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

GENUS

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

Meaning and pronunciation

Pronunciation: /ˈdʒiːnəs//ˈdʒɛnəs//ˈd͡ʒiːnəs/

Noun

A category in the classification of organisms, ranking below family (Lat. familia) and above species.

“All magnolias belong to the genus Magnolia.”

Noun

A group with common attributes.

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

How it sounds

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

Rhymes with VENUS MINAS LENIS

In a sentence

The genus Giraffe comprises five main species.
© tatoeba.org contributor BilalBouy (CC BY 2.0 FR)
Wolves and dogs are animals from the same genus, but different species.
© tatoeba.org contributor lucasmg123 (CC BY 2.0 FR)

Use GENUS in a puzzle

As an opener, it rules out about 92.3% of possible answers.

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

No completed appearance

No 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.

GENUS in Connections

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

How GENUS performs as a guess

Wordle accepts GENUS 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 183 possible answers on average.

In the previous complete opener benchmark, it ranks #6,729 of 14,855 openers, averaging 3.70 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 GENUS 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.

4.65 Entropy (bits)
183 Avg remaining
0.0% Exact match
92.3% Avg ruled out

As an opening guess: previous benchmark

How GENUS 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.

3.70 Avg guesses
99.87% Solved within six
0.70 Spread of game lengths
#6,729 Rank among openers
Opening with GENUS left 3 of the snapshot's answers unsolved after six guesses. A spread of 0.70 means those games clustered within about 0.70 of a guess of the 3.70 average. It ranks #6,729 of 14,855 openers by average guesses in games solved within six.
1 guess
0
2 guesses
65
3 guesses
830
4 guesses
1,227
5 guesses
209
6 guesses
20

Composition

5/5 unique
2 vowels
Common:
ENSU

Feedback chances

Any hit (G/Y)
82%
Green tile
24%
All gray
18%

Feedback distribution

GENUS can come back 99 different ways. These are the most likely, and how many of the possible answers give each one:

438 answers
335 answers
199 answers
150 answers
138 answers
116 answers
98 answers
88 answers
53 answers
53 answers
48 answers
40 answers
39 answers
31 answers
31 answers
31 answers
28 answers
27 answers
27 answers
25 answers
22 answers
19 answers
19 answers
17 answers
15 answers
15 answers
15 answers
12 answers
12 answers
12 answers

Letter-value totals

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

Scrabble

G2E1N1U1S1
Total: 6 points

Words With Friends

Total: 9 points

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

Strategy after playing GENUS

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

Quick reference

Largest feedback groups after playing GENUS:

18% chance
Suggested:
CAROL
14% chance
Suggested:
ORATE
8% chance
Suggested:
SLART

Follow-ups for common patterns

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

18.4% →
CAROL 6.04 bits
14.1% →
ORATE 5.20 bits
8.3% →
SLART 5.19 bits
6.3% →
SLART 5.02 bits
5.8% →
CLARY 4.92 bits
4.9% →
CURLY 4.83 bits
4.1% →
TRAIN 5.20 bits
3.7% →
ARIEL 4.60 bits
2.2% →
SHALT 4.06 bits
2.2% →
RUOTE 4.36 bits

Research on GENUS

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

Optimal play

Opening with GENUS, a proven-optimal strategy averages 3.72 guesses and ranks #6,536 of 14,855 legal openers. The best proven opener, TARSE, averages 3.55.

In hard mode it averages 3.86 guesses at best and is rank #3,173 of the 7,453 openers that can still guarantee a solve within six guesses.

Our six-turn simulation says 3.70, at or below the proven-optimal 3.72, 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
GENUS sits in the intermediate band of the wordfreq scale, appearing about 5 times per million words of written English; the band marks it as a word most readers meet regularly.

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).