SPIEL
Yes, SPIEL was the Wordle answer on October 22, 2022 (Wordle #490).
Meaning and pronunciation
Pronunciation: /ʃpiːl//spiːl/
- Noun
-
A lengthy and extravagant speech or argument usually intended to persuade.
- Noun
-
An early form of rap music.
- Verb
-
To talk at length.
- Verb
-
To give a sales pitch; to promote by speaking.
Alternative forms: shpeal, schpeal, shpiel, schpiel
Source: Wiktionary contributors · CC BY-SA 4.0. Corrections.
Etymology
Borrowed from German Spiel (“game, performance”) or Yiddish שפּיל (shpil), both from Middle High German spil, from Old High German spil, from Proto-West Germanic *spil.
Source: Wiktionary (CC BY-SA)
How it sounds
One syllable Say it SPEEL.
Rhymes with STEEL WHEEL IDEAL STEAL KNEEL
Related meanings
Synonyms play
In a sentence
I'm fed up with that spiel.
Just let Tom do his spiel.
Use SPIEL in a puzzle
As an opener, it rules out about 94.9% 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
Used oncePast Wordle answer: October 22, 2022 (#490).
See the full page for that puzzle: October 22, 2022 (#490).
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 SPIEL performs as a guess
SPIEL 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 121 possible answers on average.
In the previous complete opener benchmark, it ranks #809 of 14,855 openers, averaging 3.59 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 SPIEL 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 SPIEL 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 SPIEL in 3 guesses.
Feedback distribution
SPIEL can come back 127 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 SPIEL; 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 SPIEL
What the solver recommends next for each way the board can respond to SPIEL.
Quick reference
Largest feedback groups after playing SPIEL:
Research on SPIEL
Game-tree analysis and word research for SPIEL, with an explanation for each figure.
Optimal play
Opening with SPIEL, a proven-optimal strategy averages 3.61 guesses and ranks #433 of 14,855 legal openers. The best proven opener, TARSE, averages 3.55.
In hard mode it averages 3.77 guesses at best and is rank #569 of the 7,453 openers that can still guarantee a solve within six guesses.
Our six-turn simulation says 3.59, at or below the proven-optimal 3.61, 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
- SPIEL sits in the advanced band of the wordfreq scale, appearing less than once per million words of written English; the band marks it as an uncommon word many players still recognize.
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).