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

GNAWN

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

As an opener, it rules out about 82.4% of possible answers.

Meaning and pronunciation

Verb

past participle of gnaw

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 GNAWN performs as a guess

Wordle accepts GNAWN 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 64.1% of games, misses completely in 35.9%, and leaves about 417 possible answers on average.

In the previous complete opener benchmark, it ranks #13,173 of 14,855 openers, averaging 3.85 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 GNAWN 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.

3.57 Entropy (bits)
417 Avg remaining
0.0% Exact match
82.4% Avg ruled out
Higher first-turn entropy than about 8% of evaluated openers
2.38 bits below the highest measured first-turn entropy (~5.95 bits)

As an opening guess: previous benchmark

How GNAWN 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.

3.85 Avg guesses
99.96% Solved within six
0.71 Spread of game lengths
#13,173 Rank among openers
Opening with GNAWN 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 3.85 average. It ranks #13,173 of 14,855 openers by average guesses in games solved within six.
1 guess
0
2 guesses
32
3 guesses
675
4 guesses
1,272
5 guesses
359
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

4/5 unique
1 vowels
Common:
AN

Feedback chances

Any hit (G/Y)
64%
Green tile
25%
All gray
36%

Feedback distribution

GNAWN can come back 64 different ways. These are the most likely, and how many of the possible answers give each one:

853 answers
405 answers
206 answers
157 answers
87 answers
69 answers
61 answers
58 answers
52 answers
42 answers
38 answers
36 answers
28 answers
25 answers
24 answers
18 answers
18 answers
16 answers
15 answers
14 answers
10 answers
9 answers
9 answers
8 answers
8 answers
8 answers
7 answers
6 answers
6 answers
6 answers

Letter-value totals

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

Scrabble

G2N1A1W4N1
Total: 9 points

Words With Friends

Total: 12 points

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

Strategy after playing GNAWN

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

Quick reference

Largest feedback groups after playing GNAWN:

36% chance
Suggested:
TOILE
17% chance
Suggested:
TALER
9% chance
Suggested:
CRISE

Follow-ups for common patterns

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

35.9%
TOILE 5.98 bits
17.1%
TALER 5.56 bits
8.7%
CRISE 5.10 bits
6.6%
HOISE 5.23 bits
3.7%
SHOER 5.30 bits
2.9%
ROULE 4.88 bits
2.6%
ROULE 5.06 bits
2.4%
STILE 3.96 bits
2.2%
TUILE 4.73 bits
1.8%
SOLER 4.64 bits

Research on GNAWN

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

Optimal play

Opening with GNAWN, a proven-optimal strategy averages 3.88 guesses and ranks #13,429 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 GNAWN can guarantee a solve within six guesses.

Our six-turn simulation says 3.85, at or below the proven-optimal 3.88, 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 NAWN. Estimated pronunciation

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

Related meanings

In WordNet's sense inventory, GNAWN is a kind of bite or decay.

Synonyms ERODE

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).