The answer to Wordle #1,256 was

WITCH: A person (now usually particularly a woman) who uses magical or similar supernatural powers to influence or predict events, particularly one with malicious motives.

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 letters, only one vowel.

Compare past puzzle difficulty →

How difficult was it for the solver?

In a replay of past puzzles, Wordle #1,256 scores 96/100 for solver difficulty (hard for the solver).

56 Possible answers after CRANE
90 Possible answers after SLATE
119 Possible answers after ADIEU
4 Words in the _ITCH family
5 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 #1,256, measured

This section compares WITCH'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

96/100

This score is a percentile, not an opinion. Under the site's fixed solver settings, WITCH measured harder for the solver than about 96% of all 1,907 recorded answers to date. Its rating is hard for the solver. The example solver route takes 5 turns; CRANE, SLATE and ADIEU leave a large group.

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

TRACE left the fewest candidates: its first-guess feedback left 12 of the 2,374 words in the site's working answer pool. At the other end, AUDIO left 274 candidates, about 23 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 WITCH, and how many answer-pool words would still match it
OpenerFirst-guess feedbackAnswers still possible
TRACE TRACE 12
CRANE CRANE 56
TARSE TARSE 81
SALET SALET 88
SLATE SLATE 90
STARE STARE 102
ARISE ARISE 113
RAISE RAISE 113
ADIEU ADIEU 119
AUDIO AUDIO 274

“Answers still possible” counts the words in the site's 2,374-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 Suppressed
4 Suppressed
5 Suppressed
6 Suppressed
X Suppressed

The bars pool all 26 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 WITCH.

The solver reaches the answer in 5 guesses.

Common questions

What was the Wordle answer for November 26, 2024?
The Wordle answer for November 26, 2024 (puzzle #1256) was WITCH.
What does WITCH mean?
WITCH: A person (now usually particularly a woman) who uses magical or similar supernatural powers to influence or predict events, particularly one with malicious motives.
Why was Wordle #1256 tricky?
WITCH is rated tricky for estimated word difficulty. Why it may be difficult: uncommon letters, only one vowel.

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