5 FiveLetterWords
Past Wordle answer Possible answer Accepted guess B tier for first-turn info

ANKLE

Yes, ANKLE was the Wordle answer on March 14, 2026 (Wordle #1729).

As an opener, it rules out about 94.6% of possible answers.

Open Solver with ANKLE Open Word Finder

Meaning and pronunciation

Pronunciation: /ˈæŋ.kəl/[ˈæŋ.kʰəl] ~ [ˈæŋ.kʰl̩]/ˈaŋ.kəl/

Noun

The skeletal joint which connects the foot with the leg; the uppermost portion of the foot and lowermost portion of the leg, which contain this skeletal joint.

Verb

To walk.

Verb

To cyclically angle the foot at the ankle while pedaling, to maximize the amount of work applied to the pedal during each revolution.

Alternative forms: ancle

Source: Wiktionary contributors · CC BY-SA 4.0. Corrections.

Wordle status

A word can be a playable guess without being a possible answer.

Playable guess

Yes

Included in the Wordle guess list used by our tools.

Possible answer

Yes

Included among the answers considered by the solver.

Past Wordle answer

Used once

Past Wordle answer: March 14, 2026 (#1729).

See the full page for that puzzle: March 14, 2026 (#1729).

The possible-answer list is the solver's current list and may change when Wordle adds new answers.

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How ANKLE performs as a guess

ANKLE is a possible answer, so it would solve about one game in 2,374 when every answer is treated as equally likely.

Played as an opener, it lands at least one colored tile in 86.2% of games, misses completely in 13.8%, and leaves about 127 possible answers on average.

In the previous complete opener benchmark, it ranks #5,377 of 14,855 openers, averaging 3.68 guesses in games solved within six turns.

Try your feedback pattern

Tap the tiles to match your feedback, then see the ranked follow-up guesses.

All gray? Tap a tile to cycle gray → yellow → green.
See strategy patterns

Useful pattern pages

If you only know part of the word, start with one of these matching patterns.

A___E A in the 1st position and E in the 5th position A__L_ A in the 1st position and L in the 4th position _N__E N in the 2nd position and E in the 5th position AN_LE A in the 1st position, N in the 2nd position, L in the 4th position, and E in the 5th position

Explore lists that match the beginning, ending or letters in ANKLE.

First-turn measures

All four describe ANKLE used as an opening guess. Entropy is the same idea as “avg ruled out” on a log scale: a higher number means the guess splits the possible answers into more, smaller groups.

5.00 Entropy (bits)
127 Avg remaining
0.04% Exact match
94.6% Avg ruled out
Higher first-turn entropy than about 83% of evaluated openers
0.95 bits below the highest measured first-turn entropy (~5.95 bits)

As an opening guess: previous benchmark

How ANKLE performed in the previous complete opener benchmark, against its captured answer snapshot. These research figures are separate from today's solver recommendations. See the data page for the method.

3.68 Avg guesses
99.87% Solved within six
0.70 Spread of game lengths
#5,377 Rank among openers
Opening with ANKLE left 3 of the snapshot's answers unsolved after six guesses. A spread of 0.70 means those games clustered within about 0.70 of a guess of the 3.68 average. It ranks #5,377 of 14,855 openers by average guesses in games solved within six.
1 guess
1
2 guesses
72
3 guesses
847
4 guesses
1,218
5 guesses
194
6 guesses
19
Top-ranked in the current bounded policy screen: SLANT. The policy minimizes misses within six first, then average guesses among wins (3.46 for the leader). Compare the ranking measures

Composition

5/5 unique
2 vowels
Common:
AELN

Feedback chances

Any hit (G/Y)
86%
Green tile
31%
All gray
14%

Example solver route

R O A T E
S M I L Y
C A D G E
A N K L E

One example route used by the solver.

This solver benchmark reaches ANKLE in 4 guesses.

Feedback distribution

ANKLE can come back 102 different ways. These are the most likely, and how many of the possible answers give each one:

327 answers
225 answers
210 answers
148 answers
124 answers
90 answers
85 answers
83 answers
83 answers
75 answers
73 answers
66 answers
60 answers
47 answers
45 answers
44 answers
39 answers
31 answers
25 answers
25 answers
24 answers
22 answers
22 answers
20 answers
20 answers
19 answers
19 answers
19 answers
16 answers
15 answers

Letter-value totals

Base letter-value totals for ANKLE; these do not show whether either game accepts the word.

Scrabble

A1N1K5L1E1
Total: 9 points

Words With Friends

Total: 11 points

Scores shown are base values without double/triple letter or word bonuses.

Try next

SHORT DETER SATYR SIREE IRONY LORIS

Strategy after playing ANKLE

What the solver recommends next for each way the board can respond to ANKLE.

Quick reference

Largest feedback groups after playing ANKLE:

14% chance
Suggested:
SHORT
9% chance
Suggested:
DETER
9% chance
Suggested:
SATYR

Follow-ups for common patterns

Ranked follow-up guesses for the 10 most common feedback patterns.

13.8% →
SHORT 5.97 bits
9.5% →
DETER 5.31 bits
8.8% →
SATYR 5.06 bits
6.2% →
SIREE 4.50 bits
5.2% →
IRONY 4.92 bits
3.8% →
LORIS 4.70 bits
3.6% →
SETER 4.22 bits
3.5% →
ROAST 4.45 bits
3.5% →
RAINY 3.99 bits
3.2% →
SHART 4.30 bits

Research on ANKLE

Game-tree analysis and word research for ANKLE, with an explanation for each figure.

Optimal play

Opening with ANKLE, a proven-optimal strategy averages 3.68 guesses and ranks #3,219 of 14,855 legal openers. The best proven opener, TARSE, averages 3.55.

No guaranteed hard-mode solve In hard mode, no strategy that opens with ANKLE can guarantee a solve within six guesses.

Our six-turn simulation says 3.68, at or below the proven-optimal 3.68, because the two figures score different answer lists.

These figures come from exhaustive game-tree search and are exact for the NYT lists of July 2023 (3,158 answers). They do not use the site's working answer pool.

How it sounds

Two syllables, stress on the first syllable Say it ANGKUHL.

Related meanings

In WordNet's sense inventory, ANKLE is a kind of joint.

Familiarity and learning

Frequency
ANKLE sits in the intermediate band of the wordfreq scale, appearing about 9 times per million words of written English; the band marks it as a word most readers meet regularly.
Learner level
Appears in beginner learner vocabulary (CEFR-J level A2); among the first words English learners study.
Age of acquisition
Typically learned around age 5, by Glasgow Norms speaker ratings.
Imageability
Imageability score: 95 of 100. Raters found it easy to picture.

In a sentence

Ankle, ankle, where are you?
© tatoeba.org contributor theachaean (CC BY 2.0 FR)
What happened to your ankle?
© tatoeba.org contributor CK (CC BY 2.0 FR)

Sources: Optimal-play values: Alex Selby's exhaustive Wordle analysis (MIT); Pronunciation: CMU Pronouncing Dictionary (BSD); Word relations: Open English WordNet, 2025 edition (CC BY 4.0); Word frequency: wordfreq (data CC BY-SA 4.0); Learner levels: CEFR-J Wordlist ver 1.5, Tono Laboratory, TUFS; Glasgow Norms (CC BY 4.0).