Accepted guess Not a possible answer C tier for first-turn info

JOULE

JOULE is accepted as a guess but is not on the solver's possible-answer list.

Meaning and pronunciation

Pronunciation: /d͡ʒuːl//d͡ʒaʊl//d͡ʒʉl/

Noun

In the International System of Units, the derived unit of energy, work and heat; the work required to exert a force of one newton for a distance of one metre. Equivalent to one watt-second (one watt of power acting for a duration of one second).

Source: Wiktionary contributors · CC BY-SA 4.0. Corrections.

Etymology

Named after English physicist James Prescott Joule (1818–1889). The surname is a variant of Joel.

Source: Wiktionary (CC BY-SA)

How it sounds

One syllable Say it JOOL.

Rhymes with STOOL DROOL GHOUL SPOOL BRULE

Related meanings

Synonyms j

In a sentence

The unit of energy is the joule.
© tatoeba.org contributor mccarras (CC BY 2.0 FR)
A joule is a unit of energy.
© tatoeba.org contributor Hybrid (CC BY 2.0 FR)

Use JOULE in a puzzle

As an opener, it rules out about 92.7% of possible answers.

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

No

The solver does not currently treat this as a possible answer.

Past Wordle answer

No completed appearance

No 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.

How JOULE performs as a guess

Wordle accepts JOULE 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 83.6% of games, misses completely in 16.4%, and leaves about 173 possible answers on average.

In the previous complete opener benchmark, it ranks #11,594 of 14,855 openers, averaging 3.80 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.

First-turn measures

All four describe JOULE 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.

4.52 Entropy (bits)
173 Avg remaining
0.0% Exact match
92.7% Avg ruled out

As an opening guess: previous benchmark

How JOULE 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.

3.80 Avg guesses
99.92% Solved within six
0.72 Spread of game lengths
#11,594 Rank among openers
Opening with JOULE left 2 of the snapshot's answers unsolved after six guesses. A spread of 0.72 means those games clustered within about 0.72 of a guess of the 3.80 average. It ranks #11,594 of 14,855 openers by average guesses in games solved within six.
1 guess
0
2 guesses
50
3 guesses
717
4 guesses
1,269
5 guesses
288
6 guesses
28

Composition

5/5 unique
3 vowels
Common:
ELOU

Feedback chances

Any hit (G/Y)
84%
Green tile
38%
All gray
16%

Feedback distribution

JOULE can come back 72 different ways. These are the most likely, and how many of the possible answers give each one:

390 answers
339 answers
182 answers
173 answers
126 answers
122 answers
110 answers
109 answers
58 answers
57 answers
55 answers
54 answers
44 answers
41 answers
40 answers
38 answers
37 answers
34 answers
31 answers
29 answers
27 answers
26 answers
26 answers
24 answers
22 answers
19 answers
15 answers
14 answers
13 answers
10 answers

Letter-value totals

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

Scrabble

J8O1U1L1E1
Total: 12 points

Words With Friends

Total: 16 points

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

Strategy after playing JOULE

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

Quick reference

Largest feedback groups after playing JOULE:

16% chance
Suggested:
SAINT
14% chance
Suggested:
STAIR
8% chance
Suggested:
STAIR

Follow-ups for common patterns

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

16.4% →
SAINT 5.89 bits
14.2% →
STAIR 5.31 bits
7.6% →
STAIR 4.94 bits
7.3% →
ARSON 5.38 bits
5.3% →
SLAIN 4.88 bits
5.1% →
RENAL 4.53 bits
4.6% →
STARY 4.34 bits
4.6% →
SNARY 4.57 bits
2.4% →
SNARE 3.75 bits
2.4% →
SAINT 4.45 bits

Research on JOULE

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

Optimal play

Opening with JOULE, a proven-optimal strategy averages 3.80 guesses and ranks #10,651 of 14,855 legal openers. The best proven opener, TARSE, averages 3.55.

In hard mode it averages 4.00 guesses at best and is rank #6,224 of the 7,453 openers that can still guarantee a solve within six guesses.

Our six-turn simulation says 3.80, at or below the proven-optimal 3.80, 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
JOULE sits in the advanced band of the wordfreq scale, appearing less than once per million words of written English; the band marks it as an uncommon word many players still recognize.

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).