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? TechRadar's Quordle today page contains hints and answers for that game, and you can also take a look at our NYT Strands today and NYT Connections today pages for our 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.
Marc is TechRadar’s Global Editor in Chief and has been obsessed with Wordle for more than two years. He's authored dozens of articles on the game for TechRadar and its sister site Tom's Guide, including a detailed analysis of the most common letters in Wordle in every position. He's also played every Wordle ever and only lost once and yes, he takes it all too seriously.
Wordle hints (game #1272) - clue #1 - Vowels
How many vowels does today's Wordle have?
• Wordle today has 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).
Wordle hints (game #1272) - clue #2 - first letter
What letter does today's Wordle begin with?
• The first letter in today's Wordle answer is V.
V is a fairly uncommon starting letter in Wordle. There are only 43 answers that begin with a V, and it ranks just 16th.
Wordle hints (game #1272) - 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 #1272) - clue #4 - ending letter
What letter does today's Wordle end with?
• The last letter in today's Wordle is G.
G is not a common letter to end a Wordle answer – in fact only 41 of Wordle's 2,309 games finish with one.
Wordle hints (game #1272) - clue #5 - last chance
Still looking for more Wordle hints today? Here's an extra one for game #1271.
- Today's Wordle answer is striving for superiority.
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 #1272)
- NYT average score: 4.8
- My score: 5
- WordleBot's score: 4
- Best start word performance*: SAINT (35 remaining answers)
- My start word performance: SMACK (916)
* From WordleBot's Top 20 start words
Today's Wordle answer (game #1272) is… VYING.
Strap yourself in, ladies and gentlemen – you've got a bumpy ride ahead of you.
ING is the most common three-letter combination to end a Wordle answer, so you'd think today's game would be an easy one. Well, think again, because VYING has an average score of 4.8. That puts it right up there with the most difficult Wordles in 2024; it actually ranks equal 14th for difficulty, but many of those above it were only slightly harder, at 4.9. Make no mistake, this is a tough nut to crack.
The problem here is almost certainly that VY combo at the start. VYING is the only one of Wordle's 2,309 original solutions to begin in that way, so you certainly wouldn't think to play for it unless you, um, thought to play for it. And that's the kind of sparkling insight you get here!
I was fairly unlucky to end up with a five today. My start word, chosen at random, was SMACK – a second day in a row when I've had to contend with a K in my opener. This gave me null points and left 916 possible words. Ouch!
Still, things improved with my second word, which was TILER – chosen purely on account of its five common letters. This earned me a 98 for skill and cut my shortlist (which was really a very, very longlist) by nearly 900 words, leaving 19.
At this point I started looking for answers and came up with about a half dozen including DOING, GOING, BOING, DYING (but not yet VYING), WHIFF, WHIZZ and WHINY. I should maybe have spent a little longer searching for other words, but decided to try my luck with WHINY and managed to eliminate all but two words.
These were DYING and VYING, the latter of which I found fairly easily once I knew that the Y was included, but not at the end of the word. After all, it could only be Y-IN- or -YIN- and it didn't take a genius to see that the latter worked where the former did not.
So, I had yet another 50/50 – and as so often seems to be the case, guessed incorrectly.
How did you do today? Send me an email and let me know.
Yesterday's Wordle hints (game #1271)
In a different time zone where it's still Wednesday? Don't worry – I can give you some clues for Wordle #1271, 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 B.
B is not a common ending letter for a Wordle word. In fact, it only occurs there 11 times in total across the game's 2,309 original answers.
Still looking for more Wordle hints? Here's an extra one for game #1271.
- Yesterday's Wordle answer is exactly, precisely, or directly.
Yesterday's Wordle answer (game #1271)
- NYT average score: 4.1
- My score: 4
- WordleBot's score: 4
- Best start word performance*: PLANE (4 remaining answers)
- My start word performance: AMEND (305)
* From WordleBot's Top 20 start words
Yesterday's Wordle answer (game #1271) was… PLUMB.
PLUMB is a word of two halves. Actually, that's not true, because it has five letters and U can't be split down the middle (although it can be doubled – geddit? Yes, I'm so funny).
What I mean is that the first two letters, PL, form one of the more common opening combinations in the game, with 19 instances among the original answers list. MB at the end, meanwhile, occurs only four times in the Wordle wilds, with CLIMB (game #1,020), CRUMB (#719) and THUMB (#115) the other three. So there we have it – there are officially no more MB-ending words to come in Wordle. Well, unless the NYT adds in another one, but I don't know what that word would be.
