Today’s Wordle Hints (and Answer) for Monday, July 22, 2024

If you’re looking for the Wordle answer for July 22, 2024 read on. We’ll share some clues, tips, and strategies, and finally the solution. Today’s puzzle is easier; I got it in three. Beware, there are spoilers below for July 22, Wordle #1,129! Keep scrolling if you want some hints (and then the answer) to today’s Wordle game.

How to play Wordle

Wordle lives here on the New York Times website. A new puzzle goes live every day at midnight, your local time.

Start by guessing a five-letter word. The letters of the word will turn green if they’re correct, yellow if you have the right letter in the wrong place, or gray if the letter isn’t in the day’s secret word at all. For more, check out our guide to playing Wordle here, and my strategy guide here for more advanced tips. (We also have more information at the bottom of this post, after the hints and answers.)

Ready for the hints? Let’s go!


Does today’s Wordle have any unusual letters?

We’ll define common letters as those that appear in the old typesetters’ phrase ETAOIN SHRDLU. (Memorize this! Pronounce it “Edwin Shirdloo,” like a name, and pretend he’s a friend of yours.)

Four of today’s letters are from our mnemonic. The fifth is also pretty common.

Can you give me a hint for today’s Wordle?

A trainee in a corps.

Does today’s Wordle have any double or repeated letters?

There are no repeated letters today. 

How many vowels are in today’s Wordle?

There are two vowels.

What letter does today’s Wordle start with?

Today’s word starts with C. 

What letter does today’s Wordle end with?

Today’s word ends with T. 

What is the solution to today’s Wordle?

Ready? Today’s word is CADET.

How I solved today’s Wordle

I started with RAISE and TOUCH, and with A as the second letter, there were a few possible solutions, of which CADET seemed the most common.

Wordle 1,129 3/6

⬛🟩⬛⬛🟨
🟨⬛⬛🟨⬛
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

Yesterday’s Wordle answer

Yesterday’s Wordle was easier. The hint was “a tiny spot, like of dust or discoloration” and the answer contained two common letters, two fairly common letters, and one less common letter.

The answer to yesterday’s Wordle was SPECK.

A primer on Wordle basics

The idea of Wordle is to guess the day’s secret word. When you first open the Wordle game, you’ll see an empty grid of letters. It’s up to you to make the first move: type in any five-letter word. 

Now, you can use the colors that are revealed to get clues about the word: Green means you correctly guessed a letter, and it’s in the correct position. (For example, if you guess PARTY, and the word is actually PURSE, the P and R will be green.)

  • Yellow means the letter is somewhere in the word, but not in the position you guessed it. (For example, if you guessed PARTY, but the word is actually ROAST, the R, A and T will all be yellow.)

  • Gray means the letter is not in the solution word at all. (If you guessed PARTY and everything is gray, then the solution cannot be PURSE or ROAST.)

With all that in mind, guess another word, and then another, trying to land on the correct word before you run out of chances. You get six guesses, and then it’s game over.

The best starter words for Wordle

What should you play for that first guess? The best starters tend to contain common letters, to increase the chances of getting yellow and green squares to guide your guessing. (And if you get all grays when guessing common letters, that’s still excellent information to help you rule out possibilities.) There isn’t a single “best” starting word, but the New York Times’s Wordle analysis bot has suggested starting with one of these:

  • CRANE

  • TRACE

  • SLANT

  • CRATE

  • CARTE

Meanwhile, an MIT analysis found that you’ll eliminate the most possibilities in the first round by starting with one of these:

  • SALET

  • REAST

  • TRACE

  • CRATE

  • SLATE

Other good picks might be ARISE or ROUND. Words like ADIEU and AUDIO get more vowels in play, but you could argue that it’s better to start with an emphasis on consonants, using a starter like RENTS or CLAMP. Choose your strategy, and see how it plays out.

How to win at Wordle

We have a few guides to Wordle strategy, which you might like to read over if you’re a serious student of the game. This one covers how to use consonants to your advantage, while this one focuses on a strategy that uses the most common letters. In this advanced guide, we detail a three-pronged approach for fishing for hints while maximizing your chances of winning quickly.

The biggest thing that separates Wordle winners from Wordle losers is that winners use their guesses to gather information about what letters are in the word. If you know that the word must end in -OUND, don’t waste four guesses on MOUND, ROUND, SOUND, and HOUND; combine those consonants and guess MARSH. If the H lights up in yellow, you know the solution.

One more note 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. Sometimes they are slightly tricky words that wouldn’t have made the original list, and sometimes they are topical. For example, FEAST was the solution one Thanksgiving. So keep in mind that there may be a theme.

Wordle alternatives

If you can’t get enough of five-letter guessing games and their kin, the best Wordle alternatives, ranked by difficulty, include:

Today’s Wordle Hints (and Answer) for Sunday, July 21, 2024

If you’re looking for the Wordle answer for July 21, 2024 read on. We’ll share some clues, tips, and strategies, and finally the solution. Today’s puzzle is easier; I got it in three. Beware, there are spoilers below for July 21, Wordle #1,128! Keep scrolling if you want some hints (and then the answer) to today’s Wordle game.

