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

DEWAX

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

Meaning and pronunciation

Verb

To remove wax from (a material or surface).

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

Use DEWAX in a puzzle

As an opener, it rules out about 88.0% of possible answers.

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

No completed appearance

No appearance in our globally completed history. A recent puzzle may still be live elsewhere.

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

How DEWAX performs as a guess

Wordle accepts DEWAX 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 76.4% of games, misses completely in 23.6%, and leaves about 287 possible answers on average.

In the previous complete opener benchmark, it ranks #13,624 of 14,855 openers, averaging 3.88 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 DEWAX 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.

3.88 Entropy (bits)
287 Avg remaining
0.0% Exact match
88.0% Avg ruled out

As an opening guess: previous benchmark

How DEWAX 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.

3.88 Avg guesses
99.96% Solved within six
0.72 Spread of game lengths
#13,624 Rank among openers
Opening with DEWAX left 1 of the snapshot's answers unsolved after six guesses. A spread of 0.72 means those games clustered within about 0.72 of a guess of the 3.88 average. It ranks #13,624 of 14,855 openers by average guesses in games solved within six.
1 guess
0
2 guesses
40
3 guesses
633
4 guesses
1,287
5 guesses
367
6 guesses
26

Composition

5/5 unique
2 vowels
Common:
AE

Feedback chances

Any hit (G/Y)
76%
Green tile
21%
All gray
24%

Feedback distribution

DEWAX can come back 66 different ways. These are the most likely, and how many of the possible answers give each one:

563 answers
384 answers
363 answers
208 answers
124 answers
78 answers
70 answers
60 answers
51 answers
50 answers
39 answers
38 answers
36 answers
29 answers
29 answers
22 answers
20 answers
19 answers
17 answers
14 answers
13 answers
12 answers
11 answers
11 answers
10 answers
10 answers
7 answers
6 answers
6 answers
6 answers

Letter-value totals

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

Scrabble

D2E1W4A1X8
Total: 16 points

Words With Friends

Total: 16 points

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

Strategy after playing DEWAX

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

Quick reference

Largest feedback groups after playing DEWAX:

24% chance
Suggested:
HOIST
16% chance
Suggested:
SIREE
15% chance
Suggested:
SLART

Follow-ups for common patterns

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

23.6% →
HOIST 5.80 bits
16.1% →
SIREE 5.34 bits
15.2% →
SLART 5.20 bits
8.7% →
TARSE 4.66 bits
5.2% →
TERSE 4.51 bits
3.3% →
CORAL 4.53 bits
2.9% →
SLIER 4.55 bits
2.5% →
LURID 4.45 bits
2.1% →
ROANY 4.13 bits
2.1% →
SIREN 4.34 bits

Research on DEWAX

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

Optimal play

Opening with DEWAX, a proven-optimal strategy averages 3.85 guesses and ranks #12,659 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 DEWAX can guarantee a solve within six guesses.

Our six-turn simulation says 3.88; proven optimal play reaches 3.85. The fixed strategy accounts for the difference.

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.

Sources: Optimal-play values: Alex Selby's exhaustive Wordle analysis (MIT).