Past Wordle answer Possible answer Accepted guess C tier for first-turn info

TAWNY

Yes, TAWNY was the Wordle answer on November 27, 2023 (Wordle #891).

As an opener, it rules out about 91.7% of possible answers.

Meaning and pronunciation

Pronunciation: /ˈtɔːni//ˈtɔni//ˈtɑ-/

Adjective

Of a light brown to brownish orange colour; orangey brown tinged with gold.

Verb

To cause (someone or something) to have a light brown to brownish orange colour; to tan, to tawn.

Verb

To become a light brown to brownish orange colour; to tan, to tawn.

Noun

A light brown to brownish orange colour.

Alternative forms: tawney

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

Yes

Included among the answers considered by the solver.

Past Wordle answer

Used once

Past Wordle answer: November 27, 2023 (#891).

See the full page for that puzzle: November 27, 2023 (#891).

The possible-answer list is the solver's current list and may change when Wordle adds new answers.

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How TAWNY performs as a guess

TAWNY 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 78.7% of games, misses completely in 21.3%, and leaves about 197 possible answers on average.

In the previous complete opener benchmark, it ranks #5,559 of 14,855 openers, averaging 3.68 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 TAWNY 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.

4.57 Entropy (bits)
197 Avg remaining
0.04% Exact match
91.7% Avg ruled out
Higher first-turn entropy than about 56% of evaluated openers
1.38 bits below the highest measured first-turn entropy (~5.95 bits)

As an opening guess: previous benchmark

How TAWNY 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.

3.68 Avg guesses
99.92% Solved within six
0.68 Spread of game lengths
#5,559 Rank among openers
Opening with TAWNY left 2 of the snapshot's answers unsolved after six guesses. A spread of 0.68 means those games clustered within about 0.68 of a guess of the 3.68 average. It ranks #5,559 of 14,855 openers by average guesses in games solved within six.
1 guess
1
2 guesses
49
3 guesses
875
4 guesses
1,219
5 guesses
196
6 guesses
12
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
1 vowels
Common:
ANT

Feedback chances

Any hit (G/Y)
79%
Green tile
37%
All gray
21%

Example solver route

R O A T E
C L I N T
T A W N Y

One example route used by the solver.

This solver benchmark reaches TAWNY in 3 guesses.

Feedback distribution

TAWNY can come back 91 different ways. These are the most likely, and how many of the possible answers give each one:

506 answers
278 answers
212 answers
146 answers
137 answers
109 answers
108 answers
61 answers
60 answers
60 answers
42 answers
39 answers
38 answers
37 answers
34 answers
32 answers
31 answers
29 answers
27 answers
23 answers
23 answers
23 answers
20 answers
17 answers
15 answers
14 answers
12 answers
12 answers
11 answers
11 answers

Letter-value totals

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

Scrabble

T1A1W4N1Y4
Total: 11 points

Words With Friends

Total: 11 points

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

Strategy after playing TAWNY

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

Quick reference

Largest feedback groups after playing TAWNY:

21% chance
Suggested:
SLIER
12% chance
Suggested:
CRISE
9% chance
Suggested:
SHIER

Follow-ups for common patterns

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

21.3%
SLIER 6.11 bits
11.7%
CRISE 5.40 bits
8.9%
SHIER 5.54 bits
6.1%
MOILE 4.47 bits
5.8%
GOIER 5.13 bits
4.6%
LEAST 4.93 bits
4.5%
SOREL 4.85 bits
2.6%
SIRED 4.36 bits
2.5%
ALOSE 4.66 bits
2.5%
SHOER 4.82 bits

Research on TAWNY

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

Optimal play

Opening with TAWNY, a proven-optimal strategy averages 3.72 guesses and ranks #6,195 of 14,855 legal openers. The best proven opener, TARSE, averages 3.55.

In hard mode it averages 3.85 guesses at best and is rank #2,959 of the 7,453 openers that can still guarantee a solve within six guesses.

Our six-turn simulation says 3.68, 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.

How it sounds

Two syllables, stress on the first syllable Say it TAHNEE.

Rhymes with DONNY BONNY

Familiarity and learning

Frequency
TAWNY 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.

In a sentence

The tawny owl is a type of owl.
© tatoeba.org contributor sundown (CC BY 2.0 FR)
The elephant is grey and the lion is tawny colored.
© tatoeba.org contributor Solana (CC BY 2.0 FR)

Sources: Optimal-play values: Alex Selby's exhaustive Wordle analysis (MIT); Pronunciation: CMU Pronouncing Dictionary (BSD); Word frequency: wordfreq (data CC BY-SA 4.0).