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

HEAVY

Yes, HEAVY was the Wordle answer on February 22, 2024 (Wordle #978).

As an opener, it rules out about 91.8% of possible answers.

Open Solver with HEAVY Open Word Finder

Meaning and pronunciation

Pronunciation: /ˈhɛv.i//ˈhev.i//ˈhiːvi/

Adjective

Having great weight.

“Can you help me carry this? It's really heavy.”

Adjective

Serious, somber.

Adverb

In a heavy manner; weightily; heavily; gravely.

Adverb

To a great degree; greatly.

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: February 22, 2024 (#978).

See the full page for that puzzle: February 22, 2024 (#978).

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

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How HEAVY performs as a guess

HEAVY 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 84.4% of games, misses completely in 15.6%, and leaves about 194 possible answers on average.

In the previous complete opener benchmark, it ranks #11,843 of 14,855 openers, averaging 3.81 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.

H___Y H in the 1st position and Y in the 5th position H__V_ H in the 1st position and V in the 4th position _E__Y E in the 2nd position and Y in the 5th position

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

First-turn measures

All four describe HEAVY 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.

4.41 Entropy (bits)
194 Avg remaining
0.04% Exact match
91.8% Avg ruled out
Higher first-turn entropy than about 46% of evaluated openers
1.54 bits below the highest measured first-turn entropy (~5.95 bits)

As an opening guess: previous benchmark

How HEAVY 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.

3.81 Avg guesses
100% Solved within six
0.75 Spread of game lengths
#11,843 Rank among openers
Opening with HEAVY solved every answer in the snapshot within six guesses. A spread of 0.75 means those games clustered within about 0.75 of a guess of the 3.81 average. It ranks #11,843 of 14,855 openers by average guesses in games solved within six.
1 guess
1
2 guesses
52
3 guesses
739
4 guesses
1,205
5 guesses
325
6 guesses
32
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
2 vowels
Common:
AE

Feedback chances

Any hit (G/Y)
84%
Green tile
37%
All gray
16%

Example solver route

R O A T E
C H I L D
H E A V Y

One example route used by the solver.

This solver benchmark reaches HEAVY in 3 guesses.

Feedback distribution

HEAVY can come back 85 different ways. These are the most likely, and how many of the possible answers give each one:

397 answers
371 answers
218 answers
163 answers
163 answers
127 answers
125 answers
95 answers
84 answers
62 answers
56 answers
42 answers
32 answers
29 answers
29 answers
24 answers
22 answers
19 answers
18 answers
16 answers
15 answers
13 answers
13 answers
12 answers
12 answers
11 answers
11 answers
11 answers
10 answers
10 answers

Letter-value totals

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

Scrabble

H4E1A1V4Y4
Total: 14 points

Words With Friends

Total: 13 points

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

Try next

SIREE SNORT TALON SOILY ALTER SLANT

Strategy after playing HEAVY

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

Quick reference

Largest feedback groups after playing HEAVY:

17% chance
Suggested:
SIREE
16% chance
Suggested:
SNORT
9% chance
Suggested:
TALON

Follow-ups for common patterns

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

16.7% →
SIREE 5.32 bits
15.6% →
SNORT 5.89 bits
9.2% →
TALON 5.37 bits
6.9% →
SOILY 4.07 bits
6.9% →
ALTER 4.67 bits
5.3% →
SLANT 4.60 bits
5.3% →
TORCH 5.18 bits
4.0% →
DETER 4.50 bits
3.5% →
SAINT 3.92 bits
2.6% →
SLART 3.83 bits

Research on HEAVY

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

Optimal play

Opening with HEAVY, a proven-optimal strategy averages 3.79 guesses and ranks #10,478 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 HEAVY can guarantee a solve within six guesses.

Our six-turn simulation says 3.81; proven optimal play reaches 3.79. The fixed strategy accounts for the difference.

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

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

Rhymes with CHEVY LEVEE

Related meanings

In WordNet's sense inventory, HEAVY is a kind of player or part.

Synonyms GREAT big hard LARGE SOUND heavily

Opposites LIGHT CLEAR EMPTY thin

Familiarity and learning

Frequency
HEAVY sits in the common band of the wordfreq scale, appearing about 91 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: 47 of 100. Raters gave it a middle-range score.
Dominant sense
Lancaster raters associated it most strongly with touch (3.3 of 5).

In a sentence

Is that as heavy as this?
© tatoeba.org contributor CK (CC BY 2.0 FR)
Is that too heavy for you?
© tatoeba.org contributor sharptoothed (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).