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

CRUSE

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

As an opener, it rules out about 95.4% of possible answers.

Meaning and pronunciation

Pronunciation: /kɹuːs//kɹuːz/

Noun

An oil lamp; a crusy.

Noun

A small jar used to hold liquid, such as oil or water.

Alternative forms: cruise, cruze

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 CRUSE performs as a guess

Wordle accepts CRUSE 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 86.8% of games, misses completely in 13.2%, and leaves about 108 possible answers on average.

In the previous complete opener benchmark, it ranks #1,745 of 14,855 openers, averaging 3.61 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 CRUSE 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.

5.34 Entropy (bits)
108 Avg remaining
0.0% Exact match
95.4% Avg ruled out
Higher first-turn entropy than about 96% of evaluated openers
0.61 bits below the highest measured first-turn entropy (~5.95 bits)

As an opening guess: previous benchmark

How CRUSE 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.

3.61 Avg guesses
99.83% Solved within six
0.70 Spread of game lengths
#1,745 Rank among openers
Opening with CRUSE left 4 of the snapshot's answers unsolved after six guesses. A spread of 0.70 means those games clustered within about 0.70 of a guess of the 3.61 average. It ranks #1,745 of 14,855 openers by average guesses in games solved within six.
1 guess
0
2 guesses
85
3 guesses
939
4 guesses
1,139
5 guesses
171
6 guesses
16
Top-ranked in the current bounded policy screen: SLANT. The policy minimizes misses within six first, then average guesses among wins (3.46 for the leader). Compare the ranking measures

Composition

5/5 unique
2 vowels
Common:
ERSU

Feedback chances

Any hit (G/Y)
87%
Green tile
40%
All gray
13%

Feedback distribution

CRUSE can come back 118 different ways. These are the most likely, and how many of the possible answers give each one:

313 answers
203 answers
167 answers
123 answers
119 answers
116 answers
91 answers
82 answers
61 answers
55 answers
54 answers
52 answers
50 answers
41 answers
40 answers
38 answers
35 answers
31 answers
30 answers
30 answers
28 answers
27 answers
27 answers
26 answers
25 answers
22 answers
20 answers
19 answers
17 answers
17 answers

Letter-value totals

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

Scrabble

C3R1U1S1E1
Total: 7 points

Words With Friends

Total: 9 points

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

Strategy after playing CRUSE

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

Quick reference

Largest feedback groups after playing CRUSE:

13% chance
Suggested:
TALON
9% chance
Suggested:
LADEN
7% chance
Suggested:
LEANT

Follow-ups for common patterns

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

13.2%
TALON 5.96 bits
8.6%
LADEN 5.21 bits
7.0%
LEANT 4.40 bits
5.2%
SLANT 5.09 bits
5.0%
AGILE 4.66 bits
4.9%
TARDY 5.01 bits
3.8%
DRAIN 4.49 bits
3.5%
LUMPY 4.14 bits
2.6%
LATCH 4.42 bits
2.3%
STEEL 4.51 bits

Research on CRUSE

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

Optimal play

Opening with CRUSE, a proven-optimal strategy averages 3.63 guesses and ranks #1,028 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 CRUSE can guarantee a solve within six guesses.

Our six-turn simulation says 3.61, at or below the proven-optimal 3.63, 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 KROOZ.

Rhymes with WHOSE VIEWS SHOES BLUES CREWS

Related meanings

In WordNet's sense inventory, CRUSE is a kind of jar.

Familiarity and learning

Frequency
CRUSE sits in the advanced band of the wordfreq scale, appearing less than once per million words of written English; the band marks it as an uncommon word many players still recognize.

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).