FUNNY
Yes, FUNNY was the Wordle answer on December 18, 2023 (Wordle #912).
Meaning and pronunciation
Pronunciation: /ˈfʌni//ˈfʊni//ˈfʌne/
- Adjective
-
Amusing; humorous; comical.
“I know you'll enjoy chatting with her — she's really funny and smart.”
- Adjective
-
Strange or unusual, often in an unpleasant way.
“The milk smelt funny so I poured it away.”
- Noun
-
A joke.
- Noun
-
A comic strip.
Source: Wiktionary contributors · CC BY-SA 4.0. Corrections.
Etymology
Perhaps a jocular use of funny. See above.
Source: Wiktionary (CC BY-SA)
How it sounds
Two syllables, stress on the first syllable Say it FUHNEE.
Rhymes with MONEY HONEY SUNNY BUNNY SONNY
Related meanings
Synonyms suspect curious COMIC odd suspicious amusing
Opposites well familiar
In a sentence
Is that funny to you?
The new one is funny.
Use FUNNY in a puzzle
As an opener, it rules out about 77.9% 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: December 18, 2023 (#912).
See the full page for that puzzle: December 18, 2023 (#912).
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 →FUNNY in Connections
2 recorded appearances in completed main-edition puzzles through . A category label alone does not establish a word's meaning.
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· Puzzle #449
Reveal this appearance's category
FUNNY appeared in PECULIAR (yellow group).
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· Puzzle #148
Reveal this appearance's category
FUNNY appeared in WORDS THAT GO WITH “BONE” (purple group).
How FUNNY performs as a guess
FUNNY 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 55.9% of games, misses completely in 44.1%, and leaves about 527 possible answers on average.
In the previous complete opener benchmark, it ranks #14,005 of 14,855 openers, averaging 3.90 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 FUNNY 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 FUNNY 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 FUNNY in 4 guesses.
Feedback distribution
FUNNY can come back 61 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 FUNNY; 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 FUNNY
What the solver recommends next for each way the board can respond to FUNNY.
Quick reference
Largest feedback groups after playing FUNNY:
Research on FUNNY
Game-tree analysis and word research for FUNNY, with an explanation for each figure.
Optimal play
Opening with FUNNY, a proven-optimal strategy averages 3.90 guesses and ranks #13,915 of 14,855 legal openers. The best proven opener, TARSE, averages 3.55.
In hard mode it averages 4.06 guesses at best and is rank #6,901 of the 7,453 openers that can still guarantee a solve within six guesses.
Our six-turn simulation says 3.90, at or below the proven-optimal 3.90, 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
- FUNNY sits in the common band of the wordfreq scale, appearing about 105 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 4, by Glasgow Norms speaker ratings.
- Imageability
- Imageability score: 60 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).