rewrite this title NYT Wordle today — answer and my hints for game #1500, Monday, July 28

It’s time for your guide to today’s Wordle answer, featuring my commentary on the latest puzzle, plus a selection of hints designed to help you keep your streak going.

Don’t think you need any clues for Wordle today? No problem, just skip to my daily column. But remember: failure in this game is only ever six guesses away.

Want more word-based fun? TechRadar’s Quordle today page contains hints and answers for that game, and you can also take a look at our NYT Strands today and NYT Connections today pages for our verdict on two of the New York Times’ other brainteasers.

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SPOILER WARNING: Today’s Wordle answer and hints are below, so don’t read on if you don’t want to see them.

Wordle hints (game #1500) – clue #1 – Vowels

How many vowels does today’s Wordle have?

• Wordle today has a vowel in one place*.

* Note that by vowel we mean the five standard vowels (A, E, I, O, U), not Y (which is sometimes counted as a vowel too).

Wordle hints (game #1500) – clue #2 – first letter

What letter does today’s Wordle begin with?

• The first letter in today’s Wordle answer is S.

S is the most common starting letter in the game, featuring in 365 of Wordle’s 2,309 answers. In fact, it’s almost twice as likely to begin an answer as the next most common starting letter, C.

Wordle hints (game #1500) – clue #3 – repeated letters

Does today’s Wordle have any repeated letters?

• There are repeated letters in today’s Wordle.

Repeated letters are quite common in the game, with 748 of the 2,309 Wordle answers containing one. However, it’s still more likely that a Wordle doesn’t have one.

Wordle hints (game #1500) – clue #4 – ending letter

What letter does today’s Wordle end with?

• The last letter in today’s Wordle is Y.

Y is the second most common ending letter in the game, behind only E. In total, 364 Wordle answers end with a Y.

Wordle hints (game #1500) – clue #5 – last chance

Still looking for more Wordle hints today? Here’s an extra one for game #1500.

Today’s Wordle answer is shrewd and knowledgeable.

If you just want to know today’s Wordle answer now, simply scroll down – but I’d always recommend trying to solve it on your own first. We’ve got lots of Wordle tips and tricks to help you, including a guide to the best Wordle start words.

If you don’t want to know today’s answer then DO NOT SCROLL ANY FURTHER BECAUSE IT IS PRINTED BELOW. So don’t say you weren’t warned!

Today’s Wordle answer (game #1500)

NYT average score: 4.8My score: 4WordleBot’s score: 3My skill score: 95My luck score: 39My start word performance: EKING (639 remaining answers)WordleBot’s start word performance: SLATE (22)Tomorrow’s start word: PRUDE

Today’s Wordle answer (game #1500) is… SAVVY.

Happy 1,500th birthday, Wordle! You don’t look a day over 1,000…

We’re well over halfway through the game’s run now, with somewhere between 800 and 900 words to go in all likelihood. Still, that gives us a minimum of 2.5 years at least, so there’s plenty more Wordle fun to come.

Today’s game wasn’t much fun for most people; it has an average score right now of 4.8. However, it was a word that brought back some memories to me, because my first childhood cat was actually named SAVVY.

A mean old ginger thing, SAVVY used to terrify and terrorize me in equal measure. His favorite pastime appeared to be sleeping on my bed, while I was in it, and refusing to let me out from under the covers, swiping at me if I dared to move to the extent that I’d have to call my mum to rescue me. Happy days.

As a Wordle word, SAVVY is every bit as fearsome, with that 4.8 implying it’s yet another tough one for the month. I haven’t crunched the numbers yet, but I suspect July 2025 may be the game’s hardest ever.

The game’s high score is no major surprise to me, because a double-V is not exactly a likely occurrence. There are only four games among the 2,309 original solutions that contain a repeated V, and only one of them – SAVVY – has them next to each other. On the plus side, you won’t need to worry about it happening again, eh?

