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

CHOKE

Yes, CHOKE was the Wordle answer on February 28, 2022 (Wordle #254).

As an opener, it rules out about 91.3% of possible answers.

Open Solver with CHOKE Open Word Finder

Meaning and pronunciation

Pronunciation: /t͡ʃəʊk//t͡ʃoʊk/

Verb

To be unable to breathe because of obstruction of the windpipe (for instance food or other objects that go down the wrong way, or fumes or particles in the air that cause the throat to constrict).

“Ever since he choked on a bone, he has refused to eat fish.”

Verb

To prevent (someone) from breathing or talking by strangling or filling the windpipe.

“The collar of this shirt is too tight; it’s choking me.”

Noun

A control on a carburetor to adjust the air/fuel mixture when the engine is cold.

Noun

In wrestling, karate (etc.), a type of hold that can result in strangulation.

Alternative forms: choak, choake, chock

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: February 28, 2022 (#254).

See the full page for that puzzle: February 28, 2022 (#254).

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

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How CHOKE performs as a guess

CHOKE 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 80.7% of games, misses completely in 19.3%, and leaves about 206 possible answers on average.

In the previous complete opener benchmark, it ranks #7,636 of 14,855 openers, averaging 3.71 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.

C___E C in the 1st position and E in the 5th position C__K_ C in the 1st position and K in the 4th position _H__E H in the 2nd position and E in the 5th position

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

First-turn measures

All four describe CHOKE 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.

4.55 Entropy (bits)
206 Avg remaining
0.04% Exact match
91.3% Avg ruled out
Higher first-turn entropy than about 56% of evaluated openers
1.39 bits below the highest measured first-turn entropy (~5.95 bits)

As an opening guess: previous benchmark

How CHOKE 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.

3.71 Avg guesses
99.96% Solved within six
0.71 Spread of game lengths
#7,636 Rank among openers
Opening with CHOKE left 1 of the snapshot's answers unsolved after six guesses. A spread of 0.71 means those games clustered within about 0.71 of a guess of the 3.71 average. It ranks #7,636 of 14,855 openers by average guesses in games solved within six.
1 guess
1
2 guesses
40
3 guesses
882
4 guesses
1,160
5 guesses
248
6 guesses
22
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)
81%
Green tile
36%
All gray
19%

Example solver route

R O A T E
S L I N K
C H O K E

One example route used by the solver.

This solver benchmark reaches CHOKE in 3 guesses.

Feedback distribution

CHOKE can come back 88 different ways. These are the most likely, and how many of the possible answers give each one:

459 answers
378 answers
223 answers
208 answers
109 answers
74 answers
71 answers
46 answers
44 answers
43 answers
41 answers
33 answers
32 answers
31 answers
30 answers
29 answers
28 answers
26 answers
25 answers
24 answers
22 answers
22 answers
21 answers
20 answers
19 answers
18 answers
17 answers
16 answers
15 answers
14 answers

Letter-value totals

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

Scrabble

C3H4O1K5E1
Total: 14 points

Words With Friends

Total: 14 points

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

Try next

TRAIL ALTER SLART RAINY MOWER STAIR

Strategy after playing CHOKE

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

Quick reference

Largest feedback groups after playing CHOKE:

19% chance
Suggested:
TRAIL
16% chance
Suggested:
ALTER
9% chance
Suggested:
SLART

Follow-ups for common patterns

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

19.3% →
TRAIL 6.05 bits
15.9% →
ALTER 5.32 bits
9.4% →
SLART 5.14 bits
8.8% →
RAINY 5.01 bits
4.6% →
SLART 4.74 bits
3.1% →
SLART 4.94 bits
3.0% →
MOWER 4.05 bits
1.9% →
RAINY 4.54 bits
1.9% →
SLART 3.74 bits
1.8% →
STAIR 4.47 bits

Research on CHOKE

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

Optimal play

Opening with CHOKE, a proven-optimal strategy averages 3.72 guesses and ranks #6,404 of 14,855 legal openers. The best proven opener, TARSE, averages 3.55.

In hard mode it averages 3.87 guesses at best and is rank #3,506 of the 7,453 openers that can still guarantee a solve within six guesses.

Our six-turn simulation says 3.71, at or below the proven-optimal 3.72, 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

One syllable Say it CHOHK.

Rhymes with BROKE SMOKE SPOKE STOKE CLOAK

Related meanings

In WordNet's sense inventory, CHOKE is a kind of coil or valve.

Synonyms go die pass exit foul gag

Familiarity and learning

Frequency
CHOKE sits in the intermediate band of the wordfreq scale, appearing about 5 times per million words of written English; the band marks it as a word most readers meet regularly.
Learner level
Appears in intermediate learner vocabulary (CEFR-J level B1); a word learners usually reach after the basics.
Age of acquisition
Typically learned around age 7, by Glasgow Norms speaker ratings.
Imageability
Imageability score: 61 of 100. Raters gave it a middle-range score.

In a sentence

I'm going to choke him.
© tatoeba.org contributor Miktsoanit (CC BY 2.0 FR)
He tried to choke her.
© tatoeba.org contributor CH (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).