Short answer: ADIEU is easy to remember and reveals four vowels, but it spends four of five guesses on vowels and cannot win immediately if it is not on the answer list. For a more balanced opener, try STARE; SLATE and RAISE are also reasonable options. There is no single best starter for every scoring method or WordleBot version.
What makes a Wordle starter word good?
A strong opener helps you narrow the answer list by testing useful letters. That is not quite the same as being a possible answer yourself: Wordle accepts more guesses than it uses as solutions. A word outside the solution list can gather information, but it cannot win on the first turn.
“Best” also depends on what you want to optimize: the chance of an immediate solve, expected information, familiar letter patterns, or a second guess that is easy to choose. Hard Mode adds another constraint because each guess must respect the clues already revealed.
Is ADIEU a good Wordle starter?
ADIEU checks four distinct vowels—A, E, I and U—at once, which can quickly show which vowel might belong in the answer. Its cost is that it tests only one consonant. Since consonants help identify and position many candidate words, a vowel-heavy opener may leave you with less useful information than a balanced guess.
#1 Best Overall
ADIEU also is not on the possible-solution list used in Tom’s Guide’s 2026 analysis, so it cannot produce a one-guess win under that list. That does not make it a bad information-gathering guess; it means the choice prioritizes vowel discovery over answer eligibility.
There is a historical reason the word is familiar: The New York Times reported that ADIEU averaged 5% of users per day as a fixed starter in data collected from June 15 to August 22, 2022. That figure describes that user group and period, not current play or the word’s solving performance. One player told the Times that it “contains all the vowels except O and possibly Y,” a personal rationale rather than proof that it is optimal.
Rank #2
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Which starter should you choose?
| Starter | Why choose it | Trade-off |
|---|---|---|
| STARE | Balanced common-letter coverage; answer-eligible in the cited analysis. | Not the top choice under every scoring method, and it does not guarantee an easy follow-up. |
| SLATE | A balanced opener often discussed by players and included in WordleBot rankings. | Bot ratings depend on its model and can change. |
| RAISE | Tests three vowels alongside S and R; answer-eligible in Tom’s Guide’s 2026 recommendations. | Its ranking depends on the scoring method and word list. |
| ROATE or SOARE | Rank highly in a letter-scoring analysis focused on eliminating candidates. | Tom’s Guide’s analysis says these are not in its possible-solution list, so neither can win in one guess under that list. |
| ADIEU | Checks four distinct vowels in one turn and is easy to remember. | Tests only one consonant and is not answer-eligible in the cited analysis. |
If you want a practical default that can also be the answer, STARE is defensible. Choose SLATE or RAISE if those letter combinations suit your habits. If your priority is testing several vowels immediately, ADIEU remains a valid preference—just understand what you give up.
What do the letter-frequency figures say?
Tom’s Guide’s September 2, 2026 analysis calculated these letter frequencies across its 2,309 eligible Wordle answers:
Rank #3
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| Letter | Frequency in that analysis |
|---|---|
| E | 53.3% |
| A | 42.2% |
| R | 38.8% |
| O | 32.6% |
| T | 31.6% |
These are figures from that guide’s answer list, not an official or timeless NYT statistic. A letter’s frequency alone also does not settle the best word: position, overlap among candidates, answer eligibility and how you use the clues all matter.
Why WordleBot rankings change
WordleBot recommendations are tied to the bot’s model, mode and date. The Times documented a 2022 update in which WordleBot stopped knowing the solution list and instead assigned probabilities to roughly 4,500 common English words; its favorite changed from CRANE to SLATE. That is a historical account, not a specification of the bot today.
Rank #4
Tom’s Guide reported on September 2, 2026 that its then-current WordleBot list rated SLATE, CRANE and TRACE among the 99-rated starters, with TRACE leading standard mode and TROPE leading Hard Mode in its summary. The same article records earlier shifts, including TRACE and TROPE after a dictionary change. Treat those as dated rankings, not a permanent official answer to “What is the best word?”
Independent reader supportYour contribution helps us test, update, and keep practical guides available for everyone.What should you guess after ADIEU—or any weak opener?
Choose the second word from the feedback, not from a fixed script. Bring in useful untried letters, avoid letters confirmed gray, and put any green or yellow letters in positions that obey the clues. If ADIEU reveals little, the next guess can probe common consonants as well as any vowels still untested.
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Tom’s Guide illustrates possible follow-ups after STARE with PHONY, COULD or DOING, depending on the intended balance of consonant and vowel coverage. Those are examples, not automatic second guesses: the right choice changes with STARE’s colors and any constraints you are following.
How much do solver statistics tell a human player?
A 2022 computational strategy paper by Chao-Lin Liu reported a 3.674-guess average and a 0.65% failure rate for its best-performing strategy on a simulator’s 2,315-word answer set. Its baseline averaged 4.078 guesses and exceeded six trials 1.77% of the time. These results describe that paper’s simulated setup, not human play or a current WordleBot score.
For a human, the most useful starter may be one that is easy to remember and whose feedback is easy to interpret. A theoretically high-ranking word is less helpful if you do not know how to turn its clues into a sound second guess.
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