5 FiveLetterWords
Past Wordle answer Possible answer Accepted guess B tier opener

CRANK

Yes, CRANK was the Wordle answer on January 8, 2022 (Wordle #203).

As an opener, it rules out about 92.6% of possible answers.

Open Solver with CRANK Open Word Finder

Meaning and pronunciation

Pronunciation: /ˈkɹæŋk/[ˈkʰɹʷæŋk]/ˈkɹeɪ̯ŋk/

Adjective

Strange; weird; odd.

Adjective

Sick; unwell.

Noun

An ill-tempered or nasty person.

“Billy-Bob is a nasty old crank! He chased my cat away.”

Noun

A twist or turn of the mind; caprice; whim;

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: January 8, 2022 (#203).

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

Wordle Observatory

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About the project

Add an anonymous result and difficulty rating to the public, aggregate research dataset.

We send only this answer word for puzzle verification, the puzzle number, result, difficulty vote, Hard Mode flag, timezone and a random one-puzzle receipt token. The Observatory stores no answer word, grid, guesses, account, email, IP-derived ID or reusable player identifier. The puzzle-specific receipt prevents duplicate submissions and permits withdrawal; anyone with that token can withdraw, so keep browser-data exports private. See the privacy details.

How CRANK performs as a guess

CRANK is a possible answer, so it would solve about one game in 2,358 when every answer is treated as equally likely.

Played as an opener, it lands at least one colored tile in 80.0% of games, misses completely in 20.0%, and leaves about 174 possible answers on average.

In the previous complete v5 benchmark, it ranks #2,326 of 14,855 openers, averaging 3.63 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.

Useful pattern pages

If you only know part of the word, start with one of these matching patterns.

C___K C in the 1st position and K in the 5th position C__N_ C in the 1st position and N in the 4th position _R__K R in the 2nd position and K in the 5th position

Try next

TOILE SOREE SALET TALER STILE SPITE
Words starting with C Words ending with K

First-turn measures

4.82 Entropy (bits)
174 Avg remaining
0.04% Exact match
92.6% Avg ruled out
Higher first-turn entropy than about 73% of evaluated openers
1.13 bits below the highest measured first-turn entropy (~5.95 bits)

As an opener: v5 benchmark

How CRANK 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.

3.63 Avg guesses
100.0% Win rate
0.70 Volatility
#2,326 v5 opener rank
In the complete v5 snapshot, CRANK ranks #2,326 of 14,855 openers by average guesses in games solved within six.
1 guess
1
2 guesses
55
3 guesses
994
4 guesses
1,095
5 guesses
190
6 guesses
18
Top-ranked in the current bounded policy screen: SLANT. The policy minimizes misses within six first, then average guesses among wins (3.45 for the leader). Compare the ranking measures

Composition

5/5 unique
1 vowels
Common:
ANR

Feedback chances

Any hit (G/Y)
80%
Green tile
34%
All gray
20%

Example solver route

R O A T E
S W I N G
C A P E D
C R A N K

One example route used by the solver.

This solver benchmark reaches CRANK in 4 guesses.

Feedback distribution

105 possible patterns. Top outcomes:

472
243
223
123
122
101
96
69
69
66
46
40
36
33
33
29
25
23
23
23
22
21
19
18
16
15
15
14
14
14

Quick reference

Largest feedback groups after playing CRANK:

20% chance
Suggested:
TOILE
10% chance
Suggested:
SOREE
9% chance
Suggested:
SALET

Follow-ups for common patterns

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

20.0% →
TOILE 6.10 bits
10.3% →
SOREE 5.15 bits
9.5% →
SALET 5.48 bits
5.2% →
TOILE 5.15 bits
5.2% →
TALER 4.70 bits
4.3% →
STILE 5.29 bits
4.1% →
SPITE 4.79 bits
2.9% →
TOISE 4.75 bits
2.9% →
SAMEL 4.50 bits
2.8% →
TOILE 4.93 bits

Letter-value totals

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

Scrabble

C3R1A1N1K5
Total: 11 points

Words With Friends

Total: 13 points

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