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

SHOTE

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

As an opener, it rules out about 95.0% of possible answers.

Meaning and pronunciation

Noun

Alternative form of shoat (“young pig”).

Noun

A fish resembling the trout, the grayling (Thymallus thymallus).

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 SHOTE performs as a guess

Wordle accepts SHOTE 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 86.8% of games, misses completely in 13.2%, and leaves about 118 possible answers on average.

In the previous complete opener benchmark, it ranks #3,389 of 14,855 openers, averaging 3.64 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 SHOTE 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.

5.31 Entropy (bits)
118 Avg remaining
0.0% Exact match
95.0% Avg ruled out
Higher first-turn entropy than about 95% of evaluated openers
0.64 bits below the highest measured first-turn entropy (~5.95 bits)

As an opening guess: previous benchmark

How SHOTE 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.

3.64 Avg guesses
100% Solved within six
0.72 Spread of game lengths
#3,389 Rank among openers
Opening with SHOTE solved every answer in the snapshot within six guesses. A spread of 0.72 means those games clustered within about 0.72 of a guess of the 3.64 average. It ranks #3,389 of 14,855 openers by average guesses in games solved within six.
1 guess
0
2 guesses
73
3 guesses
943
4 guesses
1,110
5 guesses
207
6 guesses
21
Top-ranked in the current bounded policy screen: SLANT. The policy minimizes misses within six first, then average guesses among wins (3.46 for the leader). Compare the ranking measures

Composition

5/5 unique
2 vowels
Common:
EOST

Feedback chances

Any hit (G/Y)
87%
Green tile
42%
All gray
13%

Feedback distribution

SHOTE can come back 123 different ways. These are the most likely, and how many of the possible answers give each one:

314 answers
267 answers
164 answers
156 answers
99 answers
97 answers
84 answers
78 answers
62 answers
49 answers
49 answers
45 answers
41 answers
35 answers
35 answers
31 answers
29 answers
27 answers
26 answers
26 answers
24 answers
24 answers
22 answers
22 answers
20 answers
20 answers
20 answers
19 answers
18 answers
18 answers

Letter-value totals

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

Scrabble

S1H4O1T1E1
Total: 8 points

Words With Friends

Total: 7 points

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

Strategy after playing SHOTE

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

Quick reference

Largest feedback groups after playing SHOTE:

13% chance
Suggested:
GRAIL
11% chance
Suggested:
ARIEL
7% chance
Suggested:
RAILE

Follow-ups for common patterns

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

13.2%
GRAIL 5.66 bits
11.2%
ARIEL 5.23 bits
6.9%
RAILE 4.45 bits
6.6%
LAIRY 4.98 bits
4.2%
ARIEL 4.63 bits
4.1%
TRAIL 5.39 bits
3.5%
CLARY 4.82 bits
3.3%
FROND 4.12 bits
2.6%
OWNER 4.02 bits
2.1%
TONIC 4.16 bits

Research on SHOTE

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

Optimal play

Opening with SHOTE, a proven-optimal strategy averages 3.64 guesses and ranks #1,106 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 SHOTE can guarantee a solve within six guesses.

Our six-turn simulation says 3.64; proven optimal play reaches 3.64. The fixed strategy accounts for the difference.

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.

How it sounds

One syllable Say it SHOHT. Estimated pronunciation

This pronunciation is machine-estimated, not taken from a pronunciation dictionary.

Related meanings

In WordNet's sense inventory, SHOTE is a kind of young.

Synonyms PIGGY

Sources: Optimal-play values: Alex Selby's exhaustive Wordle analysis (MIT); Pronunciation: CMU Pronouncing Dictionary (BSD), with machine estimates from the g2p_en model; Word relations: Open English WordNet, 2025 edition (CC BY 4.0).