To win more in Wordle hard mode, open with common consonants, and each turn pick a word that could be the answer and tests the most letters you haven't tried yet. Watch out for word families like _IGHT and _OUND, and above all for words ending in -ER, which cause almost half of all hard mode losses in our tests.
We tested these tips by computer on every answer in Word Guess, Poozee's free Wordle-style game. Here's what hard mode really asks of you, what we measured, and what made the difference.
What hard mode actually requires
Hard mode has one rule: every hint you've revealed must be used in your next guesses.
- A green letter must stay in the same spot.
- A yellow letter must appear somewhere in the guess.
That's all. Hard mode doesn't stop you from reusing gray letters, and it doesn't make you move a yellow letter to a new spot. If CRANE turns up a yellow R and a yellow E, then REACT is a legal next guess even though A and C are gray, but MOTEL isn't, because it has no R. Word Guess uses the same rules.
How we tested
We had a computer play all 1,895 answers in Word Guess, always opening with CRANE, and choosing every later guess in one of four ways:
- Any fitting word: a random word that could still be the answer. We played each answer 50 times this way.
- Fitting word with the most new letters: a rule you can use at the table. Among the words that could be the answer, pick the one with the most letters you haven't guessed yet. On a tie, pick the one whose letters are most common among the words still possible.
- Best fitting word: the computer checks every word that could be the answer and picks the one that splits the rest into the smallest groups. You can't do this in your head, but it shows how well hard mode can be played.
- Best possible guesses, normal mode: the same search over all 8,636 allowed words, including ones that can't be the answer. Hard mode doesn't allow most of these.
Our answer list isn't the same as Wordle's, so treat the exact numbers as a guide. The patterns hold for any list of common five-letter words.
| Strategy | Losses per 1,000 games | Average guesses in a win |
|---|---|---|
| Best possible guesses, normal mode | 0 | 3.37 |
| Best fitting word | 3.2 | 3.48 |
| Fitting word with the most new letters | 6.3 | 3.56 |
| Any fitting word | 12.7 | 3.72 |
Two things stand out. First, hard mode barely slows down a good player: about 0.1 guesses per puzzle. Its real cost is the occasional loss. Second, how you choose among the fitting words matters: the new-letters rule loses half as often as picking any word that fits.
1. Pick the fitting word that tests the most new letters
When several words could be the answer, don't just play the first one you think of. Look for the one that tries the most letters you haven't used, and that moves your yellow letters to new spots.
Here's the difference on the answer MOWER. After CRANE, R and E are yellow, and 99 answers still fit. Picking any fitting word, the game can go like this:
After HOVER, nine words still fit the pattern _O_ER, and two guesses aren't enough to get through them: BOWER, MOWER and POWER are all still possible when the game runs out.
The new-letters rule plays OVERT second instead. It tests O, V and T, and it moves both yellows to new spots. That cuts 99 possible answers down to 12:
Pro tip: Before each guess, count how many new letters it tries. A fitting word with four new letters is usually better than one with two, even if the second one "feels" more likely.
2. Open with consonants, not vowels
In hard mode, your opener matters more than usual, because every hint it finds follows you for the rest of the game. We played every answer with ten popular openers:
| Opener | Losses per 1,000, any fitting word | Losses per 1,000, new-letters rule | Average guesses, new-letters rule |
|---|---|---|---|
| SLANT | 6.6 | 2.6 | 3.55 |
| SLATE | 7.8 | 6.9 | 3.51 |
| TRACE | 10.1 | 4.7 | 3.52 |
| CRATE | 9.9 | 5.8 | 3.53 |
| CRANE | 12.7 | 6.3 | 3.56 |
| STARE | 9.8 | 7.4 | 3.56 |
| RAISE | 13.0 | 4.2 | 3.59 |
| AROSE | 15.1 | 5.3 | 3.62 |
| AUDIO | 21.1 | 10.6 | 3.76 |
| ADIEU | 21.1 | 11.1 | 3.75 |
The consonant-heavy openers came out on top, and the vowel-heavy ones clearly last. AUDIO and ADIEU lost about three times as often as SLANT and needed about 0.2 more guesses to win. Finding the vowels first leaves the consonants for later, when hard mode has already fixed your letters in place. (The losses in the new-letters column come from a single game per answer, so small differences there, like 4.7 against 5.8, are mostly luck.)
