5 FiveLetterWords
Past Wordle answer Possible answer Accepted guess C tier for first-turn info

CRUSH

Yes, CRUSH was the Wordle answer on July 5, 2024 (Wordle #1112).

Meaning and pronunciation

Pronunciation: /kɹʌʃ/

Noun

A violent collision or compression; a crash; destruction; ruin.

Noun

Violent pressure, as of a moving crowd.

Verb

To press between two hard objects; to squeeze so as to alter the natural shape or integrity, or to force together into a mass.

“to crush grapes”

Verb

To reduce to fine particles by pounding or grinding.

“to crush quartz”

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

Etymology

From Middle English cruschen (“to crush, smash, squeeze, squash”), from Old French croissir (“to crush”), from Late Latin *crusciō (“to crush”), from Frankish *krustijan (“to crush, squeeze, squash”), from Proto-Germanic *kreustaną (“to crush, grind, strike, smash”).

Source: Wiktionary (CC BY-SA)

How it sounds

One syllable Say it KRUHSH.

Rhymes with BRUSH FLUSH BLUSH PLUSH SLUSH

Related meanings

Synonyms PRESS beat SHELL jam SMASH squeeze

In a sentence

I have a crush on you.
© tatoeba.org contributor CK (CC BY 2.0 FR)
You had a crush on me?
© tatoeba.org contributor Hybrid (CC BY 2.0 FR)

Use CRUSH in a puzzle

As an opener, it rules out about 91.5% of possible answers.

Open Solver with CRUSH Open Word Finder

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: July 5, 2024 (#1112).

See the full page for that puzzle: July 5, 2024 (#1112).

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

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CRUSH in Connections

7 recorded appearances in completed main-edition puzzles through . Showing the 5 most recent. A category label alone does not establish a word's meaning.

How CRUSH performs as a guess

CRUSH is a possible answer, so it would solve about one game in 2,384 when every answer is treated as equally likely.

Played as an opener, it lands at least one colored tile in 76.9% of games, misses completely in 23.1%, and leaves about 203 possible answers on average.

In the previous complete opener benchmark, it ranks #2,383 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.
See strategy patterns

Useful pattern pages

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

C___H C in the 1st position and H in the 5th position C__S_ C in the 1st position and S in the 4th position _R__H R in the 2nd position and H in the 5th position CR_SH C in the 1st position, R in the 2nd position, S in the 4th position, and H in the 5th position

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

First-turn measures

All four describe CRUSH 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.

4.70 Entropy (bits)
203 Avg remaining
0.04% Exact match
91.5% Avg ruled out

As an opening guess: previous benchmark

How CRUSH 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
99.96% Solved within six
0.70 Spread of game lengths
#2,383 Rank among openers
Opening with CRUSH left 1 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 3.63 average. It ranks #2,383 of 14,855 openers by average guesses in games solved within six.
1 guess
1
2 guesses
50
3 guesses
1,010
4 guesses
1,077
5 guesses
196
6 guesses
19

Composition

5/5 unique
1 vowels
Common:
RSU

Feedback chances

Any hit (G/Y)
77%
Green tile
32%
All gray
23%

Example solver route

R O A T E
S L I C K
C R U S H

One example route used by the solver.

This solver benchmark reaches CRUSH in 3 guesses.

Feedback distribution

CRUSH can come back 101 different ways. These are the most likely, and how many of the possible answers give each one:

550 answers
267 answers
186 answers
153 answers
115 answers
71 answers
70 answers
66 answers
64 answers
55 answers
49 answers
46 answers
39 answers
36 answers
35 answers
32 answers
32 answers
31 answers
24 answers
23 answers
21 answers
21 answers
19 answers
18 answers
16 answers
14 answers
14 answers
14 answers
12 answers
12 answers

Letter-value totals

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

Scrabble

C3R1U1S1H4
Total: 10 points

Words With Friends

Total: 11 points

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

Try next

ALONE RATEL PLATE DIANE BLITE STOAE

Strategy after playing CRUSH

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

Quick reference

Largest feedback groups after playing CRUSH:

23% chance
Suggested:
ALONE
11% chance
Suggested:
RATEL
8% chance
Suggested:
PLATE

Follow-ups for common patterns

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

23.1% →
ALONE 6.19 bits
11.2% →
RATEL 5.17 bits
7.8% →
PLATE 5.75 bits
6.4% →
DIANE 5.31 bits
4.8% →
BLITE 4.84 bits
3.0% →
STOAE 4.83 bits
2.9% →
LIANE 5.05 bits
2.8% →
THALE 5.12 bits
2.7% →
OLATE 4.61 bits
2.3% →
ALONE 4.96 bits

Research on CRUSH

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

Optimal play

Opening with CRUSH, a proven-optimal strategy averages 3.69 guesses and ranks #4,371 of 14,855 legal openers. The best proven opener, TARSE, averages 3.55.

In hard mode it averages 3.82 guesses at best and is rank #1,892 of the 7,453 openers that can still guarantee a solve within six guesses.

Our six-turn simulation says 3.63, at or below the proven-optimal 3.69, 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.

Familiarity and learning

Frequency
CRUSH 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.
Learner level
Appears in intermediate learner vocabulary (CEFR-J level B1); a word learners usually reach after the basics.
Age of acquisition
Typically learned around age 7, by Glasgow Norms speaker ratings.
Imageability
Imageability score: 56 of 100. Raters gave it a middle-range score.
Dominant sense
Lancaster raters associated it most strongly with sight (3.4 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); Learner levels: CEFR-J Wordlist ver 1.5, Tono Laboratory, TUFS; Glasgow Norms (CC BY 4.0); Lancaster Sensorimotor Norms (CC BY 4.0).