It’s time for your guide to today’s Wordle answer, featuring my commentary on the latest puzzle, plus a selection of hints designed to help you keep your streak going.
Don’t think you need any clues for Wordle today? No problem, just skip to my daily column. But remember: failure in this game is only ever six guesses away.
Want more word-based fun? My Quordle today page contains hints and answers for that game, and you can also take a look at my NYT Strands today and NYT Connections today pages for my verdict on two of the New York Times’ other brainteasers.
SPOILER WARNING: Today’s Wordle answer and hints are below, so don’t read on if you don’t want to see them.
Wordle hints (game #1260) – clue #1 – Vowels
How many vowels does today’s Wordle have?
• Wordle today has vowels in two places*.
* Note that by vowel we mean the five standard vowels (A, E, I, O, U), not Y (which is sometimes counted as a vowel too).
Wordle hints (game #1260) – clue #2 – first letter
What letter does today’s Wordle begin with?
• The first letter in today’s Wordle answer is D.
D is the ninth most common starting letter in the game, so maybe slightly less likely than you might expect.
Wordle hints (game #1260) – clue #3 – repeated letters
Does today’s Wordle have any repeated letters?
• There are no repeated letters in today’s Wordle.
Repeated letters are quite common in the game, with 748 of the 2,309 Wordle answers containing one. However, it’s still more likely that a Wordle doesn’t have one.
Wordle hints (game #1260) – clue #4 – ending letter
What letter does today’s Wordle end with?
• The last letter in today’s Wordle is A.
A is a relatively common ending letter. It ranks 10th in this regard and today’s game is one of 63 in which you’ll find an A there.
Wordle hints (game #1260) – clue #5 – last chance
Still looking for more Wordle hints today? Here’s an extra one for game #1260.
- Today’s Wordle answer is a doctrine or code.
If you just want to know today’s Wordle answer now, simply scroll down – but I’d always recommend trying to solve it on your own first. We’ve got lots of Wordle tips and tricks to help you, including a guide to the best Wordle start words.
If you don’t want to know today’s answer then DO NOT SCROLL ANY FURTHER BECAUSE IT IS PRINTED BELOW. So don’t say you weren’t warned!
Today’s Wordle answer (game #1260)
- NYT average score: 4.2
- My score: 5
- WordleBot’s score: 4
- Best start word performance*: TRADE (29 remaining answers)
- My start word performance: ARSON (46)
* From WordleBot’s Top 20 start words
Today’s Wordle answer (game #1260) is… DOGMA.
Frustration, thy name is Wordle. I scored yet another five today, failing to turn a good start into a good score on a day when the average is 4.2; it’s not an easy answer, but I made harder work of it than I should have.
And there ends a month that is officially my worst ever. I’ve tracked the scores for every Wordle since WordleBot launched in April 2022 and have figures for around 1,000 games now. Of those, my November 2024 had an average score of 4.0 – with my next worst being 3.87 in July of this year. On the other hand, the total average among all players this month was 4.03, so I still fared better than the mean; the worst month, if you’re interested, was the previous one. Yes, October 2024 had an average of 4.15 overall.
Anyway, enough of that complaining. DOGMA is a difficult Wordle, and one which demonstrated exactly why I don’t like vowels as much as consonants. That’s because I spent half of it chasing A and O around early on; it’s so much harder to place vowels than consonants, because they can go anywhere and be before or after pretty much any other letter. Consonants have consistency and patterns, whereas vowels are like little kittens flitting around everywhere and you never know where one will be until you trip over it. It’s for this reason that I would never choose to start with a word like AUDIO or ADIEU.
The annoying thing was that I had a decent start – in fact better than any of WordleBot’s top 20 other than TRADE. My opener ARSON, chosen at random, left only 46 answers, but BLOAT could only cut it to 14 then POACH to three, and I still only had those two vowels at that stage.
Fortunately the lack of options now made it easy to find the words that were still possible: VODKA, DOGMA and MOMMA. I went with the first, and when that was wrong it did at least rule out MOMMA too, meaning I could play DOGMA for my five. Let’s hope December is a better month for me!
