DOWNY
DOWNY is on the solver's possible-answer list but has not appeared as a Wordle answer yet.
As an opener, it rules out about 86.1% of possible answers.
Meaning and pronunciation
Pronunciation: /ˈdaʊni/
- Adjective
-
Having down, covered with a soft fuzzy coating as of small feathers or hair.
“The chick's downy coat of feathers formed almost immediately to keep it warm.”
- Adjective
-
Low-spirited; down in the mouth.
- Noun
-
A blanket filled with down; a duvet.
- Noun
-
A bed.
“to do the downy (i.e. lie in bed)”
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
YesIncluded in the Wordle guess list used by our tools.
Possible answer
YesIncluded among the answers considered by the solver.
Past Wordle answer
Not used yetNo past answer date found.
The possible-answer list is the solver's current list and may change when Wordle adds new answers.
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See what the public sample says →How DOWNY performs as a guess
DOWNY is a possible answer, so it would solve about one game in 2,374 when every answer is treated as equally likely.
Played as an opener, it lands at least one colored tile in 66.8% of games, misses completely in 33.2%, and leaves about 331 possible answers on average.
In the previous complete opener benchmark, it ranks #6,802 of 14,855 openers, averaging 3.70 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.
Useful pattern pages
If you only know part of the word, start with one of these matching patterns.
First-turn measures
All four describe DOWNY 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.
As an opening guess: previous benchmark
How DOWNY 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.
Composition
Feedback chances
Example solver route
One example route used by the solver.
This solver benchmark reaches DOWNY in 4 guesses.
Feedback distribution
DOWNY can come back 95 different ways. These are the most likely, and how many of the possible answers give each one:
Letter-value totals
Base letter-value totals for DOWNY; these do not show whether either game accepts the word.
Scrabble
Words With Friends
Scores shown are base values without double/triple letter or word bonuses.
Try next
Strategy after playing DOWNY
What the solver recommends next for each way the board can respond to DOWNY.
Quick reference
Largest feedback groups after playing DOWNY:
Research on DOWNY
Game-tree analysis and word research for DOWNY, with an explanation for each figure.
Optimal play
Opening with DOWNY, a proven-optimal strategy averages 3.74 guesses and ranks #7,738 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 DOWNY can guarantee a solve within six guesses.
Our six-turn simulation says 3.70, at or below the proven-optimal 3.74, 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
Two syllables, stress on the first syllable Say it DOWNEE.
Familiarity and learning
- Frequency
- DOWNY 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.
In a sentence
A layer of downy frost covered the grass in the early morning light.
The peach's downy skin glowed softly in the summer sun.
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).