The answer to Wordle #1,865 was

SONAR: Artificial echolocation by use of electronic equipment, with hydrophones to locate objects underwater, using the same wave-analysis principles that radar uses.

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

Word difficulty: Easy

Why it may be easier: five different letters, at least two vowels and none of Q, Z, X, J, K, V or W.

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: 37/100 (middle of the pack). This is a percentile among past puzzles under the same strategy: 0 is easiest and 100 is hardest for the solver.

10 Possible answers after CRANE
17 Possible answers after SLATE
289 Possible answers after ADIEU
3 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 #1,865, measured

This section compares SONAR'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

37/100

This score is a percentile, not an opinion. Under the site's fixed solver settings, SONAR measured harder for the solver than about 37% of all 1,918 recorded answers to date. Its rating is middle of the pack. 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

STARE left the fewest candidates: its first-guess feedback left 7 of the 2,374 words in the site's working answer pool. At the other end, ADIEU left 289 candidates, about 41 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 SONAR, and how many answer-pool words would still match it
OpenerFirst-guess feedbackAnswers still possible
STARE STARE 7
CRANE CRANE 10
TARSE TARSE 12
SLATE SLATE 17
RAISE RAISE 21
ARISE ARISE 23
SALET SALET 33
TRACE TRACE 62
AUDIO AUDIO 78
ADIEU ADIEU 289

“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 10
4 Suppressed
5 Suppressed
6 Suppressed
X Suppressed

The bars pool all 31 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 SONAR.

The solver reaches the answer in 3 guesses.

Common questions

What was the Wordle answer for July 28, 2026?
The Wordle answer for July 28, 2026 (puzzle #1865) was SONAR.
What does SONAR mean?
SONAR: Artificial echolocation by use of electronic equipment, with hydrophones to locate objects underwater, using the same wave-analysis principles that radar uses.
Why was Wordle #1865 tricky?
SONAR is rated easy for estimated word difficulty. Why it may be easier: five different letters, at least two vowels and none of Q, Z, X, J, K, V or W.

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