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

KATAL

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

As an opener, it rules out about 88.8% of possible answers.

Meaning and pronunciation

Noun

In the International System of Units, the derived unit of catalytic activity; one mole per second. Symbol: kat.

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

No

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

Past Wordle answer

Not used yet

No past answer date found.

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

How KATAL performs as a guess

Wordle accepts KATAL 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 72.9% of games, misses completely in 27.1%, and leaves about 265 possible answers on average.

In the previous complete opener benchmark, it ranks #10,628 of 14,855 openers, averaging 3.78 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 KATAL 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.

4.19 Entropy (bits)
265 Avg remaining
0.0% Exact match
88.8% Avg ruled out
Higher first-turn entropy than about 32% of evaluated openers
1.76 bits below the highest measured first-turn entropy (~5.95 bits)

As an opening guess: previous benchmark

How KATAL 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.

3.78 Avg guesses
99.92% Solved within six
0.71 Spread of game lengths
#10,628 Rank among openers
Opening with KATAL left 2 of the snapshot's answers unsolved after six guesses. A spread of 0.71 means those games clustered within about 0.71 of a guess of the 3.78 average. It ranks #10,628 of 14,855 openers by average guesses in games solved within six.
1 guess
0
2 guesses
41
3 guesses
766
4 guesses
1,246
5 guesses
279
6 guesses
20
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

4/5 unique
2 vowels
Common:
ALT

Feedback chances

Any hit (G/Y)
73%
Green tile
27%
All gray
27%

Feedback distribution

KATAL can come back 75 different ways. These are the most likely, and how many of the possible answers give each one:

644 answers
288 answers
217 answers
178 answers
131 answers
82 answers
73 answers
67 answers
55 answers
53 answers
47 answers
46 answers
44 answers
40 answers
29 answers
27 answers
27 answers
26 answers
20 answers
19 answers
16 answers
16 answers
16 answers
15 answers
14 answers
12 answers
8 answers
8 answers
8 answers
8 answers

Letter-value totals

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

Scrabble

K5A1T1A1L1
Total: 9 points

Words With Friends

Total: 10 points

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

Strategy after playing KATAL

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

Quick reference

Largest feedback groups after playing KATAL:

27% chance
Suggested:
RIONE
12% chance
Suggested:
SHIER
9% chance
Suggested:
MOILE

Follow-ups for common patterns

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

27.1%
RIONE 6.14 bits
12.1%
SHIER 5.66 bits
9.1%
MOILE 5.00 bits
7.5%
CRANE 5.31 bits
5.5%
SIREN 4.80 bits
3.5%
REAST 4.76 bits
3.1%
SLIME 4.50 bits
2.8%
CRINE 4.99 bits
2.3%
SOWER 4.20 bits
2.2%
COURE 4.65 bits

Research on KATAL

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

Optimal play

Opening with KATAL, a proven-optimal strategy averages 3.79 guesses and ranks #10,067 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 KATAL can guarantee a solve within six guesses.

Our six-turn simulation says 3.78, at or below the proven-optimal 3.79, 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

Two syllables, stress on the first syllable Say it KAYTUHL. Estimated pronunciation

This pronunciation is machine-estimated, not taken from a pronunciation dictionary.

Sources: Optimal-play values: Alex Selby's exhaustive Wordle analysis (MIT); Pronunciation: CMU Pronouncing Dictionary (BSD), with machine estimates from the g2p_en model.