FUDGE
FUDGE is on the solver's possible-answer list and has no appearance in our globally completed Wordle history.
Meaning and pronunciation
Pronunciation: /fʌd͡ʒ//fʊd͡ʒ/
- Noun
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A type of very sweet candy or confection, usually made from sugar, butter, and milk or cream.
“Have you tried the vanilla fudge? It's delicious!”
- Noun
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Light or frothy nonsense.
- Verb
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To try to avoid giving a direct answer.
“When I asked them if they had been at the party, they fudged.”
- Verb
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To alter something from its true state, as to hide a flaw or uncertainty, deliberately but not necessarily dishonestly or immorally.
“The results of the experiment looked impressive, but it turned out the numbers had been fudged.”
Source: Wiktionary contributors · CC BY-SA 4.0. Corrections.
Etymology
Probably a variant of fadge (“to fit”), the confectionery sense having evolved from the meaning of “merging together” or “turning out as expected”.
Source: Wiktionary (CC BY-SA)
How it sounds
One syllable Say it FUHJ.
Rhymes with JUDGE BUDGE NUDGE MUDGE
Related meanings
Synonyms cook fake duck SKIRT DODGE HEDGE
In a sentence
This fudge is way too sweet for me.
Matthew didn't seem to give a fudge.
Use FUDGE in a puzzle
As an opener, it rules out about 88.3% 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
No completed appearanceNo 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.
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See what the public sample says →FUDGE in Connections
8 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 #1073
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FUDGE appeared in MODIFY DECEPTIVELY (green group).
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· Puzzle #905
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FUDGE appeared in MILD OATHS (green group).
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· Puzzle #735
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FUDGE appeared in "AW, HECK!" (green group).
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· Puzzle #550
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FUDGE appeared in MILD OATHS (blue group).
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· Puzzle #222
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FUDGE appeared in SUNDAE TOPPINGS (yellow group).
How FUDGE performs as a guess
FUDGE 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 73.5% of games, misses completely in 26.5%, and leaves about 279 possible answers on average.
In the previous complete opener benchmark, it ranks #9,037 of 14,855 openers, averaging 3.74 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 FUDGE 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 FUDGE 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 FUDGE in 4 guesses.
Feedback distribution
FUDGE can come back 88 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 FUDGE; 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 FUDGE
What the solver recommends next for each way the board can respond to FUDGE.
Quick reference
Largest feedback groups after playing FUDGE:
Research on FUDGE
Game-tree analysis and word research for FUDGE, with an explanation for each figure.
Optimal play
Opening with FUDGE, a proven-optimal strategy averages 3.76 guesses and ranks #8,579 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 FUDGE can guarantee a solve within six guesses.
Our six-turn simulation says 3.74, at or below the proven-optimal 3.76, 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
- FUDGE sits in the intermediate band of the wordfreq scale, appearing about 2 times per million words of written English; the band marks it as a word most readers meet regularly.
- Dominant sense
- Lancaster raters associated it most strongly with taste (4.8 of 5).
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); Lancaster Sensorimotor Norms (CC BY 4.0).