How to play Wordle

Wordle lives here on the New York Times website. A new puzzle goes live every day at midnight, your local time.

Start by guessing a five-letter word. The letters of the word will turn green if they’re correct, yellow if you have the right letter in the wrong place, or gray if the letter isn’t in the day’s secret word at all. For more, check out our guide to playing Wordle here, and my strategy guide here for more advanced tips. (We also have more information at the bottom of this post, after the hints and answers.)

Ready for the hints? Let’s go!


Does today’s Wordle have any unusual letters?

We’ll define common letters as those that appear in the old typesetters’ phrase ETAOIN SHRDLU. (Memorize this! Pronounce it “Edwin Shirdloo,” like a name, and pretend he’s a friend of yours.)

Only two of today’s letters are from our mnemonic. Two are pretty common, and one is a little less common.

Can you give me a hint for today’s Wordle?

A tiny spot, like of dust or discoloration.

Does today’s Wordle have any double or repeated letters?

There are no repeated letters today. 

How many vowels are in today’s Wordle?

There is one vowel.

What letter does today’s Wordle start with?

Today’s word starts with S. 

What letter does today’s Wordle end with?

Today’s word ends with K. 

What is the solution to today’s Wordle?

Ready? Today’s word is SPECK.

How I solved today’s Wordle

I started with RAISE and TOUCH, and with C as the fourth letter, there were two solutions: SPECS or SPECK, and I guessed the latter first.

Wordle 1,128 3/6

⬛⬛⬛🟨🟨
⬛⬛⬛🟩⬛
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

Yesterday’s Wordle answer

Yesterday’s Wordle was easier. The hint was “a long handle—also an action series whose titular character is played in one film by Samuel L. Jackson” and the answer contained four common letters and one fairly common letter.

The answer to yesterday’s Wordle was SHAFT.

A primer on Wordle basics

The idea of Wordle is to guess the day’s secret word. When you first open the Wordle game, you’ll see an empty grid of letters. It’s up to you to make the first move: type in any five-letter word. 

Now, you can use the colors that are revealed to get clues about the word: Green means you correctly guessed a letter, and it’s in the correct position. (For example, if you guess PARTY, and the word is actually PURSE, the P and R will be green.)

  • Yellow means the letter is somewhere in the word, but not in the position you guessed it. (For example, if you guessed PARTY, but the word is actually ROAST, the R, A and T will all be yellow.)

  • Gray means the letter is not in the solution word at all. (If you guessed PARTY and everything is gray, then the solution cannot be PURSE or ROAST.)

With all that in mind, guess another word, and then another, trying to land on the correct word before you run out of chances. You get six guesses, and then it’s game over.

The best starter words for Wordle

What should you play for that first guess? The best starters tend to contain common letters, to increase the chances of getting yellow and green squares to guide your guessing. (And if you get all grays when guessing common letters, that’s still excellent information to help you rule out possibilities.) There isn’t a single “best” starting word, but the New York Times’s Wordle analysis bot has suggested starting with one of these:

  • CRANE

  • TRACE

  • SLANT

  • CRATE

  • CARTE

Meanwhile, an MIT analysis found that you’ll eliminate the most possibilities in the first round by starting with one of these:

  • SALET

  • REAST

  • TRACE

  • CRATE

  • SLATE

Other good picks might be ARISE or ROUND. Words like ADIEU and AUDIO get more vowels in play, but you could argue that it’s better to start with an emphasis on consonants, using a starter like RENTS or CLAMP. Choose your strategy, and see how it plays out.

How to win at Wordle

We have a few guides to Wordle strategy, which you might like to read over if you’re a serious student of the game. This one covers how to use consonants to your advantage, while this one focuses on a strategy that uses the most common letters. In this advanced guide, we detail a three-pronged approach for fishing for hints while maximizing your chances of winning quickly.

The biggest thing that separates Wordle winners from Wordle losers is that winners use their guesses to gather information about what letters are in the word. If you know that the word must end in -OUND, don’t waste four guesses on MOUND, ROUND, SOUND, and HOUND; combine those consonants and guess MARSH. If the H lights up in yellow, you know the solution.

One more note 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. Sometimes they are slightly tricky words that wouldn’t have made the original list, and sometimes they are topical. For example, FEAST was the solution one Thanksgiving. So keep in mind that there may be a theme.

Wordle alternatives

If you can’t get enough of five-letter guessing games and their kin, the best Wordle alternatives, ranked by difficulty, include:

Today’s Wordle Hints (and Answer) for Saturday, July 20, 2024

If you’re looking for the Wordle answer for July 20, 2024 read on. We’ll share some clues, tips, and strategies, and finally the solution. Today’s puzzle is easier; I got it in three. Beware, there are spoilers below for July 20, Wordle #1,127! Keep scrolling if you want some hints (and then the answer) to today’s Wordle game.

