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

CRUEL

Yes, CRUEL was the Wordle answer on January 28, 2026 (Wordle #1684).

As an opener, it rules out about 95.5% of possible answers.

Open Solver with CRUEL Open Word Finder

Meaning and pronunciation

Pronunciation: /ˈkɹuːəl//kɹuːl//kɹʊəl/

Adjective

Intentionally causing or reveling in pain and suffering; merciless, heartless.

“The supervisor was very cruel to Josh, as he would always give Josh the hardest, most degrading work he could find.”

Adjective

Harsh; severe.

“We're certainly having quite a cruel winter this year.”

Adverb

To a great degree; terribly.

Verb

To spoil or ruin (one's chance of success)

Alternative forms: cruell

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 28, 2026 (#1684).

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 CRUEL performs as a guess

CRUEL 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 87.3% of games, misses completely in 12.7%, and leaves about 107 possible answers on average.

In the previous complete v5 benchmark, it ranks #636 of 14,855 openers, averaging 3.59 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___L C in the 1st position and L in the 5th position C__E_ C in the 1st position and E in the 4th position _R__L R in the 2nd position and L in the 5th position

Try next

SAINT SALON ROAST STALE SETAE MUSTY
Words starting with C Words ending with L

First-turn measures

5.31 Entropy (bits)
107 Avg remaining
0.04% Exact match
95.5% Avg ruled out
Higher first-turn entropy than about 95% of evaluated openers
0.64 bits below the highest measured first-turn entropy (~5.95 bits)

As an opener: v5 benchmark

How CRUEL 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.

3.59 Avg guesses
99.9% Win rate
0.69 Volatility
#636 v5 opener rank
In the complete v5 snapshot, CRUEL ranks #636 of 14,855 openers by average guesses in games solved within six.
1 guess
1
2 guesses
67
3 guesses
1,028
4 guesses
1,075
5 guesses
165
6 guesses
16
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
2 vowels
Common:
ELRU

Feedback chances

Any hit (G/Y)
87%
Green tile
39%
All gray
13%

Example solver route

R O A T E
S I L E D
C L U M P
C R U E L

One example route used by the solver.

This solver benchmark reaches CRUEL in 4 guesses.

Feedback distribution

115 possible patterns. Top outcomes:

299
212
145
136
117
108
97
87
80
65
58
58
45
41
39
37
31
31
31
25
23
22
21
21
20
19
18
18
18
17

Quick reference

Largest feedback groups after playing CRUEL:

13% chance
Suggested:
SAINT
9% chance
Suggested:
SAINT
6% chance
Suggested:
SALON

Follow-ups for common patterns

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

12.7% →
SAINT 6.11 bits
9.0% →
SAINT 5.56 bits
6.1% →
SALON 5.02 bits
5.8% →
ROAST 5.12 bits
5.0% →
STALE 4.74 bits
4.6% →
SAINT 3.99 bits
4.1% →
SETAE 4.63 bits
3.7% →
SAINT 4.61 bits
3.4% →
MUSTY 4.38 bits
2.8% →
SAINT 4.78 bits

Letter-value totals

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

Scrabble

C3R1U1E1L1
Total: 7 points

Words With Friends

Total: 10 points

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