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

OLDLY

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

Meaning and pronunciation

Adverb

In an old manner.

“windows fashioned oldly”

Source: Wiktionary contributors · CC BY-SA 4.0. Corrections.

Etymology

From Middle English oldely, aldeliȝ, aldelike, equivalent to old + -ly.

Source: Wiktionary (CC BY-SA)

Use OLDLY in a puzzle

As an opener, it rules out about 85.0% of possible answers.

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

No completed appearance

No appearance in our globally completed history. A recent puzzle may still be live elsewhere.

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

How OLDLY performs as a guess

Wordle accepts OLDLY 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 66.9% of games, misses completely in 33.1%, and leaves about 358 possible answers on average.

In the previous complete opener benchmark, it ranks #11,965 of 14,855 openers, averaging 3.81 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 OLDLY 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.

3.82 Entropy (bits)
358 Avg remaining
0.0% Exact match
85.0% Avg ruled out

As an opening guess: previous benchmark

How OLDLY 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.

3.81 Avg guesses
99.87% Solved within six
0.73 Spread of game lengths
#11,965 Rank among openers
Opening with OLDLY left 3 of the snapshot's answers unsolved after six guesses. A spread of 0.73 means those games clustered within about 0.73 of a guess of the 3.81 average. It ranks #11,965 of 14,855 openers by average guesses in games solved within six.
1 guess
0
2 guesses
47
3 guesses
724
4 guesses
1,232
5 guesses
326
6 guesses
22

Composition

4/5 unique
1 vowels
Common:
LO

Feedback chances

Any hit (G/Y)
67%
Green tile
32%
All gray
33%

Feedback distribution

OLDLY can come back 76 different ways. These are the most likely, and how many of the possible answers give each one:

790 answers
351 answers
170 answers
157 answers
127 answers
121 answers
62 answers
58 answers
52 answers
51 answers
38 answers
37 answers
33 answers
31 answers
27 answers
24 answers
20 answers
20 answers
16 answers
15 answers
14 answers
12 answers
10 answers
10 answers
9 answers
8 answers
7 answers
6 answers
6 answers
6 answers

Letter-value totals

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

Scrabble

O1L1D2L1Y4
Total: 9 points

Words With Friends

Total: 10 points

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

Strategy after playing OLDLY

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

Quick reference

Largest feedback groups after playing OLDLY:

33% chance
Suggested:
TARSE
15% chance
Suggested:
TARSE
7% chance
Suggested:
TARSE

Follow-ups for common patterns

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

33.1% →
TARSE 6.42 bits
14.7% →
TARSE 5.43 bits
7.1% →
TARSE 4.87 bits
6.6% →
RENAL 5.36 bits
5.3% →
SPACE 5.05 bits
5.1% →
IRATE 5.36 bits
2.6% →
SAGER 4.37 bits
2.4% →
BRINE 4.56 bits
2.2% →
SNORE 4.32 bits
2.1% →
STAGE 4.65 bits

Research on OLDLY

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

Optimal play

Opening with OLDLY, a proven-optimal strategy averages 3.82 guesses and ranks #11,667 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 OLDLY can guarantee a solve within six guesses.

Our six-turn simulation says 3.81, at or below the proven-optimal 3.82, 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.

Sources: Optimal-play values: Alex Selby's exhaustive Wordle analysis (MIT).