PULSE
PULSE is on the solver's possible-answer list but has not appeared as a Wordle answer yet.
As an opener, it rules out about 93.8% of possible answers.
Meaning and pronunciation
Pronunciation: /pʌls/[pəls]/pʊls/
- Noun
-
A normally regular beat felt when arteries near the skin (for example, at the neck or wrist) are depressed, caused by the heart pumping blood through them; the qualitative nature of this beat.
“Her pulse was thready and weak.”
- Noun
-
The rate of this beat as an indication of a person's health.
“Her pulse was 110 at 8 a.m.”
- Verb
-
To emit or impel (something) in pulses or waves.
- Verb
-
To give to (something, especially a cell culture) an (increased) amount of a substance, such as a drug or an isotopic label, over a short time.
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
Not used yetNo past answer date found.
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 PULSE performs as a guess
PULSE 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 83.0% of games, misses completely in 17.0%, and leaves about 148 possible answers on average.
In the previous complete opener benchmark, it ranks #1,529 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.
Useful pattern pages
If you only know part of the word, start with one of these matching patterns.
First-turn measures
All four describe PULSE 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 PULSE 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 PULSE in 3 guesses.
Feedback distribution
PULSE can come back 122 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 PULSE; 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 PULSE
What the solver recommends next for each way the board can respond to PULSE.
Quick reference
Largest feedback groups after playing PULSE:
Research on PULSE
Game-tree analysis and word research for PULSE, with an explanation for each figure.
Optimal play
Opening with PULSE, a proven-optimal strategy averages 3.64 guesses and ranks #1,145 of 14,855 legal openers. The best proven opener, TARSE, averages 3.55.
In hard mode it averages 3.78 guesses at best and is rank #763 of the 7,453 openers that can still guarantee a solve within six guesses.
Our six-turn simulation says 3.61, at or below the proven-optimal 3.64, 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, PULSE is a kind of wave or happening.
Synonyms beat impulse heartbeat
Familiarity and learning
- Frequency
- PULSE sits in the common band of the wordfreq scale, appearing about 11 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 B2); a word learners usually reach after the basics.
- Age of acquisition
- Typically learned around age 9, by Glasgow Norms speaker ratings.
- Imageability
- Imageability score: 71 of 100. Raters found it easy to picture.
In a sentence
Does it have a pulse?
I can't get a pulse.
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).