I escaped with a four, thanks to a steady game that started badly. EKING gave me zero letters and left 639 options, but ROAST was exactly what the ‘Bot would have played too, and reduced those to 17.

I moved my yellow S to its most likely position at the start, and decided that with E, N, R and T all ruled out, there was a good chance the word would end with Y, so put that at the end and played SPLAY.

This left only two words: SAUCY and SAVVY. And here I had a slice of luck; I didn’t think of the first of those, which was fortunate as I’m sure I would have played it next if I had. Instead, I went with SAVVY and beat the average.

Yesterday’s Wordle hints (game #1499)

In a different time zone where it’s still Sunday? Don’t worry – I can give you some clues for Wordle #1499, too.

Wordle yesterday had vowels in two places.

* Note that by vowel we mean the five standard vowels (A, E, I, O, U), not Y (which is sometimes counted as a vowel too).

The first letter in yesterday’s Wordle answer was W.

W is a fairly average letter when it comes to starting an answer. There are 82 solutions that begin with a W, with means that it ranks 13th – so right in the middle of the alphabet.

There were no repeated letters in yesterday’s Wordle.

Repeated letters are quite common in the game, with 748 of the 2,309 Wordle answers containing one. However, it’s still more likely that a Wordle doesn’t have one.

The last letter in yesterday’s Wordle was E.

E is the most common letter to end a Wordle answer by far. That’s one of the reasons why many of the best start words, including SLATE, CRANE, CRATE and STARE, all end with one.

Still looking for more Wordle hints? Here’s an extra one for game #1499.

Yesterday’s Wordle answer is entire, complete.

Yesterday’s Wordle answer (game #1499)

NYT average score: 3.6My score: 4WordleBot’s score: 3My skill score: 92My luck score: 58My start word performance: LIEGE (60 remaining answers)WordleBot’s start word performance: SLATE (29)Tomorrow’s start word: EKING

Yesterday’s Wordle answer (game #1499) was… WHOLE.

WHOLE offers a little respite from what has been a very difficult week of Wordles, with its score of 3.6 making it only the second one in the past seven days to dip below 4.0 (the other was Tuesday’s BURNT, at 3.5).

It has that classic consonant-consonant-vowel-consonant-vowel format, plus the very common ending combination of LE. The WH at the start is not quite so likely, but if you played the odds and ruled out common letters, you’ll have reached it soon enough.

I had to settle for a four, but didn’t do an awful lot wrong. My opening LIEGE gave me the green E at the end, plus a yellow L, and left 60 options. I followed up with SLANT – leaving out the E in order to gain info about another letter – and cut that to six.

These were BOULE, JOULE, WHOLE, PROLE, CYCLE and RUBLE, according to the ‘Bot, but I didn’t spot the last two of those. I also knew that WORLD, my next choice, might leave me a 50/50 between BOULE and JOULE, but considered the first of them to be unlikely anyway, so figured it was a risk worth taking.

My hunch was correct, this time at least – because the W turned green to leave WHOLE as the only possible answer.

Wordle answers: The past 50

I’ve been playing Wordle every day for more than three years now and have tracked all of the previous answers so I can help you improve your game. Here are the last 50 solutions starting with yesterday’s answer, or check out my past Wordle answers page for the full list.

