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

UPBOW

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

Meaning and pronunciation

Pronunciation: /ˈʌpbəʊ//ˈʌpboʊ/

Noun

A note performed on a string instrument by drawing the bow upward or to the left across the instrument, moving the point of contact from the bow's tip toward the frog.

Verb

To bend or arc upwards.

Source: Wiktionary contributors · CC BY-SA 4.0. Corrections.

Use UPBOW in a puzzle

As an opener, it rules out about 83.1% of possible answers.

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

No completed appearance

No appearance in our globally completed history. A recent puzzle may still be live elsewhere.

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

How UPBOW performs as a guess

Wordle accepts UPBOW 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 64.1% of games, misses completely in 35.9%, and leaves about 402 possible answers on average.

In the previous complete opener benchmark, it ranks #12,374 of 14,855 openers, averaging 3.82 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 UPBOW 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.

3.55 Entropy (bits)
402 Avg remaining
0.0% Exact match
83.1% Avg ruled out

As an opening guess: previous benchmark

How UPBOW 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.

3.82 Avg guesses
99.96% Solved within six
0.69 Spread of game lengths
#12,374 Rank among openers
Opening with UPBOW left 1 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 3.82 average. It ranks #12,374 of 14,855 openers by average guesses in games solved within six.
1 guess
0
2 guesses
30
3 guesses
704
4 guesses
1,294
5 guesses
306
6 guesses
19

Composition

5/5 unique
2 vowels
Common:
OU

Feedback chances

Any hit (G/Y)
64%
Green tile
12%
All gray
36%

Feedback distribution

UPBOW can come back 53 different ways. These are the most likely, and how many of the possible answers give each one:

857 answers
311 answers
235 answers
164 answers
101 answers
101 answers
78 answers
68 answers
52 answers
47 answers
43 answers
40 answers
39 answers
36 answers
28 answers
27 answers
13 answers
13 answers
10 answers
10 answers
9 answers
9 answers
9 answers
9 answers
7 answers
6 answers
6 answers
6 answers
5 answers
3 answers

Letter-value totals

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

Scrabble

U1P3B3O1W4
Total: 12 points

Words With Friends

Total: 15 points

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

Strategy after playing UPBOW

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

Quick reference

Largest feedback groups after playing UPBOW:

36% chance
Suggested:
TIARE
13% chance
Suggested:
CRATE
10% chance
Suggested:
SLANE

Follow-ups for common patterns

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

35.9% →
TIARE 6.21 bits
13.0% →
CRATE 5.32 bits
9.9% →
SLANE 5.01 bits
6.9% →
PARTE 5.60 bits
4.2% →
WRITE 5.37 bits
4.2% →
RAILE 5.10 bits
3.3% →
TALER 4.82 bits
2.9% →
CRUET 4.47 bits
2.2% →
DROLE 4.56 bits
2.0% →
PULSE 4.39 bits

Research on UPBOW

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

Optimal play

Opening with UPBOW, a proven-optimal strategy averages 3.84 guesses and ranks #12,388 of 14,855 legal openers. The best proven opener, TARSE, averages 3.55.

In hard mode it averages 3.95 guesses at best and is rank #5,188 of the 7,453 openers that can still guarantee a solve within six guesses.

Our six-turn simulation says 3.82, at or below the proven-optimal 3.84, 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.

Sources: Optimal-play values: Alex Selby's exhaustive Wordle analysis (MIT).