Puzzle Cottage
Every Wordle strategy article picks a starting word and tells you to trust them. This one shows the math and explains why SALET narrowly wins, why CRANE, SLATE, and TRACE are essentially tied with it, and why ADIEU — despite the vowel-stuffing logic — is meaningfully worse. The same techniques apply to Word Scramble (our 6-letter Wordle alternative) with one extra letter to play with.
The short answer: pick one of these five
| Word | Avg. guesses | Bits of info | Solve-in-3 rate |
|---|---|---|---|
| SALET | 3.42 | 5.89 | ~28% |
| REAST | 3.43 | 5.88 | ~28% |
| CRATE | 3.44 | 5.87 | ~27% |
| TRACE | 3.44 | 5.87 | ~27% |
| SLATE | 3.44 | 5.86 | ~27% |
| CRANE | 3.46 | 5.85 | ~27% |
| ADIEU | 3.62 | 5.81 | ~21% |
Numbers from running each opener against the official 2,315-word Wordle answer list with optimal subsequent play. Source: Sanderson’s entropy-maximization analysis (3Blue1Brown, 2022).
The differences are small. SALET wins by about 1 puzzle in 20 over CRANE. If you remember CRANE and forget SALET, the math says use CRANE.
Why SALET? The information-theory case
Wordle is an information game. Each guess returns five symbols (green / yellow / gray) representing position-and-presence info about the answer. The opener that maximizes expected information gain — the entropy of the response distribution — narrows the answer space fastest on average.
SALET wins because:
- Letter coverage: S, A, L, E, T are 5 of the 8 most-frequent letters in actual Wordle answers (the answer list, not the larger allowed-guess list).
- Position frequency: S appears most often in position 1 in answers; A is the most-common position 2 letter; E is common in position 4; T is the most-common position 5 letter. SALET’s letters are placed where their letter is most likely to be a green.
- No double letters: repeating a letter in your opener wastes a slot. SALET tests 5 distinct letters.
Letter frequency in Wordle answers
Across the 2,315 actual Wordle answers (the curated list, not the larger allowed-guess list), letter frequency looks like this:
Note that U ranks 10th — below R, T, L, S, N. This is why ADIEU (which dedicates a slot to U) is suboptimal: you’re using a precious letter slot on a letter that’s less common than R or T or L.
What does the SALET opener actually look like?
You type SALET regardless of the answer. The five tiles light up green/yellow/gray. The information from those five tiles narrows the answer set from 2,315 candidates to an average of about 4 candidates — almost always solvable in 2 more guesses.
Wordle best 2 starting words (the fixed-opener strategy)
Some players use a fixed two-word opener regardless of the first result — you commit to two guesses before looking at any feedback. The reasoning: two carefully-chosen openers guarantee 10 distinct letters tested, which usually leaves a uniquely-determined answer for guess 3.
The best fixed two-word combos:
- SALET + CHIRP — tests S, A, L, E, T, C, H, I, R, P. Covers 10 of the top 12 most-frequent letters.
- CRANE + SHOUT — tests C, R, A, N, E, S, H, O, U, T. Covers a slightly different set with U included.
- SOARE + CLINT — entropy-optimal on the answer list. SOARE isn’t in every dictionary but is allowed by Wordle.
Trade-off: fixed openers throw away early info. If SALET produces three greens, you’d normally pivot to test those candidates — with a fixed opener, you ignore that and play CHIRP anyway. That costs an occasional easy solve. But the upside is consistency: you don’t have to think for the first two guesses.
What to play on guess 2 (after seeing guess-1 feedback)
If you’re willing to think, here’s how to choose guess 2 based on guess-1 results:
- 0 greens, 0 yellows: any of those five letters is in the answer. Test 5 new letters. CHIRP after SALET, BLIND after CRANE, etc.
- 0 greens, 1–2 yellows: you know 1–2 letters are in the answer but in different positions. Don’t commit yet — play another high-info word that places the yellows in new positions.
- 1–2 greens, 0 yellows: you have a partial pattern. Now you can start narrowing — play a word that tests new letters AND fits the green positions.
- 3+ greens: you’re very close. The remaining 2 cells have a constrained candidate set; usually there are 2–5 possible answers. Play one of them.
How to solve Wordle in 3 guesses (Wordle-in-3 strategy)
Solving in 3 requires three things:
- An optimal opener (SALET or equivalent). Random openers like ADIEU give up 0.04–0.10 bits of information on guess 1, which translates to 1–2 fewer 3-guess solves per month.
- An optimal second word based on guess-1 feedback. The fixed-opener (SALET + CHIRP) approach is ~1% behind the optimal-adaptive second word, and easier to remember.
- A real dictionary in your head for guess 3. Once you’ve seen 10 letters, the answer is usually uniquely determined — but only if you can recognize the candidate when you see the green/yellow pattern.
With perfect play, the expected solve-in-3 rate is about 28%. With SALET only and good intuition, you’ll hit 22–25%. Most players who claim higher are either using assistance tools or playing different word-game variants.
Why ADIEU isn’t the best (and what it’s good for)
ADIEU has been a popular opener since Wordle launched because it tests four vowels in one go. The pitch: identify the vowel structure first, then the consonants follow. The math:
- ADIEU tests A, D, I, E, U.
- Three of those (A, I, E) are top-10 letters. Excellent.
- D is mid-tier (~16% of answers). Acceptable.
- U is low-tier (~21%, ranked 10th). Each U-slot wastes information vs. testing R/T/L/N.
Net: ADIEU produces ~5.81 bits of expected information vs. SALET’s 5.89. Across 30 days that’s about 1 fewer 3-guess solve per month. ADIEU is a defensible opener if you really love the vowel-first approach — but it’s not optimal.
Should I change my starting word every day?
No. The whole point of an optimal opener is that it works regardless of the answer — that’s how it earned its score. Switching daily means:
- You don’t learn the green/yellow patterns of your opener.
- You can’t use a fixed second word.
- You’re effectively gambling that today’s answer happens to suit your random pick.
Pick one. Play it for a year. The math doesn’t care which day it is.
Wordle starting word strategy: hard mode
In Hard Mode, you have to use any green/yellow info from previous guesses in subsequent guesses. This breaks the fixed-opener strategy — once you have a green E in position 4, you can’t play a guess-2 word without an E in position 4.
For Hard Mode, the optimal opener changes slightly: CRANE beats SALET because CRANE’s green-positions are more flexibly extendable. Hard Mode also reduces the average solve rate by about 0.1 guesses (you give up some adaptive flexibility).
Where to practice this
Wordle itself is one puzzle a day, locked behind NYT Games (subscription required for the past archive). For unlimited practice with the same Wordle-style mechanic:
- Word Scramble — our free Wordle alternative with 6-letter words and an unlimited past-puzzle archive. Same green/yellow/gray feedback. Same letter-frequency math (with one extra letter).
- Free Wordle alternative — full comparison of how Word Scramble differs from NYT Wordle.