If you already love a vowel opener from our guide to starting words, it's fine in normal mode. For hard mode, switch to something like SLANT or SLATE.
3. Know the word families
Most hard mode losses come from a word family: a group of answers that share four letters in the same spots. Once you have those four letters as greens, hard mode makes you guess the family members one at a time.
Our answer list has 65 families of four or more words. Only 15% of the answers belong to one, but they caused 54% of the losses when the computer picked any fitting word. These are the biggest:
| Family | Answers |
|---|---|
| _OUND | BOUND, FOUND, HOUND, MOUND, POUND, ROUND, SOUND, WOUND |
| _IGHT | EIGHT, FIGHT, LIGHT, MIGHT, NIGHT, RIGHT, SIGHT, TIGHT |
| _ATCH | BATCH, CATCH, HATCH, LATCH, MATCH, PATCH, WATCH |
| SHA_E | SHADE, SHAKE, SHALE, SHAME, SHAPE, SHARE, SHAVE |
| _OWER | BOWER, LOWER, MOWER, POWER, ROWER, TOWER |
| GRA_E | GRACE, GRADE, GRAPE, GRATE, GRAVE, GRAZE |
| STA_E | STAGE, STAKE, STALE, STARE, STATE, STAVE |
The escape has to happen early. When your hints start to point at a pattern like these, favor guesses that test several of the letters that could fill the open spot, while you still have spots free to do it. Once four letters are green, it's too late.
4. Be extra careful with -ER words
The single biggest trap is the ending -ER. In our list, 120 answers (6%) end in -ER, but they caused 45% of all hard mode losses. There are several -ER families, like _OWER, _ATER and _OVER, and many more near-misses, like PAPER, PIPER, JOKER and WAFER, that share the E and R and little else.
When E and R turn up yellow, resist the urge to lock them into the last two spots right away. A word that puts them somewhere else, like OVERT in the MOWER game, both tests that idea and tries new letters.
5. Double letters aren't the problem
It's easy to blame words like SPEED or LLAMA, but repeated letters weren't a special risk in our tests. Words with a repeated letter were 32% of the answers and 30% of the losses, about the same share. Families are what trip up hard mode, not doubles.
6. Guesses that can't be the answer barely help
Because hard mode lets you reuse gray letters, you can sometimes play a word that fits the rules but can't be the answer, just to test letters. We let the computer do that too, choosing from every word hard mode allows. It lost 2.6 games per 1,000 instead of 3.2 and needed 3.47 guesses instead of 3.48: a real but tiny gain. For a human, it isn't worth the effort of hunting for such words. Stick to words that could be the answer.
Try hard mode on Poozee
In Word Guess, switch on Hard mode before your first guess, then play the daily word or as many unlimited games as you like. Hard mode results are marked with a star when you share them. Wordle is a trademark of The New York Times Company, and Poozee isn't affiliated with it.
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Frequently asked questions
Is Wordle hard mode actually harder?
A little. In our tests, playing well in hard mode took about 0.1 more guesses per puzzle than normal mode. The real difference is losses: normal mode's best play never lost, while hard mode can trap you in a word family with more candidates than guesses left.
What is the best starting word for Wordle hard mode?
A word with common consonants and one or two vowels. Of the openers we tested, SLANT and SLATE did best. Vowel-heavy openers like ADIEU and AUDIO lost about three times as often as SLANT, because they leave the consonants for later, when hard mode has already boxed you in.
Can you use gray letters in Wordle hard mode?
Yes. Hard mode only makes you keep green letters in place and include yellow letters. You may reuse gray letters and even leave a yellow letter in the same spot, though in our tests guesses that couldn't be the answer barely helped.
Why do I keep losing in hard mode?
Usually a word family: a group like _IGHT or _OUND where four letters are known and many words fit. Words ending in -ER are the worst. In our tests they were 6% of the answers but 45% of the losses.