How to play Wordle

Wordle lives here on the New York Times website. A new puzzle goes live every day at midnight, your local time.

Start by guessing a five-letter word. The letters of the word will turn green if they’re correct, yellow if you have the right letter in the wrong place, or gray if the letter isn’t in the day’s secret word at all. For more, check out our guide to playing Wordle here, and my strategy guide here for more advanced tips. (We also have more information at the bottom of this post, after the hints and answers.)

Ready for the hints? Let’s go!


Does today’s Wordle have any unusual letters?

We’ll define common letters as those that appear in the old typesetters’ phrase ETAOIN SHRDLU. (Memorize this! Pronounce it “Edwin Shirdloo,” like a name, and pretend he’s a friend of yours.)

Four of today’s letters are from our mnemonic. The fifth is fairly common.

Can you give me a hint for today’s Wordle?

A long handle—also an action series whose titular character is played in one film by Samuel L. Jackson.

Does today’s Wordle have any double or repeated letters?

There are no repeated letters today. 

How many vowels are in today’s Wordle?

There is one vowel.

What letter does today’s Wordle start with?

Today’s word starts with S. 

What letter does today’s Wordle end with?

Today’s word ends with T. 

What is the solution to today’s Wordle?

Ready? Today’s word is SHAFT.

How I solved today’s Wordle

I started with RAISE and TOUCH, and while this left a handful of words with my known letters, most could be ruled out with the positions of A and H. SHAFT was the best solution.

Wordle 1,127 3/6

⬛🟨⬛🟨⬛
🟨⬛⬛⬛🟨
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

Yesterday’s Wordle answer

Yesterday’s Wordle was medium difficult. The hint was “a palindrome meaning to mention” and the answer contained four common letters and one fairly common letter.

The answer to yesterday’s Wordle was REFER.

A primer on Wordle basics

The idea of Wordle is to guess the day’s secret word. When you first open the Wordle game, you’ll see an empty grid of letters. It’s up to you to make the first move: type in any five-letter word. 

Now, you can use the colors that are revealed to get clues about the word: Green means you correctly guessed a letter, and it’s in the correct position. (For example, if you guess PARTY, and the word is actually PURSE, the P and R will be green.)

  • Yellow means the letter is somewhere in the word, but not in the position you guessed it. (For example, if you guessed PARTY, but the word is actually ROAST, the R, A and T will all be yellow.)

  • Gray means the letter is not in the solution word at all. (If you guessed PARTY and everything is gray, then the solution cannot be PURSE or ROAST.)

With all that in mind, guess another word, and then another, trying to land on the correct word before you run out of chances. You get six guesses, and then it’s game over.

The best starter words for Wordle

What should you play for that first guess? The best starters tend to contain common letters, to increase the chances of getting yellow and green squares to guide your guessing. (And if you get all grays when guessing common letters, that’s still excellent information to help you rule out possibilities.) There isn’t a single “best” starting word, but the New York Times’s Wordle analysis bot has suggested starting with one of these:

  • CRANE

  • TRACE

  • SLANT

  • CRATE

  • CARTE

Meanwhile, an MIT analysis found that you’ll eliminate the most possibilities in the first round by starting with one of these:

  • SALET

  • REAST

  • TRACE

  • CRATE

  • SLATE

Other good picks might be ARISE or ROUND. Words like ADIEU and AUDIO get more vowels in play, but you could argue that it’s better to start with an emphasis on consonants, using a starter like RENTS or CLAMP. Choose your strategy, and see how it plays out.

How to win at Wordle

We have a few guides to Wordle strategy, which you might like to read over if you’re a serious student of the game. This one covers how to use consonants to your advantage, while this one focuses on a strategy that uses the most common letters. In this advanced guide, we detail a three-pronged approach for fishing for hints while maximizing your chances of winning quickly.

The biggest thing that separates Wordle winners from Wordle losers is that winners use their guesses to gather information about what letters are in the word. If you know that the word must end in -OUND, don’t waste four guesses on MOUND, ROUND, SOUND, and HOUND; combine those consonants and guess MARSH. If the H lights up in yellow, you know the solution.

One more note 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. Sometimes they are slightly tricky words that wouldn’t have made the original list, and sometimes they are topical. For example, FEAST was the solution one Thanksgiving. So keep in mind that there may be a theme.

Wordle alternatives

If you can’t get enough of five-letter guessing games and their kin, the best Wordle alternatives, ranked by difficulty, include:

This Device Turns Your Apple Watch Into an Old-School iPod

The TinyPod is one of the more ingenious ideas I’ve seen in a while: It’s a little case for a strapless Apple Watch, which essentially turns it into a miniature iPod, complete with an old-school clickwheel.

There’s a lot you can do with an Apple Watch these days, from playing music to making calls to navigating from A to B with Apple Maps. All of that functionality is kept, but the device moves from your wrist into your pocket with this compact plastic casing.

