Accepted guess Not a possible answer B tier for first-turn info

TEPAS

TEPAS is accepted as a guess but is not on the solver's possible-answer list.

As an opener, it rules out about 95.1% of possible answers.

Meaning and pronunciation

Noun

plural of tepa

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

No

The solver does not currently treat this as a possible answer.

Past Wordle answer

Not used yet

No past answer date found.

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

How TEPAS performs as a guess

Wordle accepts TEPAS as a guess, but the solver does not list it as a possible answer.

Played as an opener, it lands at least one colored tile in 87.5% of games, misses completely in 12.5%, and leaves about 116 possible answers on average.

In the previous complete opener benchmark, it ranks #911 of 14,855 openers, averaging 3.60 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 TEPAS 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.

5.21 Entropy (bits)
116 Avg remaining
0.0% Exact match
95.1% Avg ruled out
Higher first-turn entropy than about 92% of evaluated openers
0.74 bits below the highest measured first-turn entropy (~5.95 bits)

As an opening guess: previous benchmark

How TEPAS 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.

3.60 Avg guesses
99.96% Solved within six
0.68 Spread of game lengths
#911 Rank among openers
Opening with TEPAS left 1 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 3.60 average. It ranks #911 of 14,855 openers by average guesses in games solved within six.
1 guess
0
2 guesses
88
3 guesses
941
4 guesses
1,168
5 guesses
144
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
2 vowels
Common:
AEST

Feedback chances

Any hit (G/Y)
88%
Green tile
25%
All gray
12%

Feedback distribution

TEPAS can come back 117 different ways. These are the most likely, and how many of the possible answers give each one:

296 answers
243 answers
207 answers
126 answers
99 answers
95 answers
95 answers
75 answers
64 answers
62 answers
59 answers
59 answers
53 answers
51 answers
38 answers
36 answers
34 answers
34 answers
33 answers
33 answers
29 answers
27 answers
27 answers
27 answers
25 answers
24 answers
22 answers
19 answers
18 answers
18 answers

Letter-value totals

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

Scrabble

T1E1P3A1S1
Total: 7 points

Words With Friends

Total: 8 points

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

Strategy after playing TEPAS

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

Quick reference

Largest feedback groups after playing TEPAS:

12% chance
Suggested:
COULD
10% chance
Suggested:
DROLE
9% chance
Suggested:
CAIRN

Follow-ups for common patterns

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

12.5%
COULD 5.63 bits
10.2%
DROLE 5.34 bits
8.7%
CAIRN 5.19 bits
5.3%
LARGE 4.68 bits
4.2%
NORTH 4.90 bits
4.0%
SHINY 4.69 bits
4.0%
GENRE 4.25 bits
3.2%
SHIRE 4.60 bits
2.7%
SHIRT 4.35 bits
2.6%
SHALY 4.34 bits

Research on TEPAS

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

Optimal play

Opening with TEPAS, a proven-optimal strategy averages 3.65 guesses and ranks #1,583 of 14,855 legal openers. The best proven opener, TARSE, averages 3.55.

In hard mode it averages 3.74 guesses at best and is rank #179 of the 7,453 openers that can still guarantee a solve within six guesses.

Our six-turn simulation says 3.60, at or below the proven-optimal 3.65, 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 TEEPUHS. Estimated pronunciation

This pronunciation is machine-estimated, not taken from a pronunciation dictionary.

Sources: Optimal-play values: Alex Selby's exhaustive Wordle analysis (MIT); Pronunciation: CMU Pronouncing Dictionary (BSD), with machine estimates from the g2p_en model.