Possible answer Not used yet B tier for first-turn info

MINOR

MINOR is on the solver's possible-answer list but has not appeared as a Wordle answer yet.

As an opener, it rules out about 93.5% of possible answers.

Meaning and pronunciation

Pronunciation: /ˈmaɪ.nəɹ//ˈmaɪnə/

Adjective

Lesser, smaller in importance, size, degree, seriousness, or significance compared to another option, particularly

Adjective

Lesser, smaller in importance, size, degree, seriousness, or significance compared to another option

“The defendant resides at 123 Fake Street with his partner and two minor children.”

Noun

A child, a person who has not reached the age of majority, consent, etc. and is legally subject to fewer responsibilities and less accountability and entitled to fewer legal rights and privileges.

“No, he can't get a mortgage or sell the house. He's still a minor. For the most part, he can't sign a legally binding contract.”

Noun

A lesser person or thing, a person, group, or thing of minor rank or in the minor leagues.

“He plays in the minors.”

Alternative forms: miner, maner, minore, minour

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

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 MINOR performs as a guess

MINOR 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 81.7% of games, misses completely in 18.3%, and leaves about 155 possible answers on average.

In the previous complete opener benchmark, it ranks #1,088 of 14,855 openers, averaging 3.60 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 MINOR 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.

4.92 Entropy (bits)
155 Avg remaining
0.04% Exact match
93.5% Avg ruled out
Higher first-turn entropy than about 79% of evaluated openers
1.03 bits below the highest measured first-turn entropy (~5.95 bits)

As an opening guess: previous benchmark

How MINOR 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.

3.60 Avg guesses
99.92% Solved within six
0.68 Spread of game lengths
#1,088 Rank among openers
Opening with MINOR left 2 of the snapshot's answers unsolved after six guesses. A spread of 0.68 means those games clustered within about 0.68 of a guess of the 3.60 average. It ranks #1,088 of 14,855 openers by average guesses in games solved within six.
1 guess
1
2 guesses
59
3 guesses
1,000
4 guesses
1,118
5 guesses
165
6 guesses
9
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:
INOR

Feedback chances

Any hit (G/Y)
82%
Green tile
28%
All gray
18%

Example solver route

R O A T E
G R I N D
M I N O R

One example route used by the solver.

This solver benchmark reaches MINOR in 3 guesses.

Feedback distribution

MINOR can come back 105 different ways. These are the most likely, and how many of the possible answers give each one:

434 answers
240 answers
182 answers
142 answers
109 answers
105 answers
82 answers
80 answers
79 answers
77 answers
58 answers
51 answers
48 answers
38 answers
36 answers
34 answers
28 answers
28 answers
26 answers
23 answers
22 answers
21 answers
20 answers
20 answers
19 answers
18 answers
18 answers
18 answers
15 answers
15 answers

Letter-value totals

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

Scrabble

M3I1N1O1R1
Total: 7 points

Words With Friends

Total: 9 points

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

Strategy after playing MINOR

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

Quick reference

Largest feedback groups after playing MINOR:

18% chance
Suggested:
SLATE
10% chance
Suggested:
LEAST
8% chance
Suggested:
STOLE

Follow-ups for common patterns

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

18.3%
SLATE 6.54 bits
10.1%
LEAST 5.61 bits
7.7%
STOLE 5.16 bits
6.0%
STALE 5.45 bits
4.6%
SALET 5.31 bits
4.4%
STOAE 4.50 bits
3.5%
LEAST 4.72 bits
3.4%
SATED 4.30 bits
3.3%
TRIPE 4.64 bits
3.2%
SAULT 4.22 bits

Research on MINOR

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

Optimal play

Opening with MINOR, a proven-optimal strategy averages 3.66 guesses and ranks #2,511 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 MINOR can guarantee a solve within six guesses.

Our six-turn simulation says 3.60, at or below the proven-optimal 3.66, 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 MYNUR.

Rhymes with LINER MINER DINER FINER NINER

Related meanings

In WordNet's sense inventory, MINOR is a kind of juvenile or study.

Synonyms SMALL CHILD kid modest fry underage

Opposites MAJOR senior unlimited

Familiarity and learning

Frequency
MINOR sits in the common band of the wordfreq scale, appearing about 42 times per million words of written English; the band marks it as an everyday word almost every player will know.
Learner level
Appears in intermediate learner vocabulary (CEFR-J level B1); a word learners usually reach after the basics.
Age of acquisition
Typically learned around age 9, by Glasgow Norms speaker ratings.
Imageability
Imageability score: 39 of 100. Raters found it difficult to picture.
Dominant sense
Lancaster raters associated it most strongly with sight (3.1 of 5).

In a sentence

It's just a minor problem.
© tatoeba.org contributor CK (CC BY 2.0 FR)
You do know I'm a minor, right?
© tatoeba.org contributor DJ_Saidez (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; Glasgow Norms (CC BY 4.0); Lancaster Sensorimotor Norms (CC BY 4.0).