5 FiveLetterWords
Past Wordle answer Possible answer Accepted guess F tier for first-turn info

MADAM

Yes, MADAM was the Wordle answer on July 11, 2022 (Wordle #387).

As an opener, it rules out about 77.4% of possible answers.

Open Solver with MADAM Open Word Finder

Meaning and pronunciation

Pronunciation: /ˈmædəm/[ˈmædəm] ~ [ˈmædm̩]/mɐˈdam/

Noun

A polite form of address for a woman or lady.

“Mrs Grey wondered if the outfit she was trying on made her look fat. The sales assistant just said, “It suits you, madam”.”

Noun

The mistress of a household.

Verb

To address as "madam".

Verb

To be a madam; to run (a brothel).

Alternative forms: madame

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

Yes

Included among the answers considered by the solver.

Past Wordle answer

Used once

Past Wordle answer: July 11, 2022 (#387).

See the full page for that puzzle: July 11, 2022 (#387).

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

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How MADAM performs as a guess

MADAM 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 56.5% of games, misses completely in 43.5%, and leaves about 538 possible answers on average.

In the previous complete opener benchmark, it ranks #14,152 of 14,855 openers, averaging 3.91 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.
See strategy patterns

Useful pattern pages

If you only know part of the word, start with one of these matching patterns.

M___M M in the 1st position and M in the 5th position M__A_ M in the 1st position and A in the 4th position _A__M A in the 2nd position and M in the 5th position

Explore lists that match the beginning, ending or letters in MADAM.

First-turn measures

All four describe MADAM 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.

3.18 Entropy (bits)
538 Avg remaining
0.04% Exact match
77.4% Avg ruled out
Higher first-turn entropy than about 3% of evaluated openers
2.77 bits below the highest measured first-turn entropy (~5.95 bits)

As an opening guess: previous benchmark

How MADAM 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.

3.91 Avg guesses
99.87% Solved within six
0.72 Spread of game lengths
#14,152 Rank among openers
Opening with MADAM left 3 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 3.91 average. It ranks #14,152 of 14,855 openers by average guesses in games solved within six.
1 guess
1
2 guesses
41
3 guesses
566
4 guesses
1,320
5 guesses
399
6 guesses
24
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

3/5 unique
2 vowels
Common:
A

Feedback chances

Any hit (G/Y)
56%
Green tile
26%
All gray
44%

Example solver route

R O A T E
N A S A L
M A C A W
M A D A M

One example route used by the solver.

This solver benchmark reaches MADAM in 4 guesses.

Feedback distribution

MADAM can come back 60 different ways. These are the most likely, and how many of the possible answers give each one:

1032 answers
320 answers
211 answers
185 answers
103 answers
89 answers
56 answers
51 answers
42 answers
35 answers
25 answers
23 answers
19 answers
17 answers
15 answers
14 answers
12 answers
11 answers
8 answers
8 answers
7 answers
7 answers
6 answers
5 answers
5 answers
5 answers
4 answers
4 answers
4 answers
4 answers

Letter-value totals

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

Scrabble

M3A1D2A1M3
Total: 10 points

Words With Friends

Total: 12 points

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

Try next

TOISE SLATE TORSE DINER SOREL ROULE

Strategy after playing MADAM

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

Quick reference

Largest feedback groups after playing MADAM:

43% chance
Suggested:
TOISE
13% chance
Suggested:
SLATE
9% chance
Suggested:
TORSE

Follow-ups for common patterns

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

43.5% →
TOISE 6.02 bits
13.5% →
SLATE 5.51 bits
8.9% →
TORSE 4.91 bits
7.8% →
DINER 5.33 bits
4.3% →
SOREL 4.76 bits
3.7% →
ROULE 5.00 bits
2.4% →
DROLE 4.44 bits
2.1% →
TORSE 4.56 bits
1.8% →
ROULE 4.42 bits
1.5% →
PRASE 4.32 bits

Research on MADAM

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

Optimal play

Opening with MADAM, a proven-optimal strategy averages 3.92 guesses and ranks #14,165 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 MADAM can guarantee a solve within six guesses.

Our six-turn simulation says 3.91, at or below the proven-optimal 3.92, 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 MADUHM.

Related meanings

In WordNet's sense inventory, MADAM is a kind of woman or bourgeois.

Synonyms lady dame

Familiarity and learning

Frequency
MADAM 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.
Learner level
Appears in intermediate learner vocabulary (CEFR-J level B2); a word learners usually reach after the basics.
Dominant sense
Lancaster raters associated it most strongly with sight (3.6 of 5).

In a sentence

There is a madam here.
© tatoeba.org contributor Will (CC BY 2.0 FR)
May I help you, madam?
© tatoeba.org contributor sundown (CC BY 2.0 FR)

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); Learner levels: CEFR-J Wordlist ver 1.5, Tono Laboratory, TUFS; Lancaster Sensorimotor Norms (CC BY 4.0).