RAVEN
RAVEN is on the solver's possible-answer list and has no appearance in our globally completed Wordle history.
Meaning and pronunciation
Pronunciation: /ˈɹeɪvn̩//ˈɹeɪvən//ˈɹæv(ɪ)n/
- Noun
-
Any of several, generally large, species of birds in the genus Corvus with lustrous black plumage; especially the common raven (Corvus corax).
- Adjective
-
Of the jet-black and often glossy colour of the plumage of a raven (etymology 1, noun sense 1).
“raven curls raven darkness”
- Noun
-
Alternative spelling of ravin.
- Verb
-
Alternative spelling of ravin.
Source: Wiktionary contributors · CC BY-SA 4.0. Corrections.
Etymology
From Middle English raven, reven (“raven (Corvus corax); carrion crow (Corvus corone); rook (Corvus frugilegus) (?); the constellation Corvus; gall nuts of the Aleppo oak (Quercus infectoria) used to make black ink”), from Old English hræfn (“raven”), from Proto-West Germanic *hrabn (“raven”), from Proto-Germanic *hrabnaz (“raven”), probably from Proto-Indo-European *ḱrep- (“to crackle; to rattle”) or *ḱer- (“to croak, crow”), probably ultimately onomatopoeic, referring to the bird’s call.
Source: Wiktionary (CC BY-SA)
How it sounds
Two syllables, stress on the first syllable Say it RAYVUHN.
Related meanings
Synonyms pig prey devour
In a sentence
The raven is as black as coal.
A raven is as black as coal.
Use RAVEN in a puzzle
As an opener, it rules out about 94.7% of possible answers.
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
No completed appearanceNo 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.
Wordle Observatory · optional
Played this Wordle?
Add your result to the public totals · about 20 seconds
Wordle Observatory · optional
Played this Wordle?
Add your result to the public totals · about 20 seconds
Add your result and a quick difficulty rating to help explain how this puzzle played.
See the public dataThank you. Your result now helps describe this puzzle.
See what the public sample says →RAVEN in Connections
6 recorded appearances in completed main-edition puzzles through . Showing the 5 most recent. A category label alone does not establish a word's meaning.
-
· Puzzle #874
Reveal this appearance's category
RAVEN appeared in BLACK (green group).
-
· Puzzle #595
Reveal this appearance's category
RAVEN appeared in DANCE EVENTS PLUS A LETTER (purple group).
-
· Puzzle #518
Reveal this appearance's category
RAVEN appeared in N.F.L. TEAM MEMBER (blue group).
-
· Puzzle #448
Reveal this appearance's category
RAVEN appeared in SHADES OF BLACK (blue group).
-
· Puzzle #79
Reveal this appearance's category
RAVEN appeared in SHADES OF BLACK (blue group).
How RAVEN performs as a guess
RAVEN is a possible answer, so it would solve about one game in 2,384 when every answer is treated as equally likely.
Played as an opener, it lands at least one colored tile in 85.4% of games, misses completely in 14.6%, and leaves about 127 possible answers on average.
In the previous complete opener benchmark, it ranks #5,931 of 14,855 openers, averaging 3.68 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 RAVEN 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 RAVEN 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 RAVEN in 4 guesses.
Feedback distribution
RAVEN can come back 112 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 RAVEN; 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 RAVEN
What the solver recommends next for each way the board can respond to RAVEN.
Quick reference
Largest feedback groups after playing RAVEN:
Research on RAVEN
Game-tree analysis and word research for RAVEN, with an explanation for each figure.
Optimal play
Opening with RAVEN, a proven-optimal strategy averages 3.68 guesses and ranks #3,561 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 RAVEN can guarantee a solve within six guesses.
Our six-turn simulation says 3.68, at or below the proven-optimal 3.68, 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
- RAVEN sits in the intermediate band of the wordfreq scale, appearing about 6 times per million words of written English; the band marks it as a word most readers meet regularly.
- Age of acquisition
- Typically learned around age 8, by Glasgow Norms speaker ratings.
- Imageability
- Imageability score: 94 of 100. Raters found it easy to picture.
- Dominant sense
- Lancaster raters associated it most strongly with sight (3.9 of 5).
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); Glasgow Norms (CC BY 4.0); Lancaster Sensorimotor Norms (CC BY 4.0).