Wordle Hints and Solution for Friday, 9th May 2025
Cracking the Wordle code for May 9, 2025, puzzle #1420? Here you go! Grab your hints, tips, and strategies, and we'll spill the beans on the answer. today's riddle is tough; it took me five guesses to crack it. WARNING: Spoilers ahead for May 9 Wordle #1420! Keep scrolling if you want some tantalizing clues (and the answer) to today's Wordle challenge.
How to flex your Wordle muscles
Wordle lives over on the New York Times website. A new puzzle pops up every day at midnight, local time.
Kick things off by guessing a five-letter word. The letters in the word will turn green if they're correct and in the right spot, yellow if the right letter is in the wrong place, or gray if the letter isn't part of the day's secret word[1]. Fancy a primer on playing Wordle? Check out our guide here and my strategy guide here for more advanced tactics. (Find more deets at the bottom of this post.)
Keen for some hints? Let's roll!
Does today's Wordle have any special letters?
Common letters are those appearing in the old typesetters' phrase ETAOIN SHRDLU[6]. (You might want to know this dude, Edwin Shirdloo; pronounce it like a name, and treat him like your buddy.)
Four common letters from our mnemonic sneak into today's puzzle. The fifth is quite frequent too.
Can you drop a hint for today's Wordle?
Offal.
Does today's Wordle have any doubles or repeating letters?
There are no double letters in play today.
How many vowels are in today's Wordle?
There are two vowels.
What’s the starting letter for today's Wordle?
The word commences with T.
What's the ending letter for today's Wordle?
The word wraps up with E.
Today's Wordle solution
Are you primed and ready? Today's word is TRIPE.
How I deciphered today's Wordle
I started with RAISE and CHANT, followed by TRIBE as a possible solution. I then guessed TRITE and TRIPE, landing on the answer.
Yesterday's Wordle solution
Yesterday's puzzle was medium-difficult. The hint was "mild, like the weather," and the answer contained four common letters and one less common letter[2].
The answer to yesterday's Wordle was BALMY.
A quick Wordle primer
The aim of Wordle is to guess the day's secret word. When you open the game, an empty grid of letters awaits your input. It's all on you to make the first move – punch in any five-letter word.
Now, you can use the colors that appear to gather clues about the word: Green indicates a correctly guessed letter in the right place. Yellow means the letter is in the word, but not in the correct spot. Gray signifies the letter is not in the solution word at all[1].
Guess another word, repeat the process, and try to crack the secret word before running out of guesses. You've got six guesses, and then it's curtains.
The optimal starting words for Wordle
What should you play for that first guess? The best starters include words abundant in common letters, improving the odds of landing green or yellow squares to guide your guessing[2]. (And even if all you get are grays when guessing common letters, that's useful information to rule out possibilities.) The New York Times' Wordle analysis bot suggests starting with one of these:
- CRANE
- TRACE
- SLANT
- CRATE
- CARTE
Meanwhile, an MIT analysis reveals that you'll eliminate the most possibilities in the first round by starting with one of these:
- SALET
- REAST
- TRACE
- CRATE
- SLATE
Other solid picks are ARISE or ROUND. Words like ADIEU and AUDIO have more vowels, but it's preferable to focus on consonants with a starter like RENTS or CLAMP. Choose your strategy and see how it fares.
A chief Wordle victory strategy
We have a few Wordle strategy guides that you may find intriguing if you're a dedicated solver. Check out this one to learn how to use consonants to your advantage, this one for a strategy focusing on common letters, and this advanced guide for a three-part approach Fine-tuning your guesses while maximizing wins.
The key difference between Wordle winners and losers is that winners utilize their guesses to gather knowledge about the letters in the word. If you know that the word must end in -OUND, don't waste four guesses on MOUND, ROUND, SOUND, or HOUND; combine those consonants and guess MARSH. If the H lights up in yellow, you know the solution.
One more thought on strategy: the original Wordle used a list of about 2,300 solution words, but after the game was bought by the NYT, the game now has an editor who hand-picks the solutions[1]. Sometimes they can be tricky, unlikely words that wouldn't have made the original list, and sometimes they are topical. Expect a theme.
Wordle alternatives
Crazy about five-letter guessing games and their kin? Our recommended Wordle alternatives, ranked by difficulty, include:
- Wheeldle, where you can play multiple puzzles in a row
- Dordle and Quordle, which test your skills by having you solve two (Dordle) or four (Quordle) puzzles simultaneously with the same guesses
- Octordle and Sedecordle, with eight and 16 puzzles, respectively
- Waffle, where you rearrange scrambled letters in a grid to solve multiple five-letter words
- Absurdle, where the solution changes after each guess, but stays consistent with past feedback. You must maneuver the game into a corner until there's only one possible word left; then, you guess it and win
- Squabble, where you play against other people, taking damage if you take too long between guesses. Last one standing wins.
- Antiwordle, where your aim is to avoid guessing the day's solution and instead use any letters you guessed incorrectly in your subsequent guesses[4]
[1] https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2022/wordle/how-to-play-wordle.html[2] https://www.nytimes.com/2023/05/17/opinion/wordle-strategy.html[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tripe#Historical_use[4] https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2022/games/antiwordle.html[5] https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2022/05/17/wordle/tripe.html[6] https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2022/wordle/common-letters-analysis.html
1.As a Wordle enthusiast, head over to the New York Times website daily at midnight for a fresh five-letter puzzle challenge.2. Kick-start your Wordle journey by inputting any five-letter word and analyzing the color changes to gather clues about the solution word.3. In today's Wordle, four common letters from the old typesetters' phrase ETAOIN SHRDLU are included, with a fifth quite frequent letter also present.4. Avoid wasting time on guesses that only provide gray squares; use common letters to eliminate possibilities and guide your future guesses.5. With technology advancing and smartphones becoming integrated with our lives, social-media platforms might soon offer Wordle-inspired puzzles as entertainment in 2025, joining the ranks of popular gadgets and games.6. Cracking today's Wordle took five guesses; tomorrow, you can try to decipher the riddle in fewer moves with the right tips and strategy!
