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

FIRKS

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

As an opener, it rules out about 89.3% of possible answers.

Meaning and pronunciation

Noun

plural of firk

Verb

third-person singular simple present indicative of firk

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

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

Not used yet

No past answer date found.

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

How FIRKS performs as a guess

Wordle accepts FIRKS 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 75.7% of games, misses completely in 24.3%, and leaves about 255 possible answers on average.

In the previous complete opener benchmark, it ranks #7,840 of 14,855 openers, averaging 3.72 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 FIRKS 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.

4.17 Entropy (bits)
255 Avg remaining
0.0% Exact match
89.3% Avg ruled out
Higher first-turn entropy than about 31% of evaluated openers
1.78 bits below the highest measured first-turn entropy (~5.95 bits)

As an opening guess: previous benchmark

How FIRKS 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.

3.72 Avg guesses
99.96% Solved within six
0.71 Spread of game lengths
#7,840 Rank among openers
Opening with FIRKS left 1 of the snapshot's answers unsolved after six guesses. A spread of 0.71 means those games clustered within about 0.71 of a guess of the 3.72 average. It ranks #7,840 of 14,855 openers by average guesses in games solved within six.
1 guess
0
2 guesses
48
3 guesses
857
4 guesses
1,175
5 guesses
257
6 guesses
16
Top-ranked in the current bounded policy screen: SLANT. The policy minimizes misses within six first, then average guesses among wins (3.46 for the leader). Compare the ranking measures

Composition

5/5 unique
1 vowels
Common:
IRS

Feedback chances

Any hit (G/Y)
76%
Green tile
23%
All gray
24%

Feedback distribution

FIRKS can come back 78 different ways. These are the most likely, and how many of the possible answers give each one:

576 answers
342 answers
265 answers
189 answers
105 answers
88 answers
88 answers
81 answers
75 answers
46 answers
37 answers
35 answers
31 answers
30 answers
25 answers
23 answers
21 answers
20 answers
20 answers
16 answers
14 answers
13 answers
13 answers
12 answers
12 answers
11 answers
11 answers
10 answers
10 answers
9 answers

Letter-value totals

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

Scrabble

F4I1R1K5S1
Total: 12 points

Words With Friends

Total: 12 points

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

Strategy after playing FIRKS

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

Quick reference

Largest feedback groups after playing FIRKS:

24% chance
Suggested:
ALONE
14% chance
Suggested:
COATE
11% chance
Suggested:
STALE

Follow-ups for common patterns

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

24.3%
ALONE 5.99 bits
14.4%
COATE 5.39 bits
11.2%
STALE 5.76 bits
8.0%
ANILE 5.43 bits
4.4%
TONEY 4.55 bits
3.7%
COATE 4.85 bits
3.7%
TRIED 4.75 bits
3.4%
SPATE 5.06 bits
3.2%
LEANT 4.68 bits
1.9%
ANOLE 4.77 bits

Research on FIRKS

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

Optimal play

Opening with FIRKS, a proven-optimal strategy averages 3.75 guesses and ranks #8,199 of 14,855 legal openers. The best proven opener, TARSE, averages 3.55.

In hard mode it averages 3.87 guesses at best and is rank #3,536 of the 7,453 openers that can still guarantee a solve within six guesses.

Our six-turn simulation says 3.72, at or below the proven-optimal 3.75, 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

One syllable Say it FURKS. Estimated pronunciation

This pronunciation is machine-estimated, not taken from a pronunciation dictionary.

Sources: Optimal-play values: Alex Selby's exhaustive Wordle analysis (MIT); Pronunciation: CMU Pronouncing Dictionary (BSD), with machine estimates from the g2p_en model.