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

RANCE

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

Meaning and pronunciation

Pronunciation: /ɹæns//ɹɑːns/

Noun

A type of coloured marble from Belgium. Rance is red and often has white or blue graining.

Noun

A prop or shore.

Verb

To prop or shore up.

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

Etymology

From Old French ranche, from Latin ramex, ramus.

Source: Wiktionary (CC BY-SA)

How it sounds

One syllable Say it RANS.

Rhymes with DANCE LANCE NANCE HANCE

Use RANCE in a puzzle

As an opener, it rules out about 96.4% 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 RANCE performs as a guess

Wordle accepts RANCE 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 88.5% of games, misses completely in 11.5%, and leaves about 86 possible answers on average.

In the previous complete opener benchmark, it ranks #327 of 14,855 openers, averaging 3.58 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 RANCE 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.

5.61 Entropy (bits)
86 Avg remaining
0.0% Exact match
96.4% Avg ruled out

As an opening guess: previous benchmark

How RANCE 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.

3.58 Avg guesses
99.92% Solved within six
0.70 Spread of game lengths
#327 Rank among openers
Opening with RANCE left 2 of the snapshot's answers unsolved after six guesses. A spread of 0.70 means those games clustered within about 0.70 of a guess of the 3.58 average. It ranks #327 of 14,855 openers by average guesses in games solved within six.
1 guess
0
2 guesses
88
3 guesses
1,009
4 guesses
1,079
5 guesses
166
6 guesses
10

Composition

5/5 unique
2 vowels
Common:
AENR

Feedback chances

Any hit (G/Y)
88%
Green tile
40%
All gray
12%

Feedback distribution

RANCE can come back 131 different ways. These are the most likely, and how many of the possible answers give each one:

274 answers
131 answers
130 answers
124 answers
118 answers
106 answers
88 answers
82 answers
73 answers
61 answers
60 answers
57 answers
56 answers
44 answers
42 answers
40 answers
35 answers
33 answers
32 answers
30 answers
29 answers
27 answers
27 answers
26 answers
26 answers
25 answers
25 answers
24 answers
21 answers
21 answers

Letter-value totals

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

Scrabble

R1A1N1C3E1
Total: 7 points

Words With Friends

Total: 9 points

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

Strategy after playing RANCE

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

Quick reference

Largest feedback groups after playing RANCE:

11% chance
Suggested:
MOULT
5% chance
Suggested:
GROUT
5% chance
Suggested:
SLEET

Follow-ups for common patterns

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

11.5% →
MOULT 5.58 bits
5.5% →
GROUT 4.98 bits
5.5% →
SLEET 5.34 bits
5.2% →
SOLED 3.97 bits
4.9% →
PLAIT 5.10 bits
4.4% →
SOILY 4.81 bits
3.7% →
SOILY 4.81 bits
3.4% →
SLART 4.36 bits
3.1% →
SALTY 4.38 bits
2.6% →
SHALT 4.05 bits

Research on RANCE

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

Optimal play

Opening with RANCE, a proven-optimal strategy averages 3.59 guesses and ranks #61 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 RANCE can guarantee a solve within six guesses.

Our six-turn simulation says 3.58, at or below the proven-optimal 3.59, 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
RANCE 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 frequency: wordfreq (data CC BY-SA 4.0).