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

SCUPS

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

Meaning and pronunciation

Noun

plural of scup

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

Use SCUPS in a puzzle

As an opener, it rules out about 81.0% 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 SCUPS performs as a guess

Wordle accepts SCUPS 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 60.0% of games, misses completely in 40.0%, and leaves about 454 possible answers on average.

In the previous complete opener benchmark, it ranks #11,523 of 14,855 openers, averaging 3.80 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 SCUPS 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.

3.57 Entropy (bits)
454 Avg remaining
0.0% Exact match
81.0% Avg ruled out

As an opening guess: previous benchmark

How SCUPS 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.

3.80 Avg guesses
99.87% Solved within six
0.70 Spread of game lengths
#11,523 Rank among openers
Opening with SCUPS left 3 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 3.80 average. It ranks #11,523 of 14,855 openers by average guesses in games solved within six.
1 guess
0
2 guesses
34
3 guesses
741
4 guesses
1,261
5 guesses
298
6 guesses
17

Composition

4/5 unique
1 vowels
Common:
SU

Feedback chances

Any hit (G/Y)
60%
Green tile
25%
All gray
40%

Feedback distribution

SCUPS can come back 65 different ways. These are the most likely, and how many of the possible answers give each one:

953 answers
255 answers
196 answers
157 answers
127 answers
115 answers
71 answers
53 answers
38 answers
30 answers
29 answers
24 answers
23 answers
22 answers
21 answers
20 answers
19 answers
17 answers
15 answers
15 answers
14 answers
14 answers
11 answers
10 answers
10 answers
9 answers
8 answers
7 answers
7 answers
6 answers

Letter-value totals

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

Scrabble

S1C3U1P3S1
Total: 9 points

Words With Friends

Total: 12 points

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

Strategy after playing SCUPS

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

Quick reference

Largest feedback groups after playing SCUPS:

40% chance
Suggested:
ARIEL
11% chance
Suggested:
CARLE
8% chance
Suggested:
LEANT

Follow-ups for common patterns

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

40.0% →
ARIEL 6.12 bits
10.7% →
CARLE 5.51 bits
8.2% →
LEANT 5.38 bits
6.6% →
RATEL 5.04 bits
5.3% →
RAILE 5.51 bits
4.8% →
ROATE 5.63 bits
3.0% →
TRONE 4.73 bits
2.2% →
TRINE 4.44 bits
1.6% →
CLINE 3.98 bits
1.3% →
ORATE 4.44 bits

Research on SCUPS

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

Optimal play

Opening with SCUPS, a proven-optimal strategy averages 3.85 guesses and ranks #12,620 of 14,855 legal openers. The best proven opener, TARSE, averages 3.55.

In hard mode it averages 3.96 guesses at best and is rank #5,490 of the 7,453 openers that can still guarantee a solve within six guesses.

Our six-turn simulation says 3.80, at or below the proven-optimal 3.85, 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).