NYT Wordle today — answer and hints for game #997, Tuesday, March 12
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, which remains the best of all the main Wordle alternatives.
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 #997) – clue #1 – Vowels
How many vowels does today’s Wordle have?
• Wordle today has vowels in three 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 #997) – clue #2 – first letter
What letter does today’s Wordle begin with?
• The first letter in today’s Wordle answer is H.
H is not a particularly common starting letter in Wordle: only 69 games begin with it, and it ranks in 15th place.
Wordle hints (game #997) – 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 #997) – 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 #997) – clue #5 – last chance
Still looking for more Wordle hints today? Here’s an extra one for game #997.
- Today’s Wordle answer is a moving effort.
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 #997)
- NYT average score: 4.1
- My score: 4
- WordleBot’s score: 3
- Best start word performance*: LEAST (15 remaining answers)
- My start word performance: ABIDE (108)
* From WordleBot’s Top 20 start words
Today’s Wordle answer (game #997) is… HEAVE.
It’s generally the case that more vowels equals easier Wordles, but also that repeated letters makes for a harder game. So, what happens when you get three vowels, but one is repeated? Well, as you might expect, the two pretty much even out.
WordleBot duly says HEAVE has an average score of 4.1, so right in the middle of the range, albeit trending more towards the harder end of the scale. I suspect that’s because the two consonants, H and V, are relatively uncommon; H is only the 14th most common letter overall, and V the 22nd.
It won’t have helped that neither features in any of the top 20 start words as chosen by WordleBot. E and A do, of course, and the best results today were for openers that contained them. The most successful was LEAST (15 remaining answers) – which has an -EA– format, whereas the –A-E pattern found in STARE (29), SLATE (31) and CRATE (39) was not quite so helpful.
My start word today was ABIDE, which gave me a yellow A and green E, and which left 108 options. Once again, my chances of a 3/6 were almost over by the time that first guess was done. Not quite, however. If I’d got lucky with the second guess, a solve in three might still have been on the cards. For instance, playing CLASH next would have left only two solutions.
I didn’t know any of that at the time, though, so instead went with CRANE and still had 32 to pick from. A 4/6 was very much the best I could now hope for.
I could see that S, P, L and T were all common letters among the few dozen words I shortlisted – for instance, SHAKE, SHAPE, SHAME, STAGE, STAKE, PLATE, SLATE, SPATE, ELATE, LEASE. So, given that I didn’t want to waste a letter by playing either A or E again, I went for PLOTS. The O almost certainly wouldn’t be used, and the S definitely wouldn’t be at the end, but it would hopefully give me lots of info.
Despite none of the letters changing color, that’s what happened – so many were ruled out that I now had only three to choose from. And this time, I found them all: HEAVE, WEAVE and QUAKE. I couldn’t recall any having been past Wordle answers, but choosing one of the first two made sense in order to guarantee me a 5/6 at worst. HEAVE had slightly more common letters, so I went with that and was rewarded with a straightforward 4/6.
How did you do today? Send me an email and let me know.
Yesterday’s Wordle hints (game #996)
In a different time zone where it’s still Monday? Don’t worry – I can give you some clues for Wordle #996, too.
- Wordle yesterday had a vowel in one place.
* 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 P.
P is a very common first letter among Wordle answers. It’s the fifth most common in the alphabet and begins 141 solutions in total.
- 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 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 #996.
- Yesterday’s Wordle answer is troublesome.
Yesterday’s Wordle answer (game #996)
- NYT average score: 3.8
- My score: 4
- WordleBot’s score: 3
- Best start word performance*: PARSE (3 remaining answers)
- My start word performance: FLOWN (1,015)
* From WordleBot’s Top 20 start words
Yesterday’s Wordle answer (game #996) was… PESKY.
PESKY is one of the more playful Wordles we’ve had in a while, and there’s nothing wrong with that. It conjures up images of Scooby-Doo or The Beano; pesky kids getting up to mischief in a hilarious (to my younger self) manner. It’s not a word I’d use regularly these days, although my three-year-old labrador could easily be described as pesky when he chews up a cushion or digs up the garden. (I’m more likely to use certain four-letter words than the five that Wordle allows).
