MIDGE
Yes, MIDGE was the Wordle answer on July 23, 2022 (Wordle #399).
As an opener, it rules out about 90.7% of possible answers.
Meaning and pronunciation
Pronunciation: /mɪd͡ʒ/
- Noun
-
Any of various small two-winged flies, for example, from the family Chironomidae or non-biting midges, the family Chaoboridae or phantom midges, and the family Ceratopogonidae or biting midges, all belonging to the order Diptera.
- Noun
-
A small, short or insignificant person.
Alternative forms: midgie, midgy, midgey, minge
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
YesIncluded in the Wordle guess list used by our tools.
Possible answer
YesIncluded among the answers considered by the solver.
Past Wordle answer
Used oncePast Wordle answer: July 23, 2022 (#399).
See the full page for that puzzle: July 23, 2022 (#399).
The possible-answer list is the solver's current list and may change when Wordle adds new answers.
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See what the public sample says →How MIDGE performs as a guess
MIDGE 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 77.5% of games, misses completely in 22.5%, and leaves about 221 possible answers on average.
In the previous complete opener benchmark, it ranks #4,876 of 14,855 openers, averaging 3.67 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 MIDGE 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 MIDGE 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
Example solver route
One example route used by the solver.
This solver benchmark reaches MIDGE in 3 guesses.
Feedback distribution
MIDGE can come back 101 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 MIDGE; 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 MIDGE
What the solver recommends next for each way the board can respond to MIDGE.
Quick reference
Largest feedback groups after playing MIDGE:
Research on MIDGE
Game-tree analysis and word research for MIDGE, with an explanation for each figure.
Optimal play
Opening with MIDGE, a proven-optimal strategy averages 3.69 guesses and ranks #4,099 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 MIDGE can guarantee a solve within six guesses.
Our six-turn simulation says 3.67, at or below the proven-optimal 3.69, 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.
Related meanings
In WordNet's sense inventory, MIDGE is a kind of insect.
Familiarity and learning
- Frequency
- MIDGE 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.
In a sentence
I don't know whether I got this bite from a midge or a mosquito.
I was bitten by a pesky midge during our camping trip.
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).