That has its advantages and disadvantages: You can’t track your steps and heart rate if it’s not on your wrist, for example, but it does mean you can use the device more easily. The back of the watch is kept accessible, so you can still charge it in the normal way.

TinyPod case
The TinyPod has that classic iPod look.
Credit: TinyPod

While a lot of the focus is on playing music via a pair of connected AirPods, the TinyPod is also being marketed as a fully featured mini phone you can use for those times when you want to leave your main iPhone at home, which is a fair assessment of what this is—and it works even better if you have an LTE-enabled Apple Watch that can get online on its own.

However, it’s also worth pointing out that the TinyPod doesn’t really do anything except take the Apple Watch off your wrist and add a clickwheel for easier navigation—otherwise it’s just the same Apple Watch. It could appeal if you don’t want to wear your Apple Watch, or have an older one lying around, or just love the classic iPod.

Wrist detection

There’s an important security issue to bear in mind with the TinyPod, which is that wrist detection will need to be disabled, unless you want to enter your Apple Watch PIN every time you pick it up (the PIN will still be required for Apple Pay, whether wrist detection is enabled or disabled).

With wrist detection turned off, that means everything on your Apple Watch is potentially available to anyone who picks it up. You’ll need to keep a close eye on your TinyPod at all times, and might want to switch off some of the syncing that it does with your iPhone (for emails, for example), just to be on the safe side.

TinyPod case
You can access all of your Apple Watch apps on the TinyPod.
Credit: TinyPod

I emailed the TinyPod team to ask about how much battery life to expect, and how wrist detection might impair the functionality of the Apple Watch in one of these cases, but I’ve yet to hear back—I’ll update this article if they return a comment.

It’s not necessarily a reason not to get a TinyPod, but it’s something to consider. And there is actually a perk: The makers of the TinyPod say that without wrist detection enabled, battery life on the Apple Watch will stretch to several days. I haven’t been able to test one yet, so I can’t vouch for that.

If you’re sold on the idea, you can order online. The TinyPod Lite (without a clickwheel) starts at $29.99, while the full TinyPod starts at $79.99. Different sizes are available to fit 40mm, 41mm, 44mm and 45mm Apple Watch sizes, as well as the 49mm Apple Watch Ultra size, so you can pick the one you need.

Why You Should Be Running Hill Repeats (and How to Get Started)

Hill repeats are a great training tool if you’re a runner, or if you’re any kind of athlete looking to improve your cardiovascular system. But you can’t do hill workouts without a good hill, so your first question is likely to be okay, where? 

I’ll briefly answer your next few questions, too: why? How many? And how far? Let’s tackle those first, and then find your perfect hill.

What are hill repeats and why should I do them? 

A hill repeat means running uphill. They’re called “repeats” because you won’t do just one. You’ll head right back downhill, and repeat the process—maybe doing 10 reps of a short hill, or 2-3 reps of a longer hill. The shorter, faster ones are sometimes called “hill sprints.” 

Hill repeats are a type of interval training, so in theory their benefits are the same as for any similar interval training. You can improve your VO2max, your insulin sensitivity, your overall fitness, and so on. But there are lots of ways to do intervals. Why take to the hills? 

The textbook benefits of hill repeats are: 

  • They’re lower impact than sprints or speedwork on flat ground, since the ground effectively rises to meet your feet.

  • They provide strength benefits for runners, making your glutes and hamstrings work a little harder. (Hill repeats still don’t replace a proper strength workout with weights, though.) 

  • They make you practice good running form, driving your knees up and landing softly on your midfoot. 

But there’s more. I think these benefits are under-appreciated: 

  • They give you confidence to attack hills on your training runs or in a race. There’s nothing like chugging up a hill in the middle of a marathon when the people around you are stopping to walk. 

  • They give non-runners an easy way to measure effort in a workout. You don’t need a regulation track or a stopwatch to do hill repeats, nor do you need to plan a route or know your paces. You just run up until it’s time to walk down, then repeat. One hill, one workout. 

How many hill repeats should I do, and how long? 

Hills are a tool, not a workout. So it depends on what you’re trying to get out of your hill repeat workout. If you’re following a training plan, the plan should give you a distance or time for both the hill and the recovery. That said, here are a few common types of hill workouts: 

  • Hill sprints (like, real sprints): 6-8 seconds absolutely all-out. Rest about 3 minutes before going again. (This includes your walk down the hill.) Maybe 4-8 reps.

  • Hill strides: These are the hill version of strides, 15 to 30 seconds of a peppy little run with at least a minute or two of recovery. They shouldn’t feel hard on your lungs, they’re just a drill for your legs. Do these at the end of a workout, or at the end of your warmup as you’re getting ready for a race or a hard run. Two to six reps would be typical.

  • Short hill repeats: These are maybe a minute or two long, with recovery equal to however long it takes to walk back downhill. Some runners will add an extra minute of recovery at the bottom before going again. You might do 4-12 of these.

