DRAFT
Yes, DRAFT was the Wordle answer on January 8, 2025 (Wordle #1299).
Meaning and pronunciation
Pronunciation: /dɹɑːft//dɹæft//dɹaft/
- Noun
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A current of air, usually coming into a room or vehicle.
- Noun
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The draw through a flue of gasses or smoke resulting from a combustion process.
- Verb
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To write a first version; to make a preliminary sketch.
- Verb
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To draw in outline; to make a draught, sketch, or plan of, as in architectural and mechanical drawing.
Alternative forms: draught
Source: Wiktionary contributors · CC BY-SA 4.0. Corrections.
Etymology
A phonetic spelling of draught (compare laughter), from Middle English draught, draght (“that which is pulled; that which is drawn up, a design”), from Old English *dreaht, *dræht, from Proto-West Germanic *drahti, *drahtu, from Proto-Germanic *drahtuz (“a pulling, drawing”). Cognate with Dutch dracht, German Tracht, Icelandic dráttur. By surface analysis, draw + -t.
Source: Wiktionary (CC BY-SA)
How it sounds
One syllable Say it DRAFT.
Rhymes with CRAFT SHAFT GRAFT KRAFT
Related meanings
Synonyms drawing outline blueprint muster enlist draught
In a sentence
There's a draft in here.
Your first draft was fine.
Use DRAFT in a puzzle
As an opener, it rules out about 93.3% of possible answers.
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
Used oncePast Wordle answer: January 8, 2025 (#1299).
See the full page for that puzzle: January 8, 2025 (#1299).
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 →DRAFT in Connections
6 recorded appearances in completed main-edition puzzles through . Showing the 5 most recent. A category label alone does not establish a word's meaning.
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· Puzzle #1217
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DRAFT appeared in USEFUL WHEN WRITING A PAPER (yellow group).
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· Puzzle #509
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DRAFT appeared in WAYS TO ORDER A BEER (green group).
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· Puzzle #474
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DRAFT appeared in ACTIONS IN FANTASY SPORTS (blue group).
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· Puzzle #436
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DRAFT appeared in RUSH OF WIND (yellow group).
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· Puzzle #338
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DRAFT appeared in EARLY ITERATION (yellow group).
How DRAFT performs as a guess
DRAFT 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 81.0% of games, misses completely in 19.0%, and leaves about 160 possible answers on average.
In the previous complete opener benchmark, it ranks #1,424 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.
Useful pattern pages
If you only know part of the word, start with one of these matching patterns.
First-turn measures
All four describe DRAFT 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 DRAFT 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 DRAFT in 4 guesses.
Feedback distribution
DRAFT can come back 104 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 DRAFT; 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 DRAFT
What the solver recommends next for each way the board can respond to DRAFT.
Quick reference
Largest feedback groups after playing DRAFT:
Research on DRAFT
Game-tree analysis and word research for DRAFT, with an explanation for each figure.
Optimal play
Opening with DRAFT, a proven-optimal strategy averages 3.65 guesses and ranks #1,881 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 DRAFT can guarantee a solve within six guesses.
Our six-turn simulation says 3.61, at or below the proven-optimal 3.65, 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
- DRAFT sits in the common band of the wordfreq scale, appearing about 41 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 B2); a word learners usually reach after the basics.
- Age of acquisition
- Typically learned around age 9, by Glasgow Norms speaker ratings.
- Imageability
- Imageability score: 52 of 100. Raters gave it a middle-range score.
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).