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

CODES

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

Meaning and pronunciation

Pronunciation: /kəʊdz//koʊdz/

Noun

plural of code

Verb

third-person singular simple present indicative of code

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

How it sounds

One syllable Say it KOHDZ.

Rhymes with ROADS LOADS MODES NODES TOADS

Related meanings

Synonyms ride collect RALLY fool bait pod

Opposites UNDUE

In a sentence

There are too many codes to remember.
© tatoeba.org contributor fekundulo (CC BY 2.0 FR)
The access codes change every day.
© tatoeba.org contributor CK (CC BY 2.0 FR)

Use CODES in a puzzle

As an opener, it rules out about 94.4% 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 CODES performs as a guess

Wordle accepts CODES 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 86.9% of games, misses completely in 13.1%, and leaves about 133 possible answers on average.

In the previous complete opener benchmark, it ranks #3,683 of 14,855 openers, averaging 3.65 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 CODES 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.

4.96 Entropy (bits)
133 Avg remaining
0.0% Exact match
94.4% Avg ruled out

As an opening guess: previous benchmark

How CODES 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.

3.65 Avg guesses
100% Solved within six
0.68 Spread of game lengths
#3,683 Rank among openers
Opening with CODES solved every answer in the snapshot within six guesses. A spread of 0.68 means those games clustered within about 0.68 of a guess of the 3.65 average. It ranks #3,683 of 14,855 openers by average guesses in games solved within six.
1 guess
0
2 guesses
70
3 guesses
888
4 guesses
1,206
5 guesses
180
6 guesses
10

Composition

5/5 unique
2 vowels
Common:
EOS

Feedback chances

Any hit (G/Y)
87%
Green tile
33%
All gray
13%

Feedback distribution

CODES can come back 98 different ways. These are the most likely, and how many of the possible answers give each one:

313 answers
274 answers
200 answers
149 answers
143 answers
124 answers
84 answers
72 answers
71 answers
68 answers
67 answers
55 answers
52 answers
47 answers
45 answers
36 answers
32 answers
28 answers
27 answers
27 answers
24 answers
23 answers
22 answers
20 answers
20 answers
19 answers
18 answers
17 answers
15 answers
14 answers

Letter-value totals

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

Scrabble

C3O1D2E1S1
Total: 8 points

Words With Friends

Total: 9 points

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

Strategy after playing CODES

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

Quick reference

Largest feedback groups after playing CODES:

13% chance
Suggested:
TRIAL
11% chance
Suggested:
TIARE
8% chance
Suggested:
SAULT

Follow-ups for common patterns

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

13.1% →
TRIAL 5.89 bits
11.5% →
TIARE 5.43 bits
8.4% →
SAULT 5.31 bits
6.2% →
LATER 4.56 bits
6.0% →
TALON 5.17 bits
5.2% →
SLART 5.04 bits
3.5% →
LAIRY 4.21 bits
3.0% →
RAINY 4.59 bits
3.0% →
DRAIN 5.13 bits
2.9% →
LAIRY 4.73 bits

Research on CODES

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

Optimal play

Opening with CODES, a proven-optimal strategy averages 3.64 guesses and ranks #1,278 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 CODES can guarantee a solve within six guesses.

Our six-turn simulation says 3.65; proven optimal play reaches 3.64. The fixed strategy accounts for the difference.

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
CODES sits in the common band of the wordfreq scale, appearing about 15 times per million words of written English; the band marks it as an everyday word almost every player will know.
Dominant sense
Lancaster raters associated it most strongly with sight (3.2 of 5).

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); Lancaster Sensorimotor Norms (CC BY 4.0).