Wordle #1499, Sunday 27 July: WHOLEWordle #1498, Saturday 26 July: HAUNTWordle #1497, Friday 25 July: GOFERWordle #1496, Thursday 24 July: QUAKEWordle #1495, Wednesday 23 July: WATERWordle #1494, Tuesday 22 July: BURNTWordle #1493, Monday 21 July: TIZZYWordle #1492, Sunday 20 July: BLANKWordle #1491, Saturday 19 July: SWORDWordle #1490, Friday 18 July: LORISWordle #1489, Thursday 17 July: MODALWordle #1488, Wednesday 16 July: NERVYWordle #1487, Tuesday 15 July: FOISTWordle #1486, Monday 14 July: UNDIDWordle #1485, Sunday 13 July: GNOMEWordle #1484, Saturday 12 July: EXILEWordle #1483, Friday 11 July: BRANDWordle #1482, Thursday 10 July: JUMPYWordle #1481, Wednesday 9 July: NOVELWordle #1480, Tuesday 8 July: DREADWordle #1479, Monday 7 July: STILTWordle #1478, Sunday 6 July: ATRIAWordle #1477, Saturday 5 July: BALERWordle #1476, Friday 4 July: CURVEWordle #1475, Thursday 3 July: POPPYWordle #1474, Wednesday 2 July: INCURWordle #1473, Tuesday 1 July: MOLDYWordle #1472, Monday 30 June: BLINKWordle #1471, Sunday 29 June: WITTYWordle #1470, Saturday 28 June: STUMPWordle #1469, Friday 27 June: PLAINWordle #1468, Thursday 26 June: OFFERWordle #1467, Wednesday 25 June: COMFYWordle #1466, Tuesday 24 June: ELITEWordle #1465, Monday 23 June: ODDLYWordle #1464, Sunday 22 June: THRUMWordle #1463, Saturday 21 June: GLADEWordle #1462, Friday 20 June: TAUPEWordle #1461, Thursday 19 June: CURIOWordle #1460, Wednesday 18 June: MUNCHWordle #1459, Tuesday 17 June: PRANKWordle #1458, Monday 16 June: PETTYWordle #1457, Sunday 15 June: QUAILWordle #1456, Saturday 14 June: GHOSTWordle #1455, Friday 13 June: BILGEWordle #1454, Thursday 12 June: VIXENWordle #1453, Wednesday 11 June: PLAIDWordle #1452, Tuesday 10 June: TAFFYWordle #1451, Monday 9 June: BOARDWordle #1450, Sunday 8 June: LEASEWordle #1449, Saturday 7 June: REUSE

What is Wordle?

If you’re on this page then you almost certainly know what Wordle is already, and indeed have probably been playing it for a while. And even if you’ve not been playing it, you must surely have heard of it by now, because it’s the viral word game phenomenon that took the world by storm in 2022 and is still going strong in 2025.

We’ve got a full guide to the game in our What is Wordle page, but if you just want a refresher then here are the basics.

What is Wordle?

Wordle challenges you to guess a new five-letter word each day. You get six guesses, with each one revealing a little more information. If one of the letters in your guess is in the answer and in the right place, it turns green. If it’s in the answer but in the wrong place, it turns yellow. And if it’s not in the answer at all it turns gray. Simple, eh?

It’s played online via the Wordle website or the New York Times’ Games app (iOS / Android), and is entirely free.

Crucially, the answer is the same for everyone each day, meaning that you’re competing against the rest of the world, rather than just against yourself or the game. The puzzle then resets each day at midnight in your local time, giving you a new challenge, and the chance to extend your streak.

What are the Wordle rules?

The rules of Wordle are pretty straightforward, but with a couple of curveballs thrown in for good measure.

1. Letters that are in the answer and in the right place turn green.

2. Letters that are in the answer but in the wrong place turn yellow.

3. Letters that are not in the answer turn gray.

4. Answers are never plural.

5. Letters can appear more than once. So if your guess includes two of one letter, they may both turn yellow, both turn green, or one could be yellow and the other green.

6. Each guess must be a valid word in Wordle’s dictionary. You can’t guess ABCDE, for instance.

7. You do not have to include correct letters in subsequent guesses unless you play on Hard mode.

8. You have six guesses to solve the Wordle.

9. You must complete the daily Wordle before midnight in your timezone.

10. All answers are drawn from Wordle’s list of 2,309 solutions. However…

11. Wordle will accept a wider pool of words as guesses – some 10,000 of them. For instance, you can guess a plural such as WORDS. It definitely won’t be right (see point 4 above), but Wordle will accept it as a guess.

12. The NYT has added in some of its own words, that weren’t in that list of 2,309 solutions. More will undoubtedly come over the next few years.