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

LOUNS

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

As an opener, it rules out about 93.2% of possible answers.

Meaning and pronunciation

Verb

third-person singular simple present indicative of loun

Noun

plural of loun

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 LOUNS performs as a guess

Wordle accepts LOUNS 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 80.7% of games, misses completely in 19.3%, and leaves about 161 possible answers on average.

In the previous complete opener benchmark, it ranks #1,295 of 14,855 openers, averaging 3.61 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 LOUNS 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.

4.86 Entropy (bits)
161 Avg remaining
0.0% Exact match
93.2% Avg ruled out
Higher first-turn entropy than about 75% of evaluated openers
1.09 bits below the highest measured first-turn entropy (~5.95 bits)

As an opening guess: previous benchmark

How LOUNS 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.

3.61 Avg guesses
99.92% Solved within six
0.69 Spread of game lengths
#1,295 Rank among openers
Opening with LOUNS left 2 of the snapshot's answers unsolved after six guesses. A spread of 0.69 means those games clustered within about 0.69 of a guess of the 3.61 average. It ranks #1,295 of 14,855 openers by average guesses in games solved within six.
1 guess
0
2 guesses
49
3 guesses
1,037
4 guesses
1,075
5 guesses
174
6 guesses
17
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

5/5 unique
2 vowels
Common:
LNOSU

Feedback chances

Any hit (G/Y)
81%
Green tile
27%
All gray
19%

Feedback distribution

LOUNS can come back 93 different ways. These are the most likely, and how many of the possible answers give each one:

459 answers
214 answers
207 answers
127 answers
125 answers
99 answers
88 answers
73 answers
55 answers
50 answers
50 answers
49 answers
44 answers
37 answers
37 answers
36 answers
36 answers
36 answers
32 answers
30 answers
28 answers
28 answers
28 answers
27 answers
25 answers
22 answers
19 answers
19 answers
17 answers
16 answers

Letter-value totals

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

Scrabble

L1O1U1N1S1
Total: 5 points

Words With Friends

Total: 8 points

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

Strategy after playing LOUNS

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

Quick reference

Largest feedback groups after playing LOUNS:

19% chance
Suggested:
TRACE
9% chance
Suggested:
RAILE
9% chance
Suggested:
PRATE

Follow-ups for common patterns

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

19.3%
TRACE 6.35 bits
9.0%
RAILE 5.42 bits
8.7%
PRATE 5.90 bits
5.3%
TRADE 5.28 bits
5.3%
DINER 5.19 bits
4.2%
CARTE 4.56 bits
3.7%
CADRE 4.82 bits
3.1%
THALE 4.83 bits
2.3%
TARGE 4.85 bits
2.1%
TROPE 4.23 bits

Research on LOUNS

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

Optimal play

Opening with LOUNS, a proven-optimal strategy averages 3.67 guesses and ranks #3,086 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 LOUNS can guarantee a solve within six guesses.

Our six-turn simulation says 3.61, at or below the proven-optimal 3.67, 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

One syllable Say it LOWNZ. 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.