If you’re looking for the Quordle answer for Monday, May 26, 2025, read on—I’ll share some clues, tips, and strategies, and finally the solution. Beware, there are spoilers below for May 26, Quordle #1218! Keep scrolling if you want some hints (and then the answer) to today’s Quordle game. (If you play Wordle, Connections, and Strands, check out our hints for those games, too.)
How to play Quordle
Quordle lives here on the Merriam-Webster website. A new puzzle goes live every day.
If you’ve never played, it’s a twist on New York Times’ daily Wordle game, in which you have a limited number of attempts to guess a five-letter mystery word. In Quordle, though, you’re simultaneously solving four Wordle-style puzzles, and each of your guesses gets applied to the four puzzles simultaneously. Due to the increased difficulty, Quordle grants you nine guesses (or 12 if you play on “Chill” mode, and eight if you play on “Extreme”), rather than Wordle’s six.
To start, guess a five-letter word. The letters of the word in each of the four quadrants 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 that secret word at all.
Ready for the hints? Let’s go!
Can you give me a hint for today’s Quordle?
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Upper left: A sheep’s call.
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Upper right: A cowboy’s greeting.
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Lower left: Where you might set something unimportant.
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Lower right: Unit of ice cream.
Does today’s Quordle have any double or repeated letters?
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Upper left: No.
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Upper right: No.
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Lower left: No.
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Lower right: Yes, it has one repeated vowel.
What letters do today’s Quordle words start with?
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Upper left: B
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Upper right: H
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Lower left: A
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Lower right: S
What letters do today’s Quordle words end with?
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Upper left: T
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Upper right: Y
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Lower left: E
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Lower right: P
What is the solution to today’s Quordle?
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Upper left: BLEAT
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Upper right: HOWDY
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Lower left: ASIDE
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Lower right: SCOOP
How I solved today’s Quordle
I start with SLATE, then try CLEAT for the upper left. Just the C is wrong. PLEAT? Nope. BLEAT? Phew. Burned a lot of guesses there, and still zero letters in the upper right.
SPICY might fit the bottom right. Close, but not quite. SCOOP? Yes!
ASIDE might fit the bottom left. Nice.
What do you think so far?
Maybe ROWDY for the upper right? Close! HOWDY? Yes! Close one.
🙂 Daily Quordle 1218 4️⃣9️⃣ 7️⃣6️⃣ m-w.com/games/quordle/ ⬜🟩🟨🟨🟨 ⬜⬜⬜⬜⬜ ⬜🟩🟩🟩🟩 ⬜⬜⬜⬜⬜ ⬜🟩🟩🟩🟩 ⬜⬜⬜⬜⬜ 🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩 ⬜⬜⬜⬜⬜ ⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛ ⬜⬜⬜⬜🟩 ⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛ ⬜⬜🟨⬜⬜ ⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛ ⬜⬜⬜🟩⬜ ⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛ ⬜🟩🟩🟩🟩 ⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛ 🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩 🟨⬜🟨⬜🟩 🟩⬜⬜⬜⬜ ⬜⬜🟨🟨⬜ 🟨⬜⬜⬜⬜ ⬜⬜🟨🟨⬜ 🟨⬜⬜⬜⬜ ⬜⬜🟨🟨⬜ ⬜⬜⬜⬜⬜ 🟨⬜🟩⬜⬜ 🟩🟨⬜🟨⬜ 🟨⬜⬜⬜⬜ 🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩 🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩 ⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛
The best starter words for Quordle
What should you play for that first guess? We can look to Wordle for some general guidelines.
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:
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CRANE
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TRACE
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SLANT
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CRATE
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CARTE
Meanwhile, an MIT analysis found that you’ll eliminate the most possibilities in the first round by starting with one of these:
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SALET
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REAST
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TRACE
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CRATE
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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.