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

TERMS

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

As an opener, it rules out about 94.9% of possible answers.

Meaning and pronunciation

Pronunciation: /tɜːmz//tɝmz/

Noun

plural of term

Verb

third-person singular simple present indicative of term

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 TERMS performs as a guess

Wordle accepts TERMS 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 86.6% of games, misses completely in 13.4%, and leaves about 120 possible answers on average.

In the previous complete opener benchmark, it ranks #1,662 of 14,855 openers, averaging 3.61 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 TERMS 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.

5.11 Entropy (bits)
120 Avg remaining
0.0% Exact match
94.9% Avg ruled out
Higher first-turn entropy than about 88% of evaluated openers
0.84 bits below the highest measured first-turn entropy (~5.95 bits)

As an opening guess: previous benchmark

How TERMS 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.

3.61 Avg guesses
99.79% Solved within six
0.69 Spread of game lengths
#1,662 Rank among openers
Opening with TERMS left 5 of the snapshot's answers unsolved after six guesses. A spread of 0.69 means those games clustered within about 0.69 of a guess of the 3.61 average. It ranks #1,662 of 14,855 openers by average guesses in games solved within six.
1 guess
0
2 guesses
70
3 guesses
966
4 guesses
1,128
5 guesses
173
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:
ERST

Feedback chances

Any hit (G/Y)
87%
Green tile
26%
All gray
13%

Feedback distribution

TERMS can come back 105 different ways. These are the most likely, and how many of the possible answers give each one:

318 answers
210 answers
166 answers
166 answers
146 answers
127 answers
90 answers
80 answers
74 answers
63 answers
61 answers
46 answers
44 answers
43 answers
42 answers
37 answers
35 answers
35 answers
33 answers
31 answers
25 answers
25 answers
22 answers
21 answers
20 answers
20 answers
19 answers
17 answers
16 answers
16 answers

Letter-value totals

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

Scrabble

T1E1R1M3S1
Total: 7 points

Words With Friends

Total: 8 points

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

Strategy after playing TERMS

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

Quick reference

Largest feedback groups after playing TERMS:

13% chance
Suggested:
COALY
9% chance
Suggested:
ANILE
7% chance
Suggested:
DRAIN

Follow-ups for common patterns

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

13.4%
COALY 5.73 bits
8.8%
ANILE 5.54 bits
7.0%
DRAIN 5.38 bits
7.0%
LAIDE 4.37 bits
6.1%
SNAIL 5.12 bits
5.3%
HABIT 4.86 bits
3.8%
PLANE 4.70 bits
3.4%
SAINT 4.56 bits
3.1%
LIANE 4.38 bits
2.7%
ALINE 4.72 bits

Research on TERMS

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

Optimal play

Opening with TERMS, a proven-optimal strategy averages 3.65 guesses and ranks #1,614 of 14,855 legal openers. The best proven opener, TARSE, averages 3.55.

In hard mode it averages 3.75 guesses at best and is rank #328 of the 7,453 openers that can still guarantee a solve within six guesses.

Our six-turn simulation says 3.61, 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

One syllable Say it TURMZ.

Rhymes with FIRMS WORMS GERMS BERMS HERMS

Related meanings

In WordNet's sense inventory, TERMS is a kind of position or cost.

Synonyms PRICE damage footing

Familiarity and learning

Frequency
TERMS sits in the common band of the wordfreq scale, appearing about 126 times per million words of written English; the band marks it as an everyday word almost every player will know.
Dominant sense
Lancaster raters associated it most strongly with sight (2.4 of 5).

In a sentence

Are you on good terms?
© tatoeba.org contributor CK (CC BY 2.0 FR)
Come to terms with it.
© tatoeba.org contributor rul (CC BY 2.0 FR)

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); Lancaster Sensorimotor Norms (CC BY 4.0).