How did you do today? Send me an email and let me know.
Yesterday’s Wordle hints (game #1259)
In a different time zone where it’s still Friday? Don’t worry – I can give you some clues for Wordle #1259, too.
- Wordle yesterday had vowels in two places.
* Note that by vowel we mean the five standard vowels (A, E, I, O, U), not Y (which is sometimes counted as a vowel too).
- The first letter in yesterday’s Wordle answer was H.
H is not a particularly common starting letter in Wordle: only 69 games begin with it, and it ranks in 15th place.
- There were repeated letters in yesterday’s Wordle.
Repeated letters are quite common in the game, with 748 of the 2,309 Wordle answers containing one. However, it’s still more likely that a Wordle doesn’t have one.
- The last letter in yesterday’s Wordle was O.
O is a middling ending letter. It ranks 12th in this regard, and finishes 58 Wordle answers in total.
Still looking for more Wordle hints? Here’s an extra one for game #1259.
- Yesterday’s Wordle answer is an animal.
Yesterday’s Wordle answer (game #1259)
- NYT average score: 3.9
- My score: 4
- WordleBot’s score: 4
- Best start word performance*: PARSE (45 remaining answers)
- My start word performance: LATCH (96)
* From WordleBot’s Top 20 start words
Yesterday’s Wordle answer (game #1259) was… HIPPO.
I’m kind of surprised to see that HIPPO only has an average score of 3.9 and not far higher. It starts with an H, which isn’t exactly one of the top opening letters, ends with an O – which isn’t that likely either, given that it’s one of only 58 answers to have that format – and most of all, it contains two Ps.
Repeated Ps are not common in the way that repeated Es, Ls or Os are. In fact, as I show in my analysis of every Wordle answer, there are a mere 18 of them across the game’s 2,309 original solutions.
So letter-wise, it’s a tricky one. Plus, start words were not helpful at all – the best of the top 20 was PARSE, which left 45 options, but that’s not a popular opener. Meanwhile CRANE and STARE – which are – left 356 and 321 respectively.
On the other hand, it’s not like there are many words with a similar format. In fact, HIPPY is the only other likely word with just one letter changed, which wasn’t the case with yesterday’s CHOCK for instance. So maybe that’s why the average score here is about the norm for the game and not higher. Or maybe it’s just because people love hippos; I can identify with that.
I had a better start than WordleBot did today, with my opening LATCH leaving 96 words, but a three already seemed unlikely. I figured that the yellow H at the had given me a clue; if H isn’t found in the final slot after T, S or C, it’s generally found at the start after the first two of those three. I decided to play SHORE next simply because it had that SH pattern and contained a few other common letters – and it worked well enough, cutting my list to six.
Trouble was, I only found three of them: HOKUM, HOUND and HOWDY, missing HOBBY, HOPPY and the eventual answer. I think I’d still have played HOUND next anyway, though, but had to do that on the fourth go instead.
How did you do today? Send me an email and let me know.
Wordle answers: The past 50
I’ve been playing Wordle every day for more than two years now and have tracked all of the previous answers so I can help you improve your game. Here are the last 50 solutions starting with yesterday’s answer, or check out my past Wordle answers page for the full list.
