HOLES
HOLES is accepted as a guess but is not on the solver's possible-answer list.
Meaning and pronunciation
Pronunciation: /həʊlz/[hɒʊlz]/hɒlz/
- Noun
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plural of hole
- Verb
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third-person singular simple present indicative of hole
Source: Wiktionary contributors · CC BY-SA 4.0. Corrections.
Etymology
Various origins: * Variant of English Hole. * Borrowed from Slovak Holeš or Czech Holeš.
Source: Wiktionary (CC BY-SA)
How it sounds
One syllable Say it HOHLZ.
Rhymes with GOALS ROLES ROLLS SOULS POLLS
Related meanings
Synonyms fix mess trap jam hollow pickle
In a sentence
Watch out for the holes!
There were holes here and there.
Use HOLES in a puzzle
As an opener, it rules out about 95.2% of possible answers.
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
NoThe solver does not currently treat this as a possible answer.
Past Wordle answer
No completed appearanceNo 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.
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See what the public sample says →HOLES in Connections
1 recorded appearance in completed main-edition puzzles through . A category label alone does not establish a word's meaning.
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· Puzzle #1030
Reveal this appearance's category
HOLES appeared in COMPONENTS OF WHAC-A-MOLE (blue group).
How HOLES performs as a guess
Wordle accepts HOLES 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 88.5% of games, misses completely in 11.5%, and leaves about 115 possible answers on average.
In the previous complete opener benchmark, it ranks #3,654 of 14,855 openers, averaging 3.65 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 HOLES 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 HOLES 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
Feedback distribution
HOLES can come back 105 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 HOLES; 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 HOLES
What the solver recommends next for each way the board can respond to HOLES.
Quick reference
Largest feedback groups after playing HOLES:
Research on HOLES
Game-tree analysis and word research for HOLES, with an explanation for each figure.
Optimal play
Opening with HOLES, a proven-optimal strategy averages 3.66 guesses and ranks #2,203 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 HOLES can guarantee a solve within six guesses.
Our six-turn simulation says 3.65, at or below the proven-optimal 3.66, 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
- HOLES sits in the common band of the wordfreq scale, appearing about 22 times per million words of written English; the band marks it as an everyday word almost every player will know.
- Dominant sense
- Lancaster raters associated it most strongly with sight (3.9 of 5).
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); Lancaster Sensorimotor Norms (CC BY 4.0).