5 FiveLetterWords
Accepted guess Not a possible answer F tier opener

SHAMS

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

As an opener, it rules out about 86.2% of possible answers.

Open Solver with SHAMS Open Word Finder

Meaning and pronunciation

Noun

plural of sham

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

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

Not used yet

No past answer date found.

The possible-answer list is the solver's current list and may change when Wordle adds new answers.

How SHAMS performs as a guess

Wordle accepts SHAMS 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 69.3% of games, misses completely in 30.7%, and leaves about 326 possible answers on average.

In the previous complete v5 benchmark, it ranks #10,506 of 14,855 openers, averaging 3.77 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.

Useful pattern pages

If you only know part of the word, start with one of these matching patterns.

S___S S in the 1st position and S in the 5th position S__M_ S in the 1st position and M in the 4th position _H__S H in the 2nd position and S in the 5th position

Try next

RIONE TALER TRINE CONTE RUOTE TOILE
Words starting with S Words ending with S

First-turn measures

3.93 Entropy (bits)
326 Avg remaining
0.0% Exact match
86.2% Avg ruled out
Higher first-turn entropy than about 19% of evaluated openers
2.02 bits below the highest measured first-turn entropy (~5.95 bits)

As an opener: v5 benchmark

How SHAMS 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.

3.77 Avg guesses
100.0% Win rate
0.71 Volatility
#10,506 v5 opener rank
In the complete v5 snapshot, SHAMS ranks #10,506 of 14,855 openers by average guesses in games solved within six.
1 guess
0
2 guesses
44
3 guesses
775
4 guesses
1,223
5 guesses
294
6 guesses
17
Top-ranked in the current bounded policy screen: SLANT. The policy minimizes misses within six first, then average guesses among wins (3.45 for the leader). Compare the ranking measures

Composition

4/5 unique
1 vowels
Common:
AS

Feedback chances

Any hit (G/Y)
69%
Green tile
32%
All gray
31%

Feedback distribution

75 possible patterns. Top outcomes:

725
381
174
139
111
90
89
63
51
48
44
41
36
32
30
19
18
17
17
17
14
13
12
11
11
11
10
10
9
7

Quick reference

Largest feedback groups after playing SHAMS:

31% chance
Suggested:
RIONE
16% chance
Suggested:
TALER
7% chance
Suggested:
TRINE

Follow-ups for common patterns

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

30.7% →
RIONE 6.00 bits
16.2% →
TALER 5.54 bits
7.4% →
TRINE 5.16 bits
5.9% →
TRINE 4.96 bits
4.7% →
CONTE 5.13 bits
3.8% →
RUOTE 5.50 bits
3.8% →
TOILE 5.08 bits
2.7% →
RAINE 4.42 bits
2.2% →
TRICE 4.95 bits
2.0% →
LEANT 3.88 bits

Letter-value totals

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

Scrabble

S1H4A1M3S1
Total: 10 points

Words With Friends

Total: 10 points

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