  • Longer hill repeats: These span several minutes or to a specific distance. I’ve done 400-meter (quarter-mile) hill repeats, and I even have a favorite half-mile hill for very long ones. You might do only 2-4 of these, since they’re so long. 

Where I give a range of reps, usually you’ll do the lower number the first time you try them, and add a repeat or two next time. Nothing is set in stone about these descriptions; view them as typical workouts you might see, not the only types out there or the only way to do them. If you’re doing a running program and it calls for hill repeats, it should give you all the specifics.

Make sure you’re warmed up for hill repeats (as you would for any hard workout). If hill repeats are the main part of your workout for the day, jog an easy mile before you start doing them, or warm up in the way of your choosing for 10 minutes or so. You may want to do another easy mile at the end as a cooldown. 

What is a good incline for hill repeats?

The steepness of a hill is usually measured in percentage: 0% is flat ground, 2% is a little bit of a slope, and 10% is going to look like a mountain if you have to walk (or drive!) up it. A handful of the steepest streets in the world are 30% or more.

Since you’re not likely to run up a hill that’s more than about 10% grade, I’d recommend thinking of grade as a scale of 1 to 10. Want just a little bit of a hill? 2%. Need something real challenging? See if you can find 8%. The longer the repeat, the lower you probably want the incline to be. 

Here’s a guideline for how steep a hill you want:

  • 2-4% if you normally run on the flat, and you want a nice gradual slope for longer repeats. 

  • 4-6% if you’re used to hills and want a long repeat, or for short or medium repeats for most normal people.

  • 6-8% if you’re used to hills, running short repeats, or just feel like you’re up for a challenge.

How do I find out how steep a hill is?

To calculate the percentage grade of a hill, remember the phrase “rise over run.” That means the elevation gain (“rise”) gets divided (“over,” like in a fraction) by the horizontal distance (“run”). Here’s the USGS describing how it’s defined, and here’s a handy calculator so you don’t have to read all that. If you ever forget how to do this, just Google “rise over run calculator” and look for one that lets you input any units you want. If you’re in the United States, rise is usually easiest to measure in feet and run will be in miles.

So how do we find the rise and the run? Run is easy—you’re probably already tracking distance with your running watch or with route planning tools like Strava or MapMyRun. Or you can go to Google Maps and right-click on a point to measure distance. 

For rise, I like the elevation finder tool here. Click the top of the hill, wait a few seconds for the website to calculate, and then jot down the elevation in feet (or meters). Then click the bottom of the hill, and do the same. Subtract the lower elevation from the higher, and the difference is your rise, your elevation change in feet.

I’ll do the above when I’m picking out a hill, checking different start and end points to figure out exactly where the steepest hill in my neighborhood is, for example. But if you already have a hill in mind and just want to know how steep it is, you can use a route planning app. 

How to find the elevation of a hill in MapMyRun or Strava

mapmyrun with elevation

Credit: MapMyRun/Beth Skwarecki

MapMyRun requires a free account to use the route builder tool. Click your starting point and your ending point, and make sure the “show elevation” toggle is on. The elevation gain, in feet, will show at the bottom of the screen. 

Normally, if you’re doing a hilly run, you would need to worry about the total elevation gain as you run up and down and up and down. But for a single hill, there’s only up. So take that elevation gain, and the length of the run in miles, and plug that into the rise over run calculator. The hill in my example is 0.39 miles with 175 feet of rise. That’s an 8.5% grade, yikes. 

Strava also has a route builder tool, but it requires a premium subscription. It works the same way: draw a line from the bottom to top of your hill, and take a look at the total distance and elevation gain.

Strava and Rise Over Run screenshots

Credit: Strava/Omnicalculator/Beth Skwarecki

How to do hill repeats when you live in a flat place

Finally, I know some of you have one final question: how do you find a hill when your area doesn’t have any hills? If you live in a relatively flat place, open up Google Maps and turn on the “terrain” layer, which will add shading to the hills so they’re easy to spot. (Any topographic map tool can do the same.) 

Look in particular at parks within driving distance; sometimes there might be a public trail that you could run on if you’re willing to make the drive. 

Otherwise, people in prairie states and other flat areas have been known to run hill repeats on overpasses and parking garage ramps (please be safe about traffic if you go this route). Stairs are also an option: they’re not the same thing as hills, and you may have to go slower, but you can still get some of the benefits of hill repeats by climbing stadium stairs at a school track. And finally, if nothing else, there’s always the incline button on the treadmill.

Today’s Wordle Hints (and Answer) for Friday, July 19, 2024

If you’re looking for the Wordle answer for July 19, 2024 read on. We’ll share some clues, tips, and strategies, and finally the solution. Today’s puzzle is medium difficult; I got it in four. Beware, there are spoilers below for July 19, Wordle #1,126! Keep scrolling if you want some hints (and then the answer) to today’s Wordle game.

How to play Wordle

Wordle lives here on the New York Times website. A new puzzle goes live every day at midnight, your local time.

