5 FiveLetterWords
Accepted guess Not a possible answer C tier for first-turn info

NANCE

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

As an opener, it rules out about 93.0% of possible answers.

Open Solver with NANCE Open Word Finder

Meaning and pronunciation

Noun

Alternative form of nancy (“an effeminate male homosexual”).

Verb

To move in a prissy or stereotypically effeminate manner.

Noun

A large shrub or small tree of subtropical and tropical areas of the Americas, Byrsonima crassifolia, bearing a small, sweet, yellow fruit.

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 NANCE performs as a guess

Wordle accepts NANCE 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 82.4% of games, misses completely in 17.6%, and leaves about 166 possible answers on average.

In the previous complete opener benchmark, it ranks #9,412 of 14,855 openers, averaging 3.75 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.

N___E N in the 1st position and E in the 5th position N__C_ N in the 1st position and C in the 4th position _A__E A in the 2nd position and E in the 5th position

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

First-turn measures

All four describe NANCE 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.

4.67 Entropy (bits)
166 Avg remaining
0.0% Exact match
93.0% Avg ruled out
Higher first-turn entropy than about 63% of evaluated openers
1.28 bits below the highest measured first-turn entropy (~5.95 bits)

As an opening guess: previous benchmark

How NANCE 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.

3.75 Avg guesses
99.87% Solved within six
0.72 Spread of game lengths
#9,412 Rank among openers
Opening with NANCE 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 3.75 average. It ranks #9,412 of 14,855 openers by average guesses in games solved within six.
1 guess
0
2 guesses
48
3 guesses
798
4 guesses
1,230
5 guesses
246
6 guesses
29
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

4/5 unique
2 vowels
Common:
AEN

Feedback chances

Any hit (G/Y)
82%
Green tile
38%
All gray
18%

Feedback distribution

NANCE can come back 84 different ways. These are the most likely, and how many of the possible answers give each one:

417 answers
276 answers
205 answers
171 answers
113 answers
112 answers
98 answers
88 answers
73 answers
71 answers
62 answers
51 answers
50 answers
42 answers
39 answers
37 answers
27 answers
25 answers
24 answers
24 answers
22 answers
19 answers
18 answers
18 answers
17 answers
17 answers
16 answers
12 answers
12 answers
11 answers

Letter-value totals

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

Scrabble

N1A1N1C3E1
Total: 7 points

Words With Friends

Total: 10 points

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

Try next

SOILY SETER SLART GRUNT SATYR RISEN

Strategy after playing NANCE

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

Quick reference

Largest feedback groups after playing NANCE:

18% chance
Suggested:
SOILY
12% chance
Suggested:
SETER
9% chance
Suggested:
SLART

Follow-ups for common patterns

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

17.6% →
SOILY 5.61 bits
11.6% →
SETER 5.38 bits
8.6% →
SLART 5.49 bits
7.2% →
SOILY 4.54 bits
4.8% →
GRUNT 4.79 bits
4.7% →
SATYR 4.17 bits
4.1% →
SLART 4.87 bits
3.7% →
SLART 4.47 bits
3.1% →
RISEN 4.29 bits
3.0% →
SOULY 4.91 bits

Research on NANCE

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

Optimal play

Opening with NANCE, a proven-optimal strategy averages 3.76 guesses and ranks #8,607 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 NANCE can guarantee a solve within six guesses.

Our six-turn simulation says 3.75, at or below the proven-optimal 3.76, 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 NANS.

Rhymes with DANCE LANCE RANCE HANCE

Related meanings

In WordNet's sense inventory, NANCE is a kind of man.

Synonyms QUEEN FAIRY QUEER faggot fag

Familiarity and learning

Frequency
NANCE 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.

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).