- Wordle #1259, Friday 29 November: HIPPO
- Wordle #1258, Thursday 28 November: CHOCK
- Wordle #1257, Wednesday 27 November: SLANG
- Wordle #1256, Tuesday 26 November: WITCH
- Wordle #1255, Monday 25 November: BROWN
- Wordle #1254, Sunday 24 November: TWIST
- Wordle #1253, Saturday 23 November: JELLY
- Wordle #1252, Friday 22 November: PEARL
- Wordle #1251, Thursday 21 November: SPINE
- Wordle #1250, Wednesday 20 November: NICHE
- Wordle #1249, Tuesday 19 November: GOING
- Wordle #1248, Monday 18 November: FRAIL
- Wordle #1247, Sunday 17 November: TALLY
- Wordle #1246, Saturday 16 November: VISOR
- Wordle #1245, Friday 15 November: TACKY
- Wordle #1244, Thursday 14 November: UVULA
- Wordle #1243, Wednesday 13 November: PRIMP
- Wordle #1242, Tuesday 12 November: FLOWN
- Wordle #1241, Monday 11 November: STOIC
- Wordle #1240, Sunday 10 November: INNER
- Wordle #1239, Saturday 9 November: SWELL
- Wordle #1238, Friday 8 November: READY
- Wordle #1237, Thursday 7 November: EVENT
- Wordle #1236, Wednesday 6 November: TRULY
- Wordle #1235, Tuesday 5 November: OCTET
- Wordle #1234, Monday 4 November: VINYL
- Wordle #1233, Sunday 3 November: BLAZE
- Wordle #1232, Saturday 2 November: SNOOP
- Wordle #1231, Friday 1 November: SIXTH
- Wordle #1230, Thursday 31 October: WEIRD
- Wordle #1229, Wednesday 30 October: EASEL
- Wordle #1228, Tuesday 29 October: TUNIC
- Wordle #1227, Monday 28 October: BAWDY
- Wordle #1226, Sunday 27 October: SANDY
- Wordle #1225, Saturday 26 October: WREAK
- Wordle #1224, Friday 25 October: FROWN
- Wordle #1223, Thursday 24 October: BOSSY
- Wordle #1222, Wednesday 23 October: GOOFY
- Wordle #1221, Tuesday 22 October: SHOUT
- Wordle #1220, Monday 21 October: SPOON
- Wordle #1219, Sunday 20 October: DICEY
- Wordle #1218, Saturday 19 October: FIBER
- Wordle #1217, Friday 18 October: STINT
- Wordle #1216, Thursday 17 October: HALVE
- Wordle #1215, Wednesday 16 October: GRANT
- Wordle #1214, Tuesday 15 October: CORER
- Wordle #1213, Monday 14 October: GAMUT
- Wordle #1212, Sunday 13 October: PRONE
- Wordle #1211, Saturday 12 October: STAIN
- Wordle #1210, Friday 11 October: GUSTY
What is Wordle?
If you’re on this page then you almost certainly know what Wordle is already, and indeed have probably been playing it for a while. And even if you’ve not been playing it, you must surely have heard of it by now, because it’s the viral word game phenomenon that took the world by storm last year and is still going strong in 2024.
We’ve got a full guide to the game in our What is Wordle page, but if you just want a refresher then here are the basics.
What is Wordle?
Wordle challenges you to guess a new five-letter word each day. You get six guesses, with each one revealing a little more information. If one of the letters in your guess is in the answer and in the right place, it turns green. If it’s in the answer but in the wrong place, it turns yellow. And if it’s not in the answer at all it turns gray. Simple, eh?
It’s played online via the Wordle website or the New York Times’ Crossword app (iOS / Android), and is entirely free.
Crucially, the answer is the same for everyone each day, meaning that you’re competing against the rest of the world, rather than just against yourself or the game. The puzzle then resets each day at midnight in your local time, giving you a new challenge, and the chance to extend your streak.
What are the Wordle rules?
The rules of Wordle are pretty straightforward, but with a couple of curveballs thrown in for good measure.
1. Letters that are in the answer and in the right place turn green.
2. Letters that are in the answer but in the wrong place turn yellow.
3. Letters that are not in the answer turn gray.
4. Answers are never plural.
5. Letters can appear more than once. So if your guess includes two of one letter, they may both turn yellow, both turn green, or one could be yellow and the other green.
6. Each guess must be a valid word in Wordle’s dictionary. You can’t guess ABCDE, for instance.
7. You do not have to include correct letters in subsequent guesses unless you play on Hard mode.
8. You have six guesses to solve the Wordle.
9. You must complete the daily Wordle before midnight in your timezone.
10. All answers are drawn from Wordle’s list of 2,309 solutions. However…
11. Wordle will accept a wider pool of words as guesses – some 10,000 of them. For instance, you can guess a plural such as WORDS. It definitely won’t be right (see point 4 above), but Wordle will accept it as a guess.