STEEP
Yes, STEEP was the Wordle answer on February 8, 2025 (Wordle #1330).
Meaning and pronunciation
Pronunciation: /stiːp/
- Adjective
-
Of a near-vertical gradient; of a slope, surface, curve, etc. that proceeds upward at an angle near vertical.
“a steep hill or mountain; a steep roof; a steep ascent; a steep barometric gradient”
- Adjective
-
Expensive.
“Twenty quid for a shave? That's a bit steep.”
- Noun
-
The steep side of a mountain etc.; a slope or acclivity.
- Verb
-
To soak or wet thoroughly.
“They steep skins in a tanning solution to create leather.”
Source: Wiktionary contributors · CC BY-SA 4.0. Corrections.
Etymology
From Middle English stepen, from Old Norse steypa (“to make stoop, cast down, pour out, cast (metal)”), from Proto-Germanic *staupijaną (“to tumble, make tumble, plunge”), from Proto-Indo-European *(s)tewb- (“to push, hit”). Cognate with Danish støbe (“cast (metal)”), Norwegian støpe, støype, Swedish stöpa (“to found, cast (metal)”), Old English stūpian (“to stoop, bend the back, slope”). Related to stoop.
Source: Wiktionary (CC BY-SA)
How it sounds
One syllable Say it STEEP.
Rhymes with SLEEP CHEAP SHEEP SWEEP CREEP
Related meanings
Synonyms absorb outrageous plunge exorbitant high HEAVY
Opposites gradual low moderate
In a sentence
The road was very steep.
This road is very steep.
Use STEEP in a puzzle
As an opener, it rules out about 91.1% 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: February 8, 2025 (#1330).
See the full page for that puzzle: February 8, 2025 (#1330).
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 →STEEP in Connections
1 recorded appearance in completed main-edition puzzles through . A category label alone does not establish a word's meaning.
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· Puzzle #1071
Reveal this appearance's category
STEEP appeared in TEA-MAKING VERBS (blue group).
How STEEP performs as a guess
STEEP 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 76.8% of games, misses completely in 23.2%, and leaves about 212 possible answers on average.
In the previous complete opener benchmark, it ranks #6,968 of 14,855 openers, averaging 3.70 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 STEEP 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 STEEP 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 STEEP in 4 guesses.
Feedback distribution
STEEP can come back 95 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 STEEP; 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 STEEP
What the solver recommends next for each way the board can respond to STEEP.
Quick reference
Largest feedback groups after playing STEEP:
Research on STEEP
Game-tree analysis and word research for STEEP, with an explanation for each figure.
Optimal play
Opening with STEEP, a proven-optimal strategy averages 3.72 guesses and ranks #6,325 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 STEEP can guarantee a solve within six guesses.
Our six-turn simulation says 3.70, at or below the proven-optimal 3.72, 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
- STEEP sits in the intermediate band of the wordfreq scale, appearing about 10 times per million words of written English; the band marks it as a word most readers meet regularly.
- Learner level
- Appears in intermediate learner vocabulary (CEFR-J level B1); a word learners usually reach after the basics.
- Age of acquisition
- Typically learned around age 7, by Glasgow Norms speaker ratings.
- Imageability
- Imageability score: 73 of 100. Raters found it easy to picture.
- Dominant sense
- Lancaster raters associated it most strongly with sight (4.2 of 5).
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); Lancaster Sensorimotor Norms (CC BY 4.0).