I’m surprised to see that it only has an average of 3.8, because its relatively uncommon nature extends to the inclusion of a K in a position other than at the end of the answer, and an S that’s not at the start.
For the second day in a row, PARSE was the best performing of the top 20 start words, as chosen by WordleBot. Unfortunately, PARSE is not a common pick among Wordlers, so I doubt many people were able to take advantage of the fact that it only left three answers. However, the 4% of players who went with STARE will have been pleased enough (it left 23 options), while the 32 for SLATE wasn’t terrible either.
My pick, on the other hand… well let’s just say that it wasn’t the most successful opener I’ve ever had. Fate, via my random word generator, served up FLOWN – which in some scenarios could be a very good choice. But not today. Oh no. Far from it. Instead, it gave me zero letters and left me with 1,015 options.
I didn’t know there were quite that many at the time, but I could see there were hundreds, so didn’t think too hard about the second guess beyond trying to use up the most common remaining letters. With L already ruled out, they were A and E on the vowels front, and S, T and R for the consonants – which gave me STARE, my former start word of Wordles past.
STARE was much luckier, giving me two yellow letters and leaving only seven possible answers. And this time I did set out to find them all. I didn’t quite manage it, but came up with four: CHESS, GUESS, MESSY and PESKY. The three I missed were MESHY (really, WordleBot?), BUSED and MUSED. If MESHY seemed unlikely then BUSED and MUSED were equally so in my opinion, but I can’t say for sure.
It didn’t matter, as it happens. I played CHESS because it would have guaranteed me a 4/6 at worst based on the answers I had – and it ended up guaranteeing me a 4/6 anyway. Well, sort of. Technically, WordleBot said I still had three options left: PESKY, BUSED and MUSED. But my brain still refused to countenance that the latter two could be real answers, so I played PESKY and guessed right.
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 #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
- Wordle #990, Tuesday 5 March: HUNCH
- Wordle #989, Monday 4 March: FLAME
- Wordle #988, Sunday 3 March: STATE
- Wordle #987, Saturday 2 March: URBAN
- Wordle #986, Friday 1 March: FORTY
- Wordle #985, Thursday 29 February: IMAGE
- Wordle #984, Wednesday 28 February: DEVIL
- Wordle #983, Tuesday 27 February: SENSE
- Wordle #982, Monday 26 February: OFTEN
- Wordle #981, Sunday 25 February: SMITH
- Wordle #980, Saturday 24 February: PIPER
- Wordle #979, Friday 23 February: APART
- Wordle #978, Thursday 22 February: HEAVY
- Wordle #977, Wednesday 21 February: BUILD
- Wordle #976, Tuesday 20 February: MATCH
- Wordle #975, Monday 19 February: PRICE
- Wordle #974, Sunday 18 February: RIDGE
- Wordle #973, Saturday 17 February: PSALM
- Wordle #972, Friday 16 February: STASH
- Wordle #971, Thursday 15 February: ASCOT
- Wordle #970, Wednesday 14 February: TALON
- Wordle #969, Tuesday 13 February: SCRAM
- Wordle #968, Monday 12 February: PASTA
- Wordle #967, Sunday 11 February: NEVER
- Wordle #966, Saturday 10 February: FRIED
- Wordle #965, Friday 9 February: STIFF
- Wordle #964, Thursday 8 February: PLACE
- Wordle #963, Wednesday 7 February: AFTER
- Wordle #962, Tuesday 6 February: WHICH
- Wordle #961, Monday 5 February: REPEL
- Wordle #960, Sunday 4 February: VERGE
- Wordle #959, Saturday 3 February: MICRO
- Wordle #958, Friday 2 February: CLEFT
- Wordle #957, Thursday 1 February: ALIVE
- Wordle #956, Wednesday 31 January: BULKY
- Wordle #955, Tuesday 30 January: EXPEL
- Wordle #954, Monday 29 January: LEGGY
- Wordle #953, Sunday 28 January: EMBER
- Wordle #952, Saturday 27 January: SNAKE
- Wordle #951, Friday 26 January: ALOOF
- Wordle #950, Thursday 25 January: BLOCK
- Wordle #949, Wednesday 24 January: RELIC
- Wordle #948, Tuesday 23 January: STILL
- Wordle #947, Monday 22 January: TWEAK
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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