5 FiveLetterWords
Past Wordle answer Possible answer Accepted guess C tier for first-turn info

GORGE

Yes, GORGE was the Wordle answer on January 9, 2022 (Wordle #204).

As an opener, it rules out about 91.7% of possible answers.

Open Solver with GORGE Open Word Finder

Meaning and pronunciation

Pronunciation: /ɡɔːdʒ//ɡɔɹd͡ʒ/

Noun

The throat of a flower.

Noun

Food that has been taken into the gullet or the stomach, particularly if it is regurgitated or vomited out.

“My gorge rises at the sight of it.”

Verb

To stuff the gorge or gullet with food; to eat greedily and in large quantities.

“They gorged themselves on chocolate and cake.”

Verb

To swallow, especially with greediness, or in large mouthfuls or quantities.

Alternative forms: gorg

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

Yes

Included among the answers considered by the solver.

Past Wordle answer

Used once

Past Wordle answer: January 9, 2022 (#204).

See the full page for that puzzle: January 9, 2022 (#204).

The possible-answer list is the solver's current list and may change when Wordle adds new answers.

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How GORGE performs as a guess

GORGE is a possible answer, so it would solve about one game in 2,374 when every answer is treated as equally likely.

Played as an opener, it lands at least one colored tile in 79.4% of games, misses completely in 20.6%, and leaves about 198 possible answers on average.

In the previous complete opener benchmark, it ranks #9,982 of 14,855 openers, averaging 3.76 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___E G in the 1st position and E in the 5th position G__G_ G in the 1st position and G in the 4th position _O__E O in the 2nd position and E in the 5th position

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

First-turn measures

All four describe GORGE 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.

4.44 Entropy (bits)
198 Avg remaining
0.04% Exact match
91.7% Avg ruled out
Higher first-turn entropy than about 48% of evaluated openers
1.50 bits below the highest measured first-turn entropy (~5.95 bits)

As an opening guess: previous benchmark

How GORGE 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.

3.76 Avg guesses
99.87% Solved within six
0.71 Spread of game lengths
#9,982 Rank among openers
Opening with GORGE left 3 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 3.76 average. It ranks #9,982 of 14,855 openers by average guesses in games solved within six.
1 guess
1
2 guesses
46
3 guesses
784
4 guesses
1,222
5 guesses
278
6 guesses
20
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
2 vowels
Common:
EOR

Feedback chances

Any hit (G/Y)
79%
Green tile
38%
All gray
21%

Example solver route

R O A T E
G N A S H
G O R G E

One example route used by the solver.

This solver benchmark reaches GORGE in 3 guesses.

Feedback distribution

GORGE can come back 81 different ways. These are the most likely, and how many of the possible answers give each one:

490 answers
260 answers
203 answers
184 answers
161 answers
135 answers
124 answers
93 answers
59 answers
56 answers
43 answers
38 answers
31 answers
31 answers
26 answers
26 answers
25 answers
25 answers
24 answers
23 answers
23 answers
17 answers
17 answers
16 answers
16 answers
15 answers
12 answers
11 answers
10 answers
10 answers

Letter-value totals

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

Scrabble

G2O1R1G2E1
Total: 7 points

Words With Friends

Total: 9 points

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

Try next

SNAIL SLANT STAIR SAINT SALTY ARSON

Strategy after playing GORGE

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

Quick reference

Largest feedback groups after playing GORGE:

21% chance
Suggested:
SNAIL
11% chance
Suggested:
SLANT
9% chance
Suggested:
STAIR

Follow-ups for common patterns

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

20.6% →
SNAIL 5.88 bits
11.0% →
SLANT 5.55 bits
8.6% →
STAIR 4.30 bits
7.8% →
SLANT 5.27 bits
6.8% →
SAINT 5.28 bits
5.7% →
SLANT 5.09 bits
5.2% →
SALTY 4.50 bits
3.9% →
ARSON 4.17 bits
2.5% →
CRAPE 3.72 bits
2.4% →
SALTY 4.68 bits

Research on GORGE

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

Optimal play

Opening with GORGE, a proven-optimal strategy averages 3.79 guesses and ranks #10,294 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 GORGE can guarantee a solve within six guesses.

Our six-turn simulation says 3.76, at or below the proven-optimal 3.79, 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 GAWRJ.

Rhymes with FORGE

Related meanings

In WordNet's sense inventory, GORGE is a kind of ravine or pass.

Synonyms STUFF BINGE

Familiarity and learning

Frequency
GORGE sits in the intermediate band of the wordfreq scale, appearing about 3 times per million words of written English; the band marks it as a word most readers meet regularly.
Learner level
Appears in intermediate learner vocabulary (CEFR-J level B2); a word learners usually reach after the basics.
Age of acquisition
Typically learned around age 10, by Glasgow Norms speaker ratings.
Imageability
Imageability score: 71 of 100. Raters found it easy to picture.
Dominant sense
Lancaster raters associated it most strongly with sight (3.8 of 5).

In a sentence

The gorge looked very deep to him.
© tatoeba.org contributor AlanF_US (CC BY 2.0 FR)
The shepherd's house stood in a gorge.
© tatoeba.org contributor AlanF_US (CC BY 2.0 FR)

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); Lancaster Sensorimotor Norms (CC BY 4.0).