BANJO
Yes, BANJO was the Wordle answer on August 1, 2025 (Wordle #1504).
As an opener, it rules out about 88.3% of possible answers.
Meaning and pronunciation
Pronunciation: /ˈbæn.dʒəʊ//ˈbæn.d͡ʒoʊ/
- Noun
-
A stringed musical instrument (chordophone), usually with a round body, a membrane-like soundboard and a fretted neck, played by plucking or strumming the strings.
“I come from Alabama with my banjo on my knee...”
- Noun
-
Any of various similar musical instruments, such as the Tuvan doshpuluur, with a membrane-like soundboard.
- Verb
-
To play a banjo.
- Verb
-
To beat, to knock down.
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
YesIncluded in the Wordle guess list used by our tools.
Possible answer
YesIncluded among the answers considered by the solver.
Past Wordle answer
Used oncePast Wordle answer: August 1, 2025 (#1504).
See the full page for that puzzle: August 1, 2025 (#1504).
The possible-answer list is the solver's current list and may change when Wordle adds new answers.
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See what the public sample says →How BANJO performs as a guess
BANJO 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 75.4% of games, misses completely in 24.6%, and leaves about 278 possible answers on average.
In the previous complete opener benchmark, it ranks #12,568 of 14,855 openers, averaging 3.83 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.
Useful pattern pages
If you only know part of the word, start with one of these matching patterns.
First-turn measures
All four describe BANJO 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.
As an opening guess: previous benchmark
How BANJO 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.
Composition
Feedback chances
Example solver route
One example route used by the solver.
This solver benchmark reaches BANJO in 3 guesses.
Feedback distribution
BANJO can come back 64 different ways. These are the most likely, and how many of the possible answers give each one:
Letter-value totals
Base letter-value totals for BANJO; these do not show whether either game accepts the word.
Scrabble
Words With Friends
Scores shown are base values without double/triple letter or word bonuses.
Try next
Strategy after playing BANJO
What the solver recommends next for each way the board can respond to BANJO.
Quick reference
Largest feedback groups after playing BANJO:
Research on BANJO
Game-tree analysis and word research for BANJO, with an explanation for each figure.
Optimal play
Opening with BANJO, a proven-optimal strategy averages 3.82 guesses and ranks #11,734 of 14,855 legal openers. The best proven opener, TARSE, averages 3.55.
In hard mode it averages 3.95 guesses at best and is rank #5,336 of the 7,453 openers that can still guarantee a solve within six guesses.
Our six-turn simulation says 3.83, at or below the proven-optimal 3.82, 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 BANJOH.
Related meanings
In WordNet's sense inventory, BANJO is a kind of instrument.
Familiarity and learning
- Frequency
- BANJO sits in the intermediate band of the wordfreq scale, appearing about 2 times per million words of written English; the band marks it as a word most readers meet regularly.
- Age of acquisition
- Typically learned around age 9, by Glasgow Norms speaker ratings.
- Imageability
- Imageability score: 89 of 100. Raters found it easy to picture.
- Dominant sense
- Lancaster raters associated it most strongly with sound (4.6 of 5).
In a sentence
Can you play the banjo?
He can play the banjo.
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); Glasgow Norms (CC BY 4.0); Lancaster Sensorimotor Norms (CC BY 4.0).