Start by guessing a five-letter word. The letters of the word will turn green if they’re correct, yellow if you have the right letter in the wrong place, or gray if the letter isn’t in the day’s secret word at all. For more, check out our guide to playing Wordle here, and my strategy guide here for more advanced tips. (We also have more information at the bottom of this post, after the hints and answers.)

Ready for the hints? Let’s go!


Does today’s Wordle have any unusual letters?

We’ll define common letters as those that appear in the old typesetters’ phrase ETAOIN SHRDLU. (Memorize this! Pronounce it “Edwin Shirdloo,” like a name, and pretend he’s a friend of yours.)

Four of today’s letters are from our mnemonic. The fifth is fairly common.

Can you give me a hint for today’s Wordle?

Today’s word is a palindrome meaning to mention.

Does today’s Wordle have any double or repeated letters?

There are two repeated letters today. 

How many vowels are in today’s Wordle?

There is one vowel, used twice.

What letter does today’s Wordle start with?

Today’s word starts with R. 

What letter does today’s Wordle end with?

Today’s word ends with R. 

What is the solution to today’s Wordle?

Ready? Today’s word is REFER.

How I solved today’s Wordle

I started with RAISE and TOUCH, then guessed PYLON to eliminate consonants that showed up in a lot of possible solutions. There are a handful of solutions that could have fit here, but only REFER is a common word.

Wordle 1,126 4/6

🟩⬛⬛⬛🟨
⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛
⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

Yesterday’s Wordle answer

Yesterday’s Wordle was medium difficult. The hint was “an adjective for someone who is highly passionate about a pursuit” and the answer contained four common letters and one uncommon letter.

The answer to yesterday’s Wordle was NERDY.

A primer on Wordle basics

The idea of Wordle is to guess the day’s secret word. When you first open the Wordle game, you’ll see an empty grid of letters. It’s up to you to make the first move: type in any five-letter word. 

Now, you can use the colors that are revealed to get clues about the word: Green means you correctly guessed a letter, and it’s in the correct position. (For example, if you guess PARTY, and the word is actually PURSE, the P and R will be green.)

  • Yellow means the letter is somewhere in the word, but not in the position you guessed it. (For example, if you guessed PARTY, but the word is actually ROAST, the R, A and T will all be yellow.)

  • Gray means the letter is not in the solution word at all. (If you guessed PARTY and everything is gray, then the solution cannot be PURSE or ROAST.)

With all that in mind, guess another word, and then another, trying to land on the correct word before you run out of chances. You get six guesses, and then it’s game over.

The best starter words for Wordle

What should you play for that first guess? The best starters tend to contain common letters, to increase the chances of getting yellow and green squares to guide your guessing. (And if you get all grays when guessing common letters, that’s still excellent information to help you rule out possibilities.) There isn’t a single “best” starting word, but the New York Times’s Wordle analysis bot has suggested starting with one of these:

  • CRANE

  • TRACE

  • SLANT

  • CRATE

  • CARTE

Meanwhile, an MIT analysis found that you’ll eliminate the most possibilities in the first round by starting with one of these:

  • SALET

  • REAST

  • TRACE

  • CRATE

  • SLATE

Other good picks might be ARISE or ROUND. Words like ADIEU and AUDIO get more vowels in play, but you could argue that it’s better to start with an emphasis on consonants, using a starter like RENTS or CLAMP. Choose your strategy, and see how it plays out.

How to win at Wordle

We have a few guides to Wordle strategy, which you might like to read over if you’re a serious student of the game. This one covers how to use consonants to your advantage, while this one focuses on a strategy that uses the most common letters. In this advanced guide, we detail a three-pronged approach for fishing for hints while maximizing your chances of winning quickly.

The biggest thing that separates Wordle winners from Wordle losers is that winners use their guesses to gather information about what letters are in the word. If you know that the word must end in -OUND, don’t waste four guesses on MOUND, ROUND, SOUND, and HOUND; combine those consonants and guess MARSH. If the H lights up in yellow, you know the solution.

One more note 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. Sometimes they are slightly tricky words that wouldn’t have made the original list, and sometimes they are topical. For example, FEAST was the solution one Thanksgiving. So keep in mind that there may be a theme.

Wordle alternatives

If you can’t get enough of five-letter guessing games and their kin, the best Wordle alternatives, ranked by difficulty, include:

1Password’s Account Recovery Is Now More Forgiving

1Password just got a major update with lots of new features, finally adding a way for you to recover your account even if you forget your master password. That’s in addition to quality-of-life improvements, which let you automatically sign you into your account even if it has multiple login steps. Plus, the service recently added a feature that lets you use a QR code to share your wifi passwords, which I’ve used to great effect over the past few days. Here’s all the best new 1Password features, all of which are available in the latest version of the app on all devices.

You can finally recover your accounts

Previously, if you forgot your master password and lost your Secret Key, that was the end of your 1Password account. There was no way to recover it, but now there is. You can now set up a safeguard and generate a recovery code. Once you have it, you’ll want to store the code in a safe place (outside of 1Password) so that you have another way of accessing your account. The steps to do this are detailed on the 1Password support page.

