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

GARBS

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

As an opener, it rules out about 92.6% of possible answers.

Open Solver with GARBS Open Word Finder

Meaning and pronunciation

Noun

plural of garb

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 GARBS performs as a guess

Wordle accepts GARBS 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 81.6% of games, misses completely in 18.4%, and leaves about 177 possible answers on average.

In the previous complete opener benchmark, it ranks #4,445 of 14,855 openers, averaging 3.66 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.

G___S G in the 1st position and S in the 5th position G__B_ G in the 1st position and B in the 4th position _A__S A in the 2nd position and S in the 5th position

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

First-turn measures

All four describe GARBS 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.

4.60 Entropy (bits)
177 Avg remaining
0.0% Exact match
92.6% Avg ruled out
Higher first-turn entropy than about 59% of evaluated openers
1.35 bits below the highest measured first-turn entropy (~5.95 bits)

As an opening guess: previous benchmark

How GARBS 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.

3.66 Avg guesses
100% Solved within six
0.68 Spread of game lengths
#4,445 Rank among openers
Opening with GARBS solved every answer in the snapshot within six guesses. A spread of 0.68 means those games clustered within about 0.68 of a guess of the 3.66 average. It ranks #4,445 of 14,855 openers by average guesses in games solved within six.
1 guess
0
2 guesses
52
3 guesses
912
4 guesses
1,188
5 guesses
187
6 guesses
15
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:
ARS

Feedback chances

Any hit (G/Y)
82%
Green tile
25%
All gray
18%

Feedback distribution

GARBS can come back 87 different ways. These are the most likely, and how many of the possible answers give each one:

436 answers
255 answers
237 answers
199 answers
115 answers
113 answers
108 answers
68 answers
68 answers
67 answers
57 answers
46 answers
43 answers
33 answers
33 answers
31 answers
27 answers
27 answers
27 answers
27 answers
24 answers
24 answers
19 answers
17 answers
16 answers
15 answers
15 answers
14 answers
13 answers
12 answers

Letter-value totals

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

Scrabble

G2A1R1B3S1
Total: 8 points

Words With Friends

Total: 10 points

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

Try next

TOILE TRIED CLOTE CLINE TRACE THALE

Strategy after playing GARBS

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

Quick reference

Largest feedback groups after playing GARBS:

18% chance
Suggested:
TOILE
11% chance
Suggested:
TRIED
10% chance
Suggested:
TOILE

Follow-ups for common patterns

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

18.4% →
TOILE 6.07 bits
10.7% →
TRIED 5.23 bits
10.0% →
TOILE 5.51 bits
8.4% →
CLOTE 5.47 bits
4.8% →
CLINE 4.64 bits
4.8% →
TRACE 4.87 bits
4.5% →
THALE 4.79 bits
2.9% →
CLOTE 4.97 bits
2.9% →
SPITE 4.68 bits
2.8% →
TOILE 4.66 bits

Research on GARBS

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

Optimal play

Opening with GARBS, a proven-optimal strategy averages 3.70 guesses and ranks #4,632 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 GARBS can guarantee a solve within six guesses.

Our six-turn simulation says 3.66, at or below the proven-optimal 3.70, 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 GAHRBZ. Estimated pronunciation

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

Related meanings

In WordNet's sense inventory, GARBS is a kind of wear or turn.

Synonyms DRESS apparel garment attire

Familiarity and learning

Frequency
GARBS sits in the rare band of the wordfreq scale, appearing less than once per million words of written English; the band marks it as a word few players will have met in print.
Dominant sense
Lancaster raters associated it most strongly with sight (4.1 of 5).

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