle #1078, Saturday 1 June: BASIN
- Wordle #1077, Friday 31 May: CHAOS
- Wordle #1076, Thursday 30 May: GUMMY
- Wordle #1075, Wednesday 29 May: PAPAL
- Wordle #1074, Tuesday 28 May: MINUS
- Wordle #1073, Monday 27 May: SKIER
- Wordle #1072, Sunday 26 May: BEVEL
- Wordle #1071, Saturday 25 May: TITAN
- Wordle #1070, Friday 24 May: GLIDE
- Wordle #1069, Thursday 23 May: SWISH
- Wordle #1068, Wednesday 22 May: EXALT
- Wordle #1067, Tuesday 21 May: DINGO
- Wordle #1066, Monday 20 May: NICER
- Wordle #1065, Sunday 19 May: HITCH
- Wordle #1064, Saturday 18 May: BRINY
- Wordle #1063, Friday 17 May: TUTOR
- Wordle #1062, Thursday 16 May: STALL
- Wordle #1061, Wednesday 15 May: PINCH
- Wordle #1060, Tuesday 14 May: AMASS
- Wordle #1059, Monday 13 May: CUMIN
- Wordle #1058, Sunday 12 May: OUTER
- Wordle #1057, Saturday 11 May: TIDAL
- Wordle #1056, Friday 10 May: MEDIA
- Wordle #1055, Thursday 9 May: JERKY
- Wordle #1054, Wednesday 8 May: PIOUS
- Wordle #1053, Tuesday 7 May: MUSTY
- Wordle #1052, Monday 6 May: SHAVE
- Wordle #1051, Sunday 5 May: DECAL
- Wordle #1050, Saturday 4 May: VALUE
- Wordle #1049, Friday 3 May: EBONY
- Wordle #1048, Thursday 2 May: SLICE
- Wordle #1047, Wednesday 1 May: DIARY
- Wordle #1046, Tuesday 30 April: PROWL
- Wordle #1045, Monday 29 April: CRAFT
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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