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

PACER

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

Meaning and pronunciation

Noun

One who paces.

Noun

In harness racing, a horse with a gait in which the front and back legs on one side take a step together alternating with the legs on the other side; as opposed to a trotter.

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

Etymology

From the brand name Pacer.

Source: Wiktionary (CC BY-SA)

How it sounds

Two syllables, stress on the first syllable Say it PAYSUR.

Rhymes with RACER BASER FACER LACER

Use PACER in a puzzle

As an opener, it rules out about 95.3% of possible answers.

Open Solver with PACER Open Word Finder

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.

PACER in Connections

1 recorded appearance in completed main-edition puzzles through . A category label alone does not establish a word's meaning.

How PACER performs as a guess

Wordle accepts PACER 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 86.9% of games, misses completely in 13.1%, and leaves about 111 possible answers on average.

In the previous complete opener benchmark, it ranks #1,354 of 14,855 openers, averaging 3.61 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.

P___R P in the 1st position and R in the 5th position P__E_ P in the 1st position and E in the 4th position _A__R A in the 2nd position and R in the 5th position PA_ER P in the 1st position, A in the 2nd position, E in the 4th position, and R in the 5th position

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

First-turn measures

All four describe PACER 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.

5.30 Entropy (bits)
111 Avg remaining
0.0% Exact match
95.3% Avg ruled out

As an opening guess: previous benchmark

How PACER 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.

3.61 Avg guesses
99.92% Solved within six
0.71 Spread of game lengths
#1,354 Rank among openers
Opening with PACER left 2 of the snapshot's answers unsolved after six guesses. A spread of 0.71 means those games clustered within about 0.71 of a guess of the 3.61 average. It ranks #1,354 of 14,855 openers by average guesses in games solved within six.
1 guess
0
2 guesses
79
3 guesses
977
4 guesses
1,102
5 guesses
177
6 guesses
17

Composition

5/5 unique
2 vowels
Common:
AER

Feedback chances

Any hit (G/Y)
87%
Green tile
33%
All gray
13%

Feedback distribution

PACER can come back 121 different ways. These are the most likely, and how many of the possible answers give each one:

313 answers
209 answers
146 answers
142 answers
118 answers
99 answers
95 answers
92 answers
87 answers
82 answers
79 answers
55 answers
49 answers
44 answers
38 answers
31 answers
29 answers
27 answers
26 answers
25 answers
24 answers
23 answers
23 answers
22 answers
20 answers
16 answers
16 answers
16 answers
16 answers
15 answers

Letter-value totals

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

Scrabble

P3A1C3E1R1
Total: 9 points

Words With Friends

Total: 11 points

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

Try next

SOILY TOILE DROIT SLANT SLATE SONLY

Strategy after playing PACER

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

Quick reference

Largest feedback groups after playing PACER:

13% chance
Suggested:
SOILY
9% chance
Suggested:
TOILE
6% chance
Suggested:
DROIT

Follow-ups for common patterns

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

13.1% →
SOILY 5.64 bits
8.8% →
TOILE 5.31 bits
6.1% →
DROIT 5.01 bits
6.0% →
SLANT 5.31 bits
4.9% →
SLATE 4.96 bits
4.2% →
SONLY 4.70 bits
4.0% →
TOISE 4.63 bits
3.9% →
CINCH 4.85 bits
3.6% →
SOILY 3.49 bits
3.4% →
DRAFT 4.19 bits

Research on PACER

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

Optimal play

Opening with PACER, a proven-optimal strategy averages 3.62 guesses and ranks #527 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 PACER can guarantee a solve within six guesses.

Our six-turn simulation says 3.61, at or below the proven-optimal 3.62, 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.

Familiarity and learning

Frequency
PACER 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.
Dominant sense
Lancaster raters associated it most strongly with sight (1.3 of 5).

Sources: Optimal-play values: Alex Selby's exhaustive Wordle analysis (MIT); Pronunciation: CMU Pronouncing Dictionary (BSD); Word frequency: wordfreq (data CC BY-SA 4.0); Lancaster Sensorimotor Norms (CC BY 4.0).