SPOON
Yes, SPOON was the Wordle answer on October 21, 2024 (Wordle #1220).
As an opener, it rules out about 86.9% of possible answers.
Meaning and pronunciation
Pronunciation: /spuːn/[ˈspʊu̯n]
- Noun
-
An implement for eating or serving; a scooped utensil whose long handle is straight, in contrast to a ladle.
- Noun
-
An implement for stirring food while being prepared; a wooden spoon.
- Verb
-
To serve using a spoon; to transfer (something) with a spoon.
“Sarah spooned some apple sauce onto her plate.”
- Verb
-
To lie nestled front-to-back, following the contours of the bodies, in a manner reminiscent of stacked spoons.
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: October 21, 2024 (#1220).
See the full page for that puzzle: October 21, 2024 (#1220).
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 SPOON performs as a guess
SPOON 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 68.3% of games, misses completely in 31.7%, and leaves about 311 possible answers on average.
In the previous complete opener benchmark, it ranks #8,773 of 14,855 openers, averaging 3.74 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 SPOON 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 SPOON 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 SPOON in 4 guesses.
Feedback distribution
SPOON can come back 81 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 SPOON; 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 SPOON
What the solver recommends next for each way the board can respond to SPOON.
Quick reference
Largest feedback groups after playing SPOON:
Research on SPOON
Game-tree analysis and word research for SPOON, with an explanation for each figure.
Optimal play
Opening with SPOON, a proven-optimal strategy averages 3.77 guesses and ranks #9,270 of 14,855 legal openers. The best proven opener, TARSE, averages 3.55.
In hard mode it averages 3.89 guesses at best and is rank #3,913 of the 7,453 openers that can still guarantee a solve within six guesses.
Our six-turn simulation says 3.74, at or below the proven-optimal 3.77, 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, SPOON is a kind of container or amount.
Familiarity and learning
- Frequency
- SPOON sits in the intermediate band of the wordfreq scale, appearing about 8 times per million words of written English; the band marks it as a word most readers meet regularly.
- Learner level
- Appears in beginner learner vocabulary (CEFR-J level A2); among the first words English learners study.
- Age of acquisition
- Typically learned around age 3, by Glasgow Norms speaker ratings.
- Imageability
- Imageability score: 96 of 100. Raters found it easy to picture.
In a sentence
I don't have a spoon.
Would you like a spoon?
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); Learner levels: CEFR-J Wordlist ver 1.5, Tono Laboratory, TUFS; Glasgow Norms (CC BY 4.0).