IRONY
Yes, IRONY was the Wordle answer on August 26, 2022 (Wordle #433).
As an opener, it rules out about 94.2% of possible answers.
Meaning and pronunciation
Pronunciation: /ˈaɪə.ɹə.ni//ˈaɪ.ɹə.ni//ˈaɪ.ɚ.ni/
- Noun
-
The quality of a statement that, when taken in context, may actually mean something different from, or the opposite of, what is written literally; the use of words expressing something other than their literal intention, often in a humorous context.
- Noun
-
Dramatic irony: a theatrical effect in which the meaning of a situation, or some incongruity in the plot, is understood by the audience, but not by the characters in the play.
- Adjective
-
Of or pertaining to the metal iron.
“The food had an irony taste to it.”
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: August 26, 2022 (#433).
See the full page for that puzzle: August 26, 2022 (#433).
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 IRONY performs as a guess
IRONY 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 83.8% of games, misses completely in 16.2%, and leaves about 137 possible answers on average.
In the previous complete opener benchmark, it ranks #3,067 of 14,855 openers, averaging 3.64 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 IRONY 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 IRONY 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 IRONY in 3 guesses.
Feedback distribution
IRONY can come back 99 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 IRONY; 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 IRONY
What the solver recommends next for each way the board can respond to IRONY.
Quick reference
Largest feedback groups after playing IRONY:
Research on IRONY
Game-tree analysis and word research for IRONY, with an explanation for each figure.
Optimal play
Opening with IRONY, a proven-optimal strategy averages 3.71 guesses and ranks #5,348 of 14,855 legal openers. The best proven opener, TARSE, averages 3.55.
In hard mode it averages 3.85 guesses at best and is rank #2,938 of the 7,453 openers that can still guarantee a solve within six guesses.
Our six-turn simulation says 3.64, at or below the proven-optimal 3.71, 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
Three syllables, stress on the first syllable Say it YRUHNEE.
Related meanings
In WordNet's sense inventory, IRONY is a kind of humor or characteristic.
Synonyms satire sarcasm
Familiarity and learning
- Frequency
- IRONY sits in the intermediate band of the wordfreq scale, appearing about 7 times per million words of written English; the band marks it as a word most readers meet regularly.
- Age of acquisition
- Typically learned around age 11, by Glasgow Norms speaker ratings.
- Imageability
- Imageability score: 22 of 100. Raters found it difficult to picture.
In a sentence
The irony was lost on him.
He's aware of the irony.
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); Glasgow Norms (CC BY 4.0).