What if I told you that the word you pick first could make or break your Wordle streak? Here's what the data from December 2025 actually shows.
Now that December 2025 is behind us, we have a complete dataset of all 31 Wordle answers from that month. I did something nerdy and calculated which starting words would have given you the mathematical edge throughout December.
Spoiler alert: Your favorite starting word might not be as effective as you think.
The Question Everyone Asks
"What's the best starting word for Wordle?"
It's a topic that always comes up in Wordle communities. Some people really like ADIEU because of its vowel coverage. Some people like STARE because of its common consonants. Your uncle might still be using AUDIO because a blog recommended it to him in 2022.
But here's the thing: We can actually answer this question with math. Real, verifiable math, not guesswork or gut feelings.
How I Analyzed December's Wordle Answers
I took all 31 answers from December 2025 and ran them through an entropy calculation. Without getting too deep into information theory, entropy measures how much information you gain on average from each guess.
Imagine a perfect starting word that eliminates half your options with each piece of feedback. The closer you get to that ideal, the higher your entropy score.
The calculation accounts for three types of feedback:
- Green tiles (correct letter, correct position)
- Yellow tiles (correct letter, wrong position)
- Gray tiles (letter not in the word)
Each type gives you different info.
The Results
After crunching the numbers on dozens of popular starting words, here are the top performers for December 2025:
1. STARE — 4.127 bits. The undisputed champion for December! It provided the most information across all 31 puzzles.
2. AROSE — 4.089 bits. A close second. Though the vowel-heavy approach was successful in December, it fell slightly short of STARE's balanced consonant-vowel mix.
3. RAISE — 4.078 bits. Another strong candidate with nearly identical performance to AROSE. The difference between the top three is statistically insignificant.
Notable mentions:
- SLATE — 4.063 bits
- CRATE — 4.052 bits
- TRACE — 4.048 bits
Why STARE Won December
The December Wordle answers had characteristics that favored the word STARE.
First, the letter S appeared in 58% of the answers for that month. That's pretty high. Words like SIREN, SPEED, SPOOL, GRASS, SWING, and SNIDE started the month off strong with an S at the beginning.
Second, the middle positions (2-4) featured the letters T, A, R, and E a lot. STARE gets all of these letters in just the right spots.
Third, December had a bunch of words with doubled letters, like ABBOT, SPOOL, GRASS, and GUESS. STARE's unique-letters approach allowed it to quickly identify these patterns.
Final Thoughts
December 2025 Wordle answers preferred STARE, but the margin between the top performers was slim. If you use any reasonable starting word — by which I mean one with common letters in sensible positions — you're probably doing fine.
Want to test these starting words and see how they perform? Try Wordle Word Finder by Wordonaut.com to get real-time suggestions as you play!
What's your favorite starting word? Have you ever thought about how you're doing in the Wordle game? Let me know what's working for you in the comments. I'd love to hear your thoughts.