September 2024 in review

September 2024 is complete, with 30 puzzles and every date recorded. On the site's word-property scale it was an ordinary month. The highest estimated difficulty occurred on Sep 21, 2024 and the lowest on Sep 2, 2024; 9 answers doubled a letter and 6 answers used at least one of Q, Z, X, J, K, V or W.

The hardest and easiest answers

Highest estimated difficulty

SEVEN 2.5 pts · Sep 21, 2024 · #1,190

SEVEN combines the scale's two heaviest penalties: it repeats E and contains uncommon V, which ordinary opening guesses rarely test.

Lowest estimated difficulty

CAMEL 0 pts · Sep 2, 2024 · #1,171

CAMEL has five distinct letters, 2 vowels and no uncommon letters. Common first guesses therefore test many of its letters.

The spread ran from 0 points on Sep 2, 2024 to 2.5 on Sep 21, 2024. Both numbers describe single words, not a sequence. A hard day and an easy one can occur in the same week, so the trend line below compares whole months rather than individual days.

The difficulty trend

An ordinary month. September's 30 answers averaged 1.1 points on the estimated word-difficulty scale against 1.3 across the trailing six months, and a gap of 0.2 points sits inside the normal month-to-month spread of about ±0.3. At roughly thirty answers a month that is sampling noise, not a change in how answers were chosen. The difference does not support changing openers or strategy. The scale combines general-English corpus frequency with repeats, uncommon letters and missing vowels. It measures word properties, not player results.

Letters and patterns

9 of 30 answers doubled a letter, in line with the long-run archive rate of about 31%. This matches the usual rate. Test a repeat when the board stalls.

6 of 30 answers used at least one of Q, Z, X, J, K, V or W, in line with the long-run archive rate of about 28%. Standard openers test these letters less often, so the difficulty scale adds a penalty for each one.

No day reused an earlier answer: every puzzle this month was a first appearance in the site's recorded history. Repeats do happen, so a word having been a solution before is still no reason to drop it from your guesses.

Double-letter days: Sep 6 (#1,175) doubled R; Sep 10 (#1,179) doubled E; Sep 12 (#1,181) doubled S; Sep 13 (#1,182) doubled H; Sep 15 (#1,184) doubled R; Sep 18 (#1,187) doubled L; Sep 19 (#1,188) doubled S; Sep 21 (#1,190) doubled E; Sep 29 (#1,198) doubled R.

Uncommon-letter days: Sep 5 (#1,174) used W; Sep 7 (#1,176) used W; Sep 8 (#1,177) used W; Sep 20 (#1,189) used K; Sep 21 (#1,190) used V; Sep 26 (#1,195) used K.

How players fared

No day from this month has reached the Observatory's minimum public sample of 10 opt-in games, so no crowd numbers appear. The gate is deliberate: below it, a handful of results could stand in for a crowd and misrepresent a day.

Answer words are shown only for completed puzzles. Open a puzzle for its definition, difficulty and solver replay.

DateDayPuzzleAnswerWord difficulty
Sep 30, 2024 Monday #1,199 → CLOUD Easy
Sep 29, 2024 Sunday #1,198 → RIDER Moderate
Sep 28, 2024 Saturday #1,197 → BRAIN Easy
Sep 27, 2024 Friday #1,196 → FAITH Easy
Sep 26, 2024 Thursday #1,195 → THANK Tricky
Sep 25, 2024 Wednesday #1,194 → TORCH Moderate
Sep 24, 2024 Tuesday #1,193 → HANDY Moderate
Sep 23, 2024 Monday #1,192 → STEAM Easy
Sep 22, 2024 Sunday #1,191 → TEACH Easy
Sep 21, 2024 Saturday #1,190 → SEVEN Tricky
Sep 20, 2024 Friday #1,189 → SMOKE Moderate
Sep 19, 2024 Thursday #1,188 → PRESS Tricky
Sep 18, 2024 Wednesday #1,187 → FULLY Tricky
Sep 17, 2024 Tuesday #1,186 → BEAUT Tricky
Sep 16, 2024 Monday #1,185 → HONEY Easy
Sep 15, 2024 Sunday #1,184 → RECUR Tricky
Sep 14, 2024 Saturday #1,183 → BROAD Easy
Sep 13, 2024 Friday #1,182 → HARSH Tricky
Sep 12, 2024 Thursday #1,181 → BRASS Tricky
Sep 11, 2024 Wednesday #1,180 → AISLE Easy
Sep 10, 2024 Tuesday #1,179 → REBEL Moderate
Sep 9, 2024 Monday #1,178 → DEBIT Easy
Sep 8, 2024 Sunday #1,177 → DRAWN Tricky
Sep 7, 2024 Saturday #1,176 → OWNER Moderate
Sep 6, 2024 Friday #1,175 → RERUN Tricky
Sep 5, 2024 Thursday #1,174 → WIDEN Moderate
Sep 4, 2024 Wednesday #1,173 → STERN Moderate
Sep 3, 2024 Tuesday #1,172 → FAINT Easy
Sep 2, 2024 Monday #1,171 → CAMEL Easy
Sep 1, 2024 Sunday #1,170 → MUSHY Tricky

On this day in Wordle

Past answers published on September 7 in earlier years. Every puzzle listed here is complete, so this section does not spoil a live game.

  1. 1 year ago
    Easy

    Nothing unusual appears in the letters: all five are distinct and familiar. Ordinary letter coverage works well on words like this.

    Puzzle #1,541 → Word page →

  2. 2 years ago
    Moderate

    Nothing unusual appears in the letters: all five are distinct and familiar. Ordinary letter coverage works well on words like this.

    Puzzle #1,176 → Word page →

  3. 3 years ago
    Hard

    The doubled L raises the difficulty. Once a letter shows up yellow or green, few players try it a second time unprompted.

    Puzzle #810 → Word page →

The Easy-to-Brutal badge combines general-English corpus frequency with repeats, uncommon letters and vowel count. It estimates word difficulty, not player results. Dates come from the site's recorded answer history.

Archive totals

30 Answers
R Most common start (4)
N Most common end (6)
SEVEN Highest estimated difficulty

Estimated word difficulty combines wordfreq corpus frequency with repeats, uncommon letters and vowel count. It measures word properties, not player results. Compare solver difficulty →

  • Easy 11
  • Moderate 8
  • Tricky 11

From the guides

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