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

VERTU

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

As an opener, it rules out about 93.1% of possible answers.

Meaning and pronunciation

Pronunciation: /vəˈtuː//vɚˈtu/

Noun

Especially with reference to the writings of Machiavelli (1469–1527): the requisite qualities for political or military success; vitality, determination; power.

Noun

Moral worth; virtue, virtuousness.

Alternative forms: vertù, virtu

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 VERTU performs as a guess

Wordle accepts VERTU 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 83.0% of games, misses completely in 17.0%, and leaves about 163 possible answers on average.

In the previous complete opener benchmark, it ranks #7,868 of 14,855 openers, averaging 3.72 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.

First-turn measures

All four describe VERTU 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.

4.65 Entropy (bits)
163 Avg remaining
0.0% Exact match
93.1% Avg ruled out
Higher first-turn entropy than about 62% of evaluated openers
1.29 bits below the highest measured first-turn entropy (~5.95 bits)

As an opening guess: previous benchmark

How VERTU 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.

3.72 Avg guesses
99.96% Solved within six
0.70 Spread of game lengths
#7,868 Rank among openers
Opening with VERTU left 1 of the snapshot's answers unsolved after six guesses. A spread of 0.70 means those games clustered within about 0.70 of a guess of the 3.72 average. It ranks #7,868 of 14,855 openers by average guesses in games solved within six.
1 guess
0
2 guesses
51
3 guesses
827
4 guesses
1,226
5 guesses
232
6 guesses
17
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:
ERTU

Feedback chances

Any hit (G/Y)
83%
Green tile
22%
All gray
17%

Feedback distribution

VERTU can come back 82 different ways. These are the most likely, and how many of the possible answers give each one:

404 answers
259 answers
183 answers
183 answers
159 answers
154 answers
90 answers
85 answers
61 answers
57 answers
53 answers
47 answers
45 answers
44 answers
42 answers
39 answers
31 answers
30 answers
25 answers
24 answers
24 answers
20 answers
19 answers
19 answers
17 answers
15 answers
15 answers
14 answers
14 answers
13 answers

Letter-value totals

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

Scrabble

V4E1R1T1U1
Total: 8 points

Words With Friends

Total: 10 points

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

Strategy after playing VERTU

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

Quick reference

Largest feedback groups after playing VERTU:

17% chance
Suggested:
SALON
11% chance
Suggested:
SLANE
8% chance
Suggested:
DRAIN

Follow-ups for common patterns

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

17.0%
SALON 5.92 bits
10.9%
SLANE 5.49 bits
7.7%
DRAIN 5.21 bits
7.7%
SAICE 4.58 bits
6.7%
SONLY 4.80 bits
6.5%
HOIST 5.19 bits
3.8%
SHALT 4.92 bits
3.6%
LIANE 4.51 bits
2.6%
COAST 4.60 bits
2.4%
COUNT 4.21 bits

Research on VERTU

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

Optimal play

Opening with VERTU, a proven-optimal strategy averages 3.76 guesses and ranks #8,670 of 14,855 legal openers. The best proven opener, TARSE, averages 3.55.

In hard mode it averages 3.89 guesses at best and is rank #3,900 of the 7,453 openers that can still guarantee a solve within six guesses.

Our six-turn simulation says 3.72, at or below the proven-optimal 3.76, 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 VEHRTOO. Estimated pronunciation

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

Related meanings

In WordNet's sense inventory, VERTU is a kind of taste or quality.

Familiarity and learning

Frequency
VERTU 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.

Sources: Optimal-play values: Alex Selby's exhaustive Wordle analysis (MIT); Pronunciation: CMU Pronouncing Dictionary (BSD), with machine estimates from the g2p_en model; Word relations: Open English WordNet, 2025 edition (CC BY 4.0); Word frequency: wordfreq (data CC BY-SA 4.0).