Accepted guess Not a possible answer B tier for first-turn info

ARTIC

ARTIC is accepted as a guess but is not on the solver's possible-answer list.

Meaning and pronunciation

Pronunciation: /ɑ(ɹ)ˈtɪk/

Noun

Abbreviation of articulated lorry; A semi-trailer truck.

Noun

Abbreviation of articulated bus

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

Use ARTIC in a puzzle

As an opener, it rules out about 95.3% of possible answers.

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

No

The solver does not currently treat this as a possible answer.

Past Wordle answer

No completed appearance

No appearance in our globally completed history. A recent puzzle may still be live elsewhere.

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

How ARTIC performs as a guess

Wordle accepts ARTIC as a guess, but the solver does not list it as a possible answer.

Played as an opener, it lands at least one colored tile in 87.1% of games, misses completely in 12.9%, and leaves about 113 possible answers on average.

In the previous complete opener benchmark, it ranks #695 of 14,855 openers, averaging 3.59 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.

First-turn measures

All four describe ARTIC 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.

5.20 Entropy (bits)
113 Avg remaining
0.0% Exact match
95.3% Avg ruled out

As an opening guess: previous benchmark

How ARTIC 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.

3.59 Avg guesses
99.92% Solved within six
0.69 Spread of game lengths
#695 Rank among openers
Opening with ARTIC left 2 of the snapshot's answers unsolved after six guesses. A spread of 0.69 means those games clustered within about 0.69 of a guess of the 3.59 average. It ranks #695 of 14,855 openers by average guesses in games solved within six.
1 guess
0
2 guesses
60
3 guesses
1,044
4 guesses
1,061
5 guesses
173
6 guesses
14

Composition

5/5 unique
2 vowels
Common:
AIRT

Feedback chances

Any hit (G/Y)
87%
Green tile
27%
All gray
13%

Feedback distribution

ARTIC can come back 108 different ways. These are the most likely, and how many of the possible answers give each one:

307 answers
207 answers
162 answers
157 answers
116 answers
114 answers
103 answers
88 answers
79 answers
78 answers
54 answers
52 answers
51 answers
49 answers
40 answers
39 answers
35 answers
34 answers
29 answers
26 answers
25 answers
22 answers
21 answers
20 answers
19 answers
18 answers
18 answers
18 answers
17 answers
16 answers

Letter-value totals

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

Scrabble

A1R1T1I1C3
Total: 7 points

Words With Friends

Total: 8 points

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

Strategy after playing ARTIC

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

Quick reference

Largest feedback groups after playing ARTIC:

13% chance
Suggested:
SOLDE
9% chance
Suggested:
SLANE
7% chance
Suggested:
SORER

Follow-ups for common patterns

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

12.9% →
SOLDE 5.90 bits
8.7% →
SLANE 5.31 bits
6.8% →
SORER 5.09 bits
6.6% →
SIDLE 5.24 bits
4.9% →
SLYER 4.55 bits
4.8% →
SHULE 5.31 bits
4.3% →
SLANE 5.07 bits
3.7% →
CLONE 5.26 bits
3.3% →
CLAME 4.79 bits
3.3% →
SHINE 4.67 bits

Research on ARTIC

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

Optimal play

Opening with ARTIC, a proven-optimal strategy averages 3.65 guesses and ranks #1,797 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 ARTIC can guarantee a solve within six guesses.

Our six-turn simulation says 3.59, at or below the proven-optimal 3.65, 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.

Familiarity and learning

Frequency
ARTIC sits in the advanced band of the wordfreq scale, appearing less than once per million words of written English; the band marks it as an uncommon word many players still recognize.

Sources: Optimal-play values: Alex Selby's exhaustive Wordle analysis (MIT); Word frequency: wordfreq (data CC BY-SA 4.0).