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

COLLY

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

As an opener, it rules out about 87.3% of possible answers.

Open Solver with COLLY Open Word Finder

Meaning and pronunciation

Pronunciation: /ˈkɒli//ˈkɑli/

Adjective

Black as coal.

Verb

To make black, as with coal.

Noun

Soot.

Noun

A blackbird

Alternative forms: kelly

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 COLLY performs as a guess

Wordle accepts COLLY 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 69.7% of games, misses completely in 30.3%, and leaves about 302 possible answers on average.

In the previous complete opener benchmark, it ranks #10,151 of 14,855 openers, averaging 3.76 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___Y C in the 1st position and Y in the 5th position C__L_ C in the 1st position and L in the 4th position _O__Y O in the 2nd position and Y in the 5th position

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

First-turn measures

All four describe COLLY 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.

4.06 Entropy (bits)
302 Avg remaining
0.0% Exact match
87.3% Avg ruled out
Higher first-turn entropy than about 26% of evaluated openers
1.88 bits below the highest measured first-turn entropy (~5.95 bits)

As an opening guess: previous benchmark

How COLLY 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.

3.76 Avg guesses
99.92% Solved within six
0.73 Spread of game lengths
#10,151 Rank among openers
Opening with COLLY left 2 of the snapshot's answers unsolved after six guesses. A spread of 0.73 means those games clustered within about 0.73 of a guess of the 3.76 average. It ranks #10,151 of 14,855 openers by average guesses in games solved within six.
1 guess
0
2 guesses
45
3 guesses
800
4 guesses
1,200
5 guesses
277
6 guesses
30
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

4/5 unique
1 vowels
Common:
LO

Feedback chances

Any hit (G/Y)
70%
Green tile
38%
All gray
30%

Feedback distribution

COLLY can come back 82 different ways. These are the most likely, and how many of the possible answers give each one:

719 answers
234 answers
225 answers
189 answers
135 answers
125 answers
86 answers
51 answers
51 answers
45 answers
38 answers
32 answers
30 answers
25 answers
24 answers
24 answers
23 answers
22 answers
22 answers
21 answers
19 answers
17 answers
17 answers
15 answers
12 answers
11 answers
10 answers
10 answers
10 answers
8 answers

Letter-value totals

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

Scrabble

C3O1L1L1Y4
Total: 10 points

Words With Friends

Total: 12 points

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

Try next

RAISE TRONE SAINT TIARE RANSE IRATE

Strategy after playing COLLY

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

Quick reference

Largest feedback groups after playing COLLY:

30% chance
Suggested:
RAISE
10% chance
Suggested:
TRONE
9% chance
Suggested:
RAISE

Follow-ups for common patterns

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

30.3% →
RAISE 6.25 bits
9.9% →
TRONE 5.38 bits
9.5% →
RAISE 5.43 bits
8.0% →
SAINT 4.88 bits
5.7% →
TIARE 5.46 bits
5.3% →
RANSE 4.75 bits
3.6% →
IRATE 5.31 bits
2.1% →
STAGE 4.68 bits
2.1% →
BLASE 4.08 bits
1.9% →
SWORE 3.52 bits

Research on COLLY

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

Optimal play

Opening with COLLY, a proven-optimal strategy averages 3.80 guesses and ranks #10,491 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 COLLY can guarantee a solve within six guesses.

Our six-turn simulation says 3.76, at or below the proven-optimal 3.80, 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 KAHLEE.

Rhymes with HOLLY MOLLY JOLLY DOLLY POLLY

Related meanings

In WordNet's sense inventory, COLLY is a kind of change.

Synonyms DIRTY soil GRIME

Familiarity and learning

Frequency
COLLY sits in the rare band of the wordfreq scale, appearing less than once per million words of written English; the band marks it as a word few players will have met in print.

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).