Autosave credit cards

1Password will now detect when you type in credit card details and ask if you want to save them to the password manager. I’ve never bothered to save my current credit card to 1Password, but this change might finally encourage me to do so. You’ll have a choice between adding a new card or updating an existing credit card.

Faster sign-in workflows

When you sign in to websites, they often add multiple steps to the login process. You may see an email page, a new page for the password, and additional pages for one-time passwords or other information. If you have all this information saved in 1Password, it’ll automatically load all pages and complete the sign-in process for you.

A QR code for improved setup processes

If you’re already signed in to 1Password on one device, you’ll now be able to scan a QR code on new devices to quickly setup the app. Previously, you had to manually enter your account details, password, and Secret Key for sign up. 1Password says this code is temporary and doesn’t contain sensitive information, protecting it against attacks via screenshots or by people standing behind you.

Search terms now include Secure Notes

1Password’s Secure Notes are good for storing information that doesn’t fit anywhere else. For example, you could use them for something as simple as a shopping list or as important as tax information. Previously, the search feature wouldn’t scan the contents of these Secure Notes, but that’s now changed.

Four Downsides to High-Rise Buildings That People Don’t Consider

City living comes with a lot of challenges. Between safety concerns, the sheer expense, and the plethora of old housing stock, there can be a lot of frustrations in the urban lifestyle. That also translates into a lot of reasons an apartment in a high-rise building might be appealing: The security of a doorman, the spectacular city views from an upper floor, and the potential for modern amenities to name just a few.

But that luxurious image of high-rise living hides some serious downsides—downsides that most people don’t figure out until they’re actually living there. Having a home hundreds of feet in the air might seem like an exciting, glamorous way to live, but there are some potential downsides you should consider before you get in too deep.

A ton of neighbors means a lot of small talk

This one seems obvious—of course a giant building has more people in it—but it’s worth thinking about. If you’ve never lived the high-rise lifestyle before, you might be in for a shock. A single-family home typically has only a few next-door neighbors—one on either side, perhaps one behind the lot (though likely buffered by an outdoor space) and then the folks across the street. Even on a busy street or in a condo situation, you probably have a small number of neighbors you have to deal with.

In a high-rise, the median number of neighbors is around 274. That’s a lot of people you will have to interact with on both a polite good-morning level and on a more substantive level when dealing with building issues.

You’re reliant on elevators, which adds time and complications

When you live several dozen floors above the street, you’re totally reliant on elevators to get to and from your apartment. This certainly has a lot of advantages over living in a walk-up, but elevator living has its own lush subcategory of downsides:

  • Breakdowns. As noted in this old Reddit thread, elevators can be delicate machines that break down regularly—even in nice high-rise buildings. That can leave you waiting a long time for the next elevator, or carrying your groceries up multiple flights of stairs as you wonder how long it would take anyone to notice you were missing if you had a sudden heart attack.

  • Crowds. Remember all those neighbors I mentioned? Since the elevators are the one way up and down in your building, you should steel yourself for endless encounters and a lot of polite chit-chat as you wait for and ride in elevators with other people.

  • Delays. Elevators aren’t all the same, and some can be infuriatingly slow, resulting in a lot of lost time. If it takes five minutes to get from your apartment to the lobby (and vice versa), you’ll need to build significant elevator time into every plan you make. This makes it especially challenging to take your dog out for a quick midday pee break—rather than open the door and walk down a flight of stairs, you may have to wait a few minutes for an elevator to arrive. And if your dog (or the dog on the elevator) isn’t particularly friendly, you may have to let it pass you by and catch the next one.

If the water pressure goes down, you might be waiting a while

Typically, city water pressure is sufficient to push water up a few floors (in New York City, for example, standard city water can make it to the sixth floor without a problem). After that, it requires a pump and storage system to get water to storage tanks that then disperse it to the apartments.

That’s fine when everything is working, but when pumps fail or water pipes leak in the building, it can be disastrous, because so much of that infrastructure is outside your control. Floods from broken water pipes can impact multiple apartments, creating an insurance mess. Unlike a smaller building, where leaks can be quickly isolated and dealt with, fixing leaks in high-rises can be a major undertaking that can further impact your water pressure—and sanity.

The creepy, wind-fueled shakes

High-rise buildings are designed to sway slightly. If they were completely rigid, high winds and storms would affect them much more powerfully.

So a little bit of movement is normal—but it can also be kind of terrifying. In this video, you can clearly hear what can only be described as alarming creaking noises in a high-rise apartment while a storm batters the building. High-rises can be noisy on the best of days—with “creaking, banging, and clicking noises” being pretty common—but in a storm you’ll have to get used to that sense that the whole place is on the verge of collapse (it probably isn’t, it will just sound that way). If you’re not sure you could sleep peacefully through that, a high-rise might not be for you.

