5 FiveLetterWords
Past Wordle answer Possible answer Accepted guess C tier opener

TOUGH

Yes, TOUGH was the Wordle answer on March 21, 2023 (Wordle #640).

As an opener, it rules out about 89.8% of possible answers.

Open Solver with TOUGH Open Word Finder

Meaning and pronunciation

Pronunciation: /tʌf//tɐf//tʊf/

Adjective

Of a material, strong and resilient; sturdy.

“The tent, made of tough canvas, held up to many abuses.”

Adjective

Of food, difficult to cut or chew.

“To soften a tough cut of meat, the recipe suggested simmering it for hours.”

Interjection

Used to indicate lack of sympathy

“If you don't like it, tough!”

Noun

A person who obtains things by force; a thug or bully.

“They were doing fine until they encountered a bunch of toughs from the opposition.”

Alternative forms: tuff

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: March 21, 2023 (#640).

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

Wordle Observatory

How did this puzzle feel?

About the project

Add an anonymous result and difficulty rating to the public, aggregate research dataset.

We send only this answer word for puzzle verification, the puzzle number, result, difficulty vote, Hard Mode flag, timezone and a random one-puzzle receipt token. The Observatory stores no answer word, grid, guesses, account, email, IP-derived ID or reusable player identifier. The puzzle-specific receipt prevents duplicate submissions and permits withdrawal; anyone with that token can withdraw, so keep browser-data exports private. See the privacy details.

How TOUGH performs as a guess

TOUGH is a possible answer, so it would solve about one game in 2,358 when every answer is treated as equally likely.

Played as an opener, it lands at least one colored tile in 73.0% of games, misses completely in 27.0%, and leaves about 241 possible answers on average.

In the previous complete v5 benchmark, it ranks #5,187 of 14,855 openers, averaging 3.67 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.

Useful pattern pages

If you only know part of the word, start with one of these matching patterns.

T___H T in the 1st position and H in the 5th position T__G_ T in the 1st position and G in the 4th position _O__H O in the 2nd position and H in the 5th position

Try next

RAILE SALET CRANE MARLE SILER SACRE
Words starting with T Words ending with H

First-turn measures

4.47 Entropy (bits)
241 Avg remaining
0.04% Exact match
89.8% Avg ruled out
Higher first-turn entropy than about 50% of evaluated openers
1.48 bits below the highest measured first-turn entropy (~5.95 bits)

As an opener: v5 benchmark

How TOUGH 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.

3.67 Avg guesses
100.0% Win rate
0.71 Volatility
#5,187 v5 opener rank
In the complete v5 snapshot, TOUGH ranks #5,187 of 14,855 openers by average guesses in games solved within six.
1 guess
1
2 guesses
54
3 guesses
919
4 guesses
1,136
5 guesses
228
6 guesses
16
Top-ranked in the current bounded policy screen: SLANT. The policy minimizes misses within six first, then average guesses among wins (3.45 for the leader). Compare the ranking measures

Composition

5/5 unique
2 vowels
Common:
OTU

Feedback chances

Any hit (G/Y)
73%
Green tile
29%
All gray
27%

Example solver route

R O A T E
C U M I N
D O U B T
T O U G H

One example route used by the solver.

This solver benchmark reaches TOUGH in 4 guesses.

Feedback distribution

96 possible patterns. Top outcomes:

636
218
202
130
125
101
93
66
59
57
45
40
30
30
29
29
28
26
26
23
20
16
16
16
16
15
14
13
13
12

Quick reference

Largest feedback groups after playing TOUGH:

27% chance
Suggested:
RAILE
9% chance
Suggested:
SALET
9% chance
Suggested:
CRANE

Follow-ups for common patterns

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

27.0% →
RAILE 6.16 bits
9.2% →
SALET 5.74 bits
8.6% →
CRANE 5.31 bits
5.5% →
MARLE 4.77 bits
5.3% →
SILER 4.93 bits
4.3% →
SACRE 5.33 bits
3.9% →
RAILE 5.25 bits
2.8% →
PAIRE 4.98 bits
2.5% →
PLORE 4.38 bits
2.4% →
SALEP 4.66 bits

Letter-value totals

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

Scrabble

T1O1U1G2H4
Total: 9 points

Words With Friends

Total: 10 points

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