By FiveLetterWords · Guide updated . The puzzle date is shown separately.

This page always keeps Wordle #102 for September 29, 2021. Check that number against your game before opening a hint. The answer remains below a separate reveal.

Wordle changes at midnight in your local time zone. For the current local puzzle, use today’s hints. This dated page keeps the same puzzle when the day changes.

Our independent hints use the verified puzzle answer. Play the official game at The New York Times.

Hints for Wordle #102

What kind of word

Wiktionary lists it as a noun, and also as an adverb.

What it means

“One fourteenth of an inch.”

Source: Wiktionary contributors, available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Selected and lightly formatted from Wiktionary; long entries may be shortened.

How it starts

Begins with A.

Vowels and repeats

Three vowels. One letter appears twice.

Where the vowels sit

The vowels are the first, third and fifth letters.

Reveal the answer and explanation

The answer to Wordle #102 was

AGATE: A semitransparent, uncrystallized silicate mineral and semiprecious stone, presenting various tints in the same specimen, with colors delicately arranged and often curved in parallel alternating dark and light stripes or bands, or blended in clouds; various authorities call it a variety of chalcedony, a variety of quartz, or a combination of the two.

Source: Wiktionary contributors, available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Selected and lightly formatted from Wiktionary; long entries may be shortened.

Word difficulty: Tricky

Why it may be difficult: uncommon in general English, a repeated letter.

The word rating describes familiarity and letter features. The solver score below measures how a fixed strategy handles the puzzle; an unusual word can still be easy for that strategy.

Compare past puzzle difficulty →

How difficult was it for the solver?

Solver pressure: 19/100 (easier for the solver). This is a percentile among past puzzles under the same strategy: 0 is easiest and 100 is hardest for the solver.

45 Possible answers after CRANE
6 Possible answers after SLATE
22 Possible answers after ADIEU
4 Guesses in the solver replay

This compares past puzzles under the same solver settings; it does not measure how players performed. Compare more puzzles →

Wordle #102, measured

This section compares AGATE's solver-difficulty percentile, first-guess results for ten familiar openers, and opt-in player reports. Each number identifies its dataset.

Solver difficulty, as a percentile

19/100

This score is a percentile, not an opinion. Under the site's fixed solver settings, AGATE measured harder for the solver than about 19% of all 1,952 recorded answers to date. Its rating is easier for the solver. It repeats A; the example solver route takes four turns.

Solver pressure ranks the answer within the pool; it does not measure player performance. The opener table compares first-guess results, and the contributed ratings report player results.

CRANE, SLATE and ADIEU benchmark

STARE left the fewest candidates: its first-guess feedback left 5 of the 2,384 words in the site's working answer pool. At the other end, AUDIO left 49 candidates, about 10 times as many. The vowel-heavy probes ADIEU and AUDIO revealed comparatively little here. Vowel coverage helps only when the answer's vowels are still in doubt.

First-guess feedback each opener would have received against AGATE, and how many answer-pool words would still match it
OpenerFirst-guess feedbackAnswers still possible
STARE STARE 5
SLATE SLATE 6
TARSE TARSE 7
TRACE TRACE 13
ARISE ARISE 20
SALET SALET 20
ADIEU ADIEU 22
RAISE RAISE 41
CRANE CRANE 45
AUDIO AUDIO 49

“Answers still possible” counts the words in the site's 2,384-word working answer pool whose feedback would match that opener exactly. This is pattern arithmetic, not a simulation. A smaller number means the opener left fewer possible answers after the first guess. It does not describe later turns.

Contributed player ratings

Not enough contributed games to publish player figures for this puzzle. Per-puzzle numbers appear only after at least 10 opt-in games arrive. See how the Observatory collects and publishes player data →

What did you get?

Tap your result to compare it with contributed games. Your choice stays in this browser and is not sent anywhere.

1 Suppressed
2 Suppressed
3 12
4 10
5 Suppressed
6 Suppressed
X Suppressed

The bars pool all 40 contributed games across every completed puzzle. The Observatory does not publish per-puzzle guess distributions below its sample threshold, so this is the broadest available comparison. “Suppressed” marks a low-count cell.

Solver replay

One route our solver takes from its usual opening word to AGATE.

The solver reaches the answer in 4 guesses.

Common questions

What was the Wordle answer for September 29, 2021?
The Wordle answer for September 29, 2021 (puzzle #102) was AGATE.
What does AGATE mean?
AGATE: A semitransparent, uncrystallized silicate mineral and semiprecious stone, presenting various tints in the same specimen, with colors delicately arranged and often curved in parallel alternating dark and light stripes or bands, or blended in clouds; various authorities call it a variety of chalcedony, a variety of quartz, or a combination of the two.
Why was Wordle #102 tricky?
AGATE is rated tricky for estimated word difficulty. Why it may be difficult: uncommon in general English, a repeated letter.

Keep solving and playing