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

BEFOG

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

As an opener, it rules out about 88.6% of possible answers.

Meaning and pronunciation

Verb

To envelop in fog or smoke.

Verb

To confuse, mystify (a person); to make less acute or perceptive, to cloud (a person’s faculties).

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

No

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

Past Wordle answer

Not used yet

No past answer date found.

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

How BEFOG performs as a guess

Wordle accepts BEFOG 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 77.0% of games, misses completely in 23.0%, and leaves about 270 possible answers on average.

In the previous complete opener benchmark, it ranks #10,238 of 14,855 openers, averaging 3.77 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 BEFOG 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.

4.05 Entropy (bits)
270 Avg remaining
0.0% Exact match
88.6% Avg ruled out
Higher first-turn entropy than about 25% of evaluated openers
1.90 bits below the highest measured first-turn entropy (~5.95 bits)

As an opening guess: previous benchmark

How BEFOG 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.

3.77 Avg guesses
99.92% Solved within six
0.68 Spread of game lengths
#10,238 Rank among openers
Opening with BEFOG left 2 of the snapshot's answers unsolved after six guesses. A spread of 0.68 means those games clustered within about 0.68 of a guess of the 3.77 average. It ranks #10,238 of 14,855 openers by average guesses in games solved within six.
1 guess
0
2 guesses
41
3 guesses
756
4 guesses
1,277
5 guesses
267
6 guesses
11
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:
EO

Feedback chances

Any hit (G/Y)
77%
Green tile
24%
All gray
23%

Feedback distribution

BEFOG can come back 69 different ways. These are the most likely, and how many of the possible answers give each one:

546 answers
458 answers
239 answers
147 answers
139 answers
79 answers
72 answers
72 answers
66 answers
57 answers
41 answers
37 answers
30 answers
30 answers
27 answers
25 answers
23 answers
19 answers
18 answers
18 answers
17 answers
16 answers
13 answers
12 answers
11 answers
10 answers
10 answers
9 answers
9 answers
9 answers

Letter-value totals

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

Scrabble

B3E1F4O1G2
Total: 11 points

Words With Friends

Total: 13 points

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

Strategy after playing BEFOG

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

Quick reference

Largest feedback groups after playing BEFOG:

23% chance
Suggested:
SAINT
19% chance
Suggested:
STAIR
10% chance
Suggested:
COAST

Follow-ups for common patterns

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

23.0%
SAINT 5.94 bits
19.3%
STAIR 5.51 bits
10.1%
COAST 5.03 bits
6.2%
SLART 4.95 bits
5.9%
TORSE 4.44 bits
3.3%
SAINT 4.48 bits
3.0%
GRAIN 4.76 bits
3.0%
RAILE 4.78 bits
2.8%
SAINT 5.07 bits
2.4%
SLANT 4.72 bits

Research on BEFOG

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

Optimal play

Opening with BEFOG, a proven-optimal strategy averages 3.79 guesses and ranks #10,455 of 14,855 legal openers. The best proven opener, TARSE, averages 3.55.

In hard mode it averages 3.92 guesses at best and is rank #4,557 of the 7,453 openers that can still guarantee a solve within six guesses.

Our six-turn simulation says 3.77, at or below the proven-optimal 3.79, 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 BEHFAWG. Estimated pronunciation

This pronunciation is machine-estimated, not taken from a pronunciation dictionary.

Related meanings

In WordNet's sense inventory, BEFOG is a kind of hide.

Synonyms CLOUD fog obscure mist

In a sentence

The cursed crown began to befog the king's judgment.
© tatoeba.org contributor rul (CC BY 2.0 FR)

Sources: Optimal-play values: Alex Selby's exhaustive Wordle analysis (MIT); Pronunciation: CMU Pronouncing Dictionary (BSD), with machine estimates from the g2p_en model; Word relations: Open English WordNet, 2025 edition (CC BY 4.0).