The important thing to take from these ramblings is that you may have found it a lot easier to complete the PL or PLU bit than than the remainder. That's evident in WordleBot's report, which reveals that PLUCK, PLUME, PLONK, PLUMP, PLUSH and, er, PLUMS were are all played by lots of Wordlers today. Indeed, PLUMP gathered 14% of all fourth guesses today – presumably on a 50/50 with the eventual answer, which will have been frustrating for anyone who went for the wrong one.
It's not a super-hard Wordle overall, but as its average of 4.1 indicates it's more difficult than most. I was fairly happy to score a four myself, having been left with 171 options after my opening SPIKY gave me a yellow P but nothing more. I played it safe on the second guess, simply adding in four common letters to make TAPER, and was rewarded with… nothing; I still had only that single yellow P.
In reality of course I had made progress by dint of ruling out those other letters, and indeed now had a mere 16 words to choose from. I didn't find them all, but got most of them: BLOOP, GLOOP, POUND, PUNCH, PLUMP, PLUMB, POUCH, CLUMP, WHOOP, CHOMP, CLOMP and WHOMP, with only CHUMP, HUMPH, POOCH and OOMPH missing.
I certainly had enough to go on to formulate a plan – and that involved playing CLUMP next. This would be almost certain to give me the answer in four, and might even be right itself. I didn't quite get that lucky, but it ruled out all words other than PLUMB, so I played that next for my four.
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 #1271, Wednesday 11 December: PLUMB
- Wordle #1270, Tuesday 10 December: PATIO
- Wordle #1269, Monday 9 December: FLUNG
- Wordle #1268, Sunday 8 December: HYENA
- Wordle #1267, Saturday 7 December: HILLY
- Wordle #1266, Friday 6 December: SHOVE
- Wordle #1265, Thursday 5 December: ENDOW
- Wordle #1264, Wednesday 4 December: CRYPT
- Wordle #1263, Tuesday 3 December: SHAKY
- Wordle #1262, Monday 2 December: GUILE
- Wordle #1261, Sunday 1 December: MAUVE
- Wordle #1260, Saturday 30 November: DOGMA
- Wordle #1259, Friday 29 November: HIPPO
- Wordle #1258, Thursday 28 November: CHOCK
- Wordle #1257, Wednesday 27 November: SLANG
- Wordle #1256, Tuesday 26 November: WITCH
- Wordle #1255, Monday 25 November: BROWN
- Wordle #1254, Sunday 24 November: TWIST
- Wordle #1253, Saturday 23 November: JELLY
- Wordle #1252, Friday 22 November: PEARL
- Wordle #1251, Thursday 21 November: SPINE
- Wordle #1250, Wednesday 20 November: NICHE
- Wordle #1249, Tuesday 19 November: GOING
- Wordle #1248, Monday 18 November: FRAIL
- Wordle #1247, Sunday 17 November: TALLY
- Wordle #1246, Saturday 16 November: VISOR
- Wordle #1245, Friday 15 November: TACKY
- Wordle #1244, Thursday 14 November: UVULA
- Wordle #1243, Wednesday 13 November: PRIMP
- Wordle #1242, Tuesday 12 November: FLOWN
- Wordle #1241, Monday 11 November: STOIC
- Wordle #1240, Sunday 10 November: INNER
- Wordle #1239, Saturday 9 November: SWELL
- Wordle #1238, Friday 8 November: READY
- Wordle #1237, Thursday 7 November: EVENT
- Wordle #1236, Wednesday 6 November: TRULY
- Wordle #1235, Tuesday 5 November: OCTET
- Wordle #1234, Monday 4 November: VINYL
- Wordle #1233, Sunday 3 November: BLAZE
- Wordle #1232, Saturday 2 November: SNOOP
- Wordle #1231, Friday 1 November: SIXTH
- Wordle #1230, Thursday 31 October: WEIRD
- Wordle #1229, Wednesday 30 October: EASEL
- Wordle #1228, Tuesday 29 October: TUNIC
- Wordle #1227, Monday 28 October: BAWDY
- Wordle #1226, Sunday 27 October: SANDY
- Wordle #1225, Saturday 26 October: WREAK
- Wordle #1224, Friday 25 October: FROWN
- Wordle #1223, Thursday 24 October: BOSSY
- Wordle #1222, Wednesday 23 October: GOOFY
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.
