SHRED
Yes, SHRED was the Wordle answer on February 25, 2026 (Wordle #1712).
As an opener, it rules out about 94.5% of possible answers.
Meaning and pronunciation
Pronunciation: /ʃɹɛd/
- Noun
-
A fragment of something; a particle; a piece; also, a very small amount.
“There isn’t a shred of evidence to support his claims.”
- Noun
-
A long, narrow piece (especially of fabric) cut or torn off; a strip; specifically, a piece of cloth or clothing.
- Verb
-
To cut or tear (something) into long, narrow pieces or strips.
- Verb
-
To destroy (a document) by cutting or tearing into strips or small pieces that cannot easily be read, especially using a shredder.
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
YesIncluded in the Wordle guess list used by our tools.
Possible answer
YesIncluded among the answers considered by the solver.
Past Wordle answer
Used oncePast Wordle answer: February 25, 2026 (#1712).
See the full page for that puzzle: February 25, 2026 (#1712).
The possible-answer list is the solver's current list and may change when Wordle adds new answers.
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See what the public sample says →How SHRED performs as a guess
SHRED is a possible answer, so it would solve about one game in 2,374 when every answer is treated as equally likely.
Played as an opener, it lands at least one colored tile in 84.2% of games, misses completely in 15.8%, and leaves about 130 possible answers on average.
In the previous complete opener benchmark, it ranks #2,348 of 14,855 openers, averaging 3.63 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 SHRED 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 SHRED 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 SHRED in 3 guesses.
Feedback distribution
SHRED can come back 105 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 SHRED; 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 SHRED
What the solver recommends next for each way the board can respond to SHRED.
Quick reference
Largest feedback groups after playing SHRED:
Research on SHRED
Game-tree analysis and word research for SHRED, with an explanation for each figure.
Optimal play
Opening with SHRED, a proven-optimal strategy averages 3.64 guesses and ranks #1,329 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 SHRED can guarantee a solve within six guesses.
Our six-turn simulation says 3.63, at or below the proven-optimal 3.64, 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.
Related meanings
In WordNet's sense inventory, SHRED is a kind of amount or piece.
Synonyms tag rag whit
Familiarity and learning
- Frequency
- SHRED sits in the intermediate band of the wordfreq scale, appearing about 2 times per million words of written English; the band marks it as a word most readers meet regularly.
- Dominant sense
- Lancaster raters associated it most strongly with sight (4.0 of 5).
In a sentence
There wasn't a single shred of evidence.
He didn't have a shred of moral sense.
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); Lancaster Sensorimotor Norms (CC BY 4.0).