KNOTS
KNOTS is accepted as a guess but is not on the solver's possible-answer list.
Meaning and pronunciation
Pronunciation: /nɒts//nɑts/
- Noun
-
plural of knot
- Verb
-
third-person singular simple present indicative of knot
Source: Wiktionary contributors · CC BY-SA 4.0. Corrections.
How it sounds
One syllable Say it NAHTS.
Rhymes with SHOTS SPOTS SLOTS WATTS PLOTS
Related meanings
Synonyms tangle
In a sentence
My back is full of knots.
Do you know how to tie knots?
Use KNOTS in a puzzle
As an opener, it rules out about 91.0% 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.
Wordle Observatory · optional
Played this Wordle?
Add your result to the public totals · about 20 seconds
Wordle Observatory · optional
Played this Wordle?
Add your result to the public totals · about 20 seconds
Add your result and a quick difficulty rating to help explain how this puzzle played.
See the public dataThank you. Your result now helps describe this puzzle.
See what the public sample says →KNOTS in Connections
1 recorded appearance in completed main-edition puzzles through . A category label alone does not establish a word's meaning.
-
· Puzzle #1203
Reveal this appearance's category
KNOTS appeared in FEATURES OF WOOD (blue group).
How KNOTS performs as a guess
Wordle accepts KNOTS 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 76.5% of games, misses completely in 23.5%, and leaves about 213 possible answers on average.
In the previous complete opener benchmark, it ranks #3,954 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 KNOTS 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 KNOTS 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
KNOTS can come back 75 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 KNOTS; 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 KNOTS
What the solver recommends next for each way the board can respond to KNOTS.
Quick reference
Largest feedback groups after playing KNOTS:
Research on KNOTS
Game-tree analysis and word research for KNOTS, with an explanation for each figure.
Optimal play
Opening with KNOTS, a proven-optimal strategy averages 3.71 guesses and ranks #5,835 of 14,855 legal openers. The best proven opener, TARSE, averages 3.55.
In hard mode it averages 3.81 guesses at best and is rank #1,725 of the 7,453 openers that can still guarantee a solve within six guesses.
Our six-turn simulation says 3.65, 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.
Familiarity and learning
- Frequency
- KNOTS sits in the intermediate band of the wordfreq scale, appearing about 4 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 8, by Glasgow Norms speaker ratings.
- Imageability
- Imageability score: 68 of 100. Raters gave it a middle-range score.
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).