These Prime Day Deals on Apple Products Are Still Available

Prime Day might be over, but some of the best deals on Apple products are still active. You can find deals on M3 and M2 MacBook Airs, 10th Generation iPad, Apple Watch Series 9, AirPods Max, and more. Here are the best Apple deals from Prime Day that are still kicking—with the caveat, of course, that these may expire at any time.

13.6-inch Liquid Retina Display, 8GB Unified Memory, 256GB SSD Storage, Backlit Keyboard, HD Camera.
Apple 2024 MacBook Air 13-inch Laptop with M3 chip

Apple MacBook Air 13-inch (2024, M3)


$899.00
at Amazon

$1,099.00
Save $200.00

13.6-inch Liquid Retina Display, 8GB RAM, 256GB SSD Storage, Backlit Keyboard, 1080p FaceTime HD Cam
Apple 2022 MacBook Air Laptop with M2 chip

Apple MacBook Air M2 13-inch


$799.00
at Amazon

$999.00
Save $200.00

Wireless Over-Ear Headphones, Active Noise Cancelling, Transparency Mode, Personalized Spatial Audio
Apple AirPods Max

Apple AirPods Max


$394.99
at Amazon

$549.00
Save $154.01

Smartwatch with Rugged Titanium Case & Blue Alpine Loop Small. Fitness Tracker, Precision GPS.
Apple Watch Ultra 2 [GPS + Cellular 49mm]

Apple Watch Ultra 2 [GPS + Cellular 49mm] Smartwatch with Rugged Titanium Case & Blue Alpine Loop Small. Fitness Tracker, Precision GPS, Action Button, Extra-Long Battery Life, Carbon Neutral


$699.99
at Amazon

$799.00
Save $99.01

Smartwatch with Midnight Aluminum Case with Midnight Sport Loop One Size. Fitness Tracker, ECG Apps.
Apple Watch Series 9 [GPS 45mm]

Apple Watch Series 9 (GPS, 45mm, Midnight, Loop One Size Band, Without Blood Oxygen)


$309.99
at Amazon

$429.00
Save $119.01

A14 Bionic chip, 10.9-inch Liquid Retina Display, 64GB, Wi-Fi 6, 12MP front/12MP Back Camera.
Apple iPad (10th Generation)

Apple iPad (2022)


$299.00
at Amazon

$349.00
Save $50.00

Wireless Ear Buds with USB-C Charging, Up to 2X More Active Noise Cancelling Bluetooth Headphones.
Apple AirPods Pro (2nd Generation)

Apple AirPods Pro (2nd Generation) With MagSafe Charging Case (USB‑C)


$168.99
at Amazon

$249.00
Save $80.01

Wireless Ear Buds, Bluetooth Headphones, Personalized Spatial Audio, Sweat and Water Resistant.
Apple AirPods (3rd Generation)

Apple AirPods (3rd Generation)


$119.99
at Amazon

$169.00
Save $49.01

Keep track of and find your items alongside friends and devices in the Find My app.
Apple AirTag 4-pack

Apple AirTag 4 pack


$84.99
at Amazon

$99.00
Save $14.01

Apple MacBook Airs starting at $799

Prime Day brought new record low prices for both the M3 and M2 MacBook Airs, both of which are still on sale. The 13-inch M3 with 8 GB of RAM and 256 GB of storage starts at $899 (originally $1,099) and the 13-inch M2 with the same RAM and storage starts at $799. I covered the M3 back in May when it dropped to $949 as well as the M2 last month when it dropped to $829. Both are great laptops, but if you can afford the extra $100, the M3 is my recommendation. If you’re not sure which MacBook is a better fit for you, check out our comparison post.

AirPods Max and AirPods Pro are still discounted, too

I’m still surprised how much the Apple AirPods Max came down for Prime Day, and they are still available at the same $394.99 (originally $549) price. If you’re an Apple user looking for the best headphones for your Apple products, this are the ones for you. If you don’t have that kind of disposable income available or just prefer something a little less bulky, the 2nd Generation AirPods Pro for $168.99 (originally $249) and the 3rd Generation Apple AirPods for $119.99 (originally $169.99) are both also at their lowest price yet.

Apple Watches reached a new low price

The Apple Watch Ultra 2, the most impressive Apple Watch available, dropped $100 on Prime Day, and that discount is still going. The Ultra 2 is great for fitness enthusiasts but also offers a lot for casual users, and you can get it for $699.99 (originally $799). If you don’t want to spend that much, the Apple Watch Series 9 is $309.99 (originally $429), is the second-most expensive watch, and is much cheaper than it was when it dropped in price back in May.

The 10th Generation iPad is $299

Another impressive Prime Day discount was the 10th generation iPad dropping to $299 (originally $349). As Senior Tech Editor Jake Peterson said in his Prime Day post, this is the best iPad for most people, and it’s down to its lowest price yet. This is the 64 GB and wifi-only version, which came out in October of 2022.

If you’re scared you might lose any of these expensive high-tech Apple devices, the four-pack of Apple AirTags is also down to its lowest price yet of $74.99 (originally $99).