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

FEVER

Yes, FEVER was the Wordle answer on January 28, 2025 (Wordle #1319).

Meaning and pronunciation

Pronunciation: /ˈfiːvə//ˈfivɚ/

Noun

A higher than normal body temperature of a person (or, generally, a mammal), usually caused by disease.

“There has been a rise in my fever. I think I've the flu.”

Noun

Any of various diseases.

“scarlet fever”

Verb

To put into a fever; to affect with fever.

Verb

To become fevered.

Alternative forms: feaver, fevre

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

Etymology

From Middle English fever, fevere, from Old English fefer, fefor (“fever”) and Old French fievre (“fever”), from Latin febris (“a fever”), from Proto-Indo-European *dʰegʷʰ- (“to burn”). Displaced native Old English hriþ (“fever”). Compare also Saterland Frisian Fiewer, German Fieber, Danish feber, Swedish feber.

Source: Wiktionary (CC BY-SA)

How it sounds

Two syllables, stress on the first syllable Say it FEEVUR.

In a sentence

Do I have a fever?
© tatoeba.org contributor CM (CC BY 2.0 FR)
Do you have a fever?
© tatoeba.org contributor CK (CC BY 2.0 FR)

Use FEVER in a puzzle

As an opener, it rules out about 85.7% of possible answers.

Open Solver with FEVER 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: January 28, 2025 (#1319).

See the full page for that puzzle: January 28, 2025 (#1319).

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

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FEVER in Connections

4 recorded appearances in completed main-edition puzzles through . A category label alone does not establish a word's meaning.

How FEVER performs as a guess

FEVER 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 68.4% of games, misses completely in 31.6%, and leaves about 340 possible answers on average.

In the previous complete opener benchmark, it ranks #11,899 of 14,855 openers, averaging 3.81 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.

F___R F in the 1st position and R in the 5th position F__E_ F in the 1st position and E in the 4th position _E__R E in the 2nd position and R in the 5th position FE_ER F in the 1st position, E in the 2nd position, E in the 4th position, and R in the 5th position

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

First-turn measures

All four describe FEVER 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.

3.93 Entropy (bits)
340 Avg remaining
0.04% Exact match
85.7% Avg ruled out

As an opening guess: previous benchmark

How FEVER 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.

3.81 Avg guesses
99.96% Solved within six
0.72 Spread of game lengths
#11,899 Rank among openers
Opening with FEVER 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 3.81 average. It ranks #11,899 of 14,855 openers by average guesses in games solved within six.
1 guess
1
2 guesses
43
3 guesses
724
4 guesses
1,243
5 guesses
324
6 guesses
18

Composition

4/5 unique
2 vowels
Common:
ER

Feedback chances

Any hit (G/Y)
68%
Green tile
31%
All gray
32%

Example solver route

R O A T E
S I L E D
P E N C E
F E V E R

One example route used by the solver.

This solver benchmark reaches FEVER in 4 guesses.

Feedback distribution

FEVER can come back 77 different ways. These are the most likely, and how many of the possible answers give each one:

754 answers
323 answers
293 answers
123 answers
95 answers
85 answers
76 answers
53 answers
51 answers
44 answers
34 answers
29 answers
29 answers
26 answers
24 answers
24 answers
24 answers
17 answers
15 answers
13 answers
13 answers
12 answers
12 answers
12 answers
11 answers
10 answers
10 answers
9 answers
9 answers
9 answers

Letter-value totals

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

Scrabble

F4E1V4E1R1
Total: 11 points

Words With Friends

Total: 12 points

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

Try next

SLANT COAST SHALT LADEN STARY SAINT

Strategy after playing FEVER

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

Quick reference

Largest feedback groups after playing FEVER:

32% chance
Suggested:
SLANT
14% chance
Suggested:
COAST
12% chance
Suggested:
SLANT

Follow-ups for common patterns

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

31.6% →
SLANT 5.86 bits
13.5% →
COAST 5.40 bits
12.3% →
SLANT 5.65 bits
5.2% →
COAST 4.78 bits
4.0% →
COAST 3.50 bits
3.6% →
SHALT 4.61 bits
3.2% →
LADEN 4.46 bits
2.2% →
SLANT 4.55 bits
2.1% →
STARY 3.97 bits
1.8% →
SAINT 3.99 bits

Research on FEVER

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

Optimal play

Opening with FEVER, a proven-optimal strategy averages 3.83 guesses and ranks #11,873 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 FEVER can guarantee a solve within six guesses.

Our six-turn simulation says 3.81, at or below the proven-optimal 3.83, 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
FEVER sits in the common band of the wordfreq scale, appearing about 17 times per million words of written English; the band marks it as an everyday word almost every player will know.
Learner level
Appears in beginner learner vocabulary (CEFR-J level A1); among the first words English learners study.
Age of acquisition
Typically learned around age 6, by Glasgow Norms speaker ratings.
Imageability
Imageability score: 62 of 100. Raters gave it a middle-range score.
Dominant sense
Lancaster raters associated it most strongly with internal bodily sensation (4.7 of 5).

Sources: Optimal-play values: Alex Selby's exhaustive Wordle analysis (MIT); Pronunciation: CMU Pronouncing Dictionary (BSD); 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).