HOIST
Yes, HOIST was the Wordle answer on February 19, 2026 (Wordle #1706).
As an opener, it rules out about 93.6% of possible answers.
Meaning and pronunciation
Pronunciation: /hɔɪst/
- Verb
-
To raise; to lift; to elevate (especially, to raise or lift to a desired elevation, by means of tackle or pulley, said of a sail, a flag, a heavy package or weight).
- Verb
-
To lift a trophy or similar prize into the air in celebration of a victory.
- Noun
-
Any member of certain classes of devices that hoist things.
- Noun
-
The act of hoisting; a lift.
“Give me a hoist over that wall.”
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
YesIncluded in the Wordle guess list used by our tools.
Possible answer
YesIncluded among the answers considered by the solver.
Past Wordle answer
Used oncePast Wordle answer: February 19, 2026 (#1706).
See the full page for that puzzle: February 19, 2026 (#1706).
The possible-answer list is the solver's current list and may change when Wordle adds new answers.
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See what the public sample says →How HOIST performs as a guess
HOIST 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 80.1% of games, misses completely in 19.9%, and leaves about 153 possible answers on average.
In the previous complete opener benchmark, it ranks #269 of 14,855 openers, averaging 3.57 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.
Useful pattern pages
If you only know part of the word, start with one of these matching patterns.
First-turn measures
All four describe HOIST 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.
As an opening guess: previous benchmark
How HOIST 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.
Composition
Feedback chances
Example solver route
One example route used by the solver.
This solver benchmark reaches HOIST in 4 guesses.
Feedback distribution
HOIST can come back 112 different ways. These are the most likely, and how many of the possible answers give each one:
Letter-value totals
Base letter-value totals for HOIST; these do not show whether either game accepts the word.
Scrabble
Words With Friends
Scores shown are base values without double/triple letter or word bonuses.
Try next
Strategy after playing HOIST
What the solver recommends next for each way the board can respond to HOIST.
Quick reference
Largest feedback groups after playing HOIST:
Research on HOIST
Game-tree analysis and word research for HOIST, with an explanation for each figure.
Optimal play
Opening with HOIST, a proven-optimal strategy averages 3.65 guesses and ranks #1,552 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 HOIST can guarantee a solve within six guesses.
Our six-turn simulation says 3.57, at or below the proven-optimal 3.65, 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.
Related meanings
In WordNet's sense inventory, HOIST is a kind of device or raise.
Synonyms wind lift
Familiarity and learning
- Frequency
- HOIST sits in the intermediate band of the wordfreq scale, appearing about once per million words of written English; the band marks it as a word most readers meet regularly.
In a sentence
We went out to hoist a few beers.
Hoist your sail when the wind is fair.
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).