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

YARNS

YARNS 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

Noun

plural of yarn

Verb

third-person singular simple present indicative of yarn

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 YARNS performs as a guess

Wordle accepts YARNS 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 87.3% of games, misses completely in 12.7%, and leaves about 121 possible answers on average.

In the previous complete opener benchmark, it ranks #2,526 of 14,855 openers, averaging 3.63 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 YARNS 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.

5.04 Entropy (bits)
121 Avg remaining
0.0% Exact match
94.9% Avg ruled out
Higher first-turn entropy than about 85% of evaluated openers
0.91 bits below the highest measured first-turn entropy (~5.95 bits)

As an opening guess: previous benchmark

How YARNS 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.

3.63 Avg guesses
99.87% Solved within six
0.68 Spread of game lengths
#2,526 Rank among openers
Opening with YARNS left 3 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 3.63 average. It ranks #2,526 of 14,855 openers by average guesses in games solved within six.
1 guess
0
2 guesses
49
3 guesses
986
4 guesses
1,121
5 guesses
179
6 guesses
16
Top-ranked in the current bounded policy screen: SLANT. The policy minimizes misses within six first, then average guesses among wins (3.46 for the leader). Compare the ranking measures

Composition

5/5 unique
1 vowels
Common:
ANRS

Feedback chances

Any hit (G/Y)
87%
Green tile
28%
All gray
13%

Feedback distribution

YARNS can come back 90 different ways. These are the most likely, and how many of the possible answers give each one:

302 answers
238 answers
167 answers
161 answers
128 answers
120 answers
116 answers
93 answers
75 answers
56 answers
45 answers
45 answers
44 answers
41 answers
39 answers
37 answers
34 answers
34 answers
31 answers
30 answers
28 answers
28 answers
28 answers
28 answers
27 answers
25 answers
24 answers
24 answers
22 answers
17 answers

Letter-value totals

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

Scrabble

Y4A1R1N1S1
Total: 8 points

Words With Friends

Total: 8 points

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

Strategy after playing YARNS

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

Quick reference

Largest feedback groups after playing YARNS:

13% chance
Suggested:
TOILE
10% chance
Suggested:
TOILE
7% chance
Suggested:
CLOTE

Follow-ups for common patterns

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

12.7%
TOILE 6.23 bits
10.0%
TOILE 5.18 bits
7.0%
CLOTE 5.48 bits
6.8%
STILE 5.50 bits
5.4%
TRACE 4.93 bits
5.1%
TOILE 5.19 bits
4.9%
MOILE 4.34 bits
3.9%
STALE 4.97 bits
3.2%
CLOTE 4.50 bits
2.4%
STIPE 4.65 bits

Research on YARNS

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

Optimal play

Opening with YARNS, a proven-optimal strategy averages 3.68 guesses and ranks #3,194 of 14,855 legal openers. The best proven opener, TARSE, averages 3.55.

No guaranteed hard-mode solve In hard mode, no strategy that opens with YARNS can guarantee a solve within six guesses.

Our six-turn simulation says 3.63, at or below the proven-optimal 3.68, 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 YAHRNZ.

Rhymes with BARNS KARNS CARNS DARNS

Related meanings

In WordNet's sense inventory, YARNS is a kind of report or cord.

Synonyms thread narration recital

Familiarity and learning

Frequency
YARNS sits in the advanced band of the wordfreq scale, appearing about 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); Word relations: Open English WordNet, 2025 edition (CC BY 4.0); Word frequency: wordfreq (data CC BY-SA 4.0).