The Unofficial Hive

NYT Spelling Bee answers & analysis

ADELMNG

Saturday, December 20, 2025

Words
77
Points
370
Genius
259
Pangram
1

Official answers

Show the 77 answersHide answers

Pangram highlighted. Click a word for its definition.

  • adage

    No cached definition. Look it up on Wiktionary.

    Appeared in 3 recorded puzzles.

  • aged

    No cached definition. Look it up on Wiktionary.

    Appeared in 3 recorded puzzles.

  • agenda

    No cached definition. Look it up on Wiktionary.

    Appeared in 2 recorded puzzles.

  • agleam

    No cached definition. Look it up on Wiktionary.

  • alga

    noun — Any of many aquatic photosynthetic organisms, including the seaweeds, whose size ranges from a single cell to giant kelps and whose biochemistry and forms are very diverse, some being eukaryotic.

    Appeared in 9 recorded puzzles.

  • algae

    No cached definition. Look it up on Wiktionary.

    Appeared in 4 recorded puzzles.

  • algal

    noun — An alga.

    adjective — Pertaining to, or like, algae

    Appeared in 9 recorded puzzles.

  • allege

    No cached definition. Look it up on Wiktionary.

    Appeared in 4 recorded puzzles.

  • alleged

    No cached definition. Look it up on Wiktionary.

  • amalgam

    noun — An alloy containing mercury.

    verb — To amalgamate.

    noun — A combination of different things.

    noun — One of the ingredients in an alloy.

    Appeared in 5 recorded puzzles.

  • angel

    No cached definition. Look it up on Wiktionary.

    Appeared in 3 recorded puzzles.

  • angle

    No cached definition. Look it up on Wiktionary.

    Appeared in 3 recorded puzzles.

  • angled

    No cached definition. Look it up on Wiktionary.

  • damage

    No cached definition. Look it up on Wiktionary.

  • damaged

    No cached definition. Look it up on Wiktionary.

  • dang

    No cached definition. Look it up on Wiktionary.

    Appeared in 6 recorded puzzles.

  • dangle

    No cached definition. Look it up on Wiktionary.

  • dangled

    No cached definition. Look it up on Wiktionary.

  • eagle

    No cached definition. Look it up on Wiktionary.

    Appeared in 4 recorded puzzles.

  • eagled

    No cached definition. Look it up on Wiktionary.

  • edge

    noun — The boundary line of a surface.

    verb — To move an object slowly and carefully in a particular direction.

    noun — A one-dimensional face of a polytope. In particular, the joining line between two vertices of a polygon; the place where two faces of a polyhedron meet.

    noun — An advantage.

    noun — The thin cutting side of the blade of an instrument, such as an ax, knife, sword, or scythe; that which cuts as an edge does, or wounds deeply, etc.

    noun — A sharp terminating border; a margin; a brink; an extreme verge.

    Appeared in 6 recorded puzzles.

  • edged

    verb — To move an object slowly and carefully in a particular direction.

    adjective — That has a sharp planar surface.

    verb — To move slowly and carefully in a particular direction.

    verb — (usually in the form 'just edge') To win by a small margin.

    verb — To hit the ball with an edge of the bat, causing a fine deflection.

    verb — To trim the margin of a lawn where the grass meets the sidewalk, usually with an electric or gas-powered lawn edger.

    Appeared in 6 recorded puzzles.

  • egad

    No cached definition. Look it up on Wiktionary.

    Appeared in 3 recorded puzzles.

  • egged

    verb — To throw eggs at.

    verb — To encourage, incite.

    verb — To dip in or coat with beaten egg.

    verb — To distort a circular cross-section (as in a tube) to an elliptical or oval shape, either inadvertently or intentionally.

    Appeared in 6 recorded puzzles.

  • endgame

    No cached definition. Look it up on Wiktionary.

  • engage

    No cached definition. Look it up on Wiktionary.

    Appeared in 8 recorded puzzles.

  • engaged

    No cached definition. Look it up on Wiktionary.

    Appeared in 2 recorded puzzles.

  • gadded

    No cached definition. Look it up on Wiktionary.

    Appeared in 3 recorded puzzles.

  • gaga

    adjective — Mentally senile.

    noun — A variant of dodgeball played inside a fenced area, usually a hexagon or octagon.

    adjective — Crazy.

    adjective — Infatuated.

    Appeared in 19 recorded puzzles.

  • gage

    No cached definition. Look it up on Wiktionary.

    Appeared in 9 recorded puzzles.

  • gagged

    No cached definition. Look it up on Wiktionary.

    Appeared in 3 recorded puzzles.

  • gaggle

    No cached definition. Look it up on Wiktionary.

    Appeared in 4 recorded puzzles.

  • gala

    noun — Pomp, show, or festivity.

    adjective — Celebratory; festive.

    noun — A member of an androgynous class of priests of the Sumerian goddess Inanna.

    noun — A showy and festive party.

    Appeared in 9 recorded puzzles.

  • galangal

    No cached definition. Look it up on Wiktionary.

    Appeared in 4 recorded puzzles.

  • gale

    No cached definition. Look it up on Wiktionary.

    Appeared in 4 recorded puzzles.

  • gall

    noun — Bile, especially that of an animal; the greenish, profoundly bitter-tasting fluid found in bile ducts and gall bladders, structures associated with the liver.

    verb — To bother or trouble.

    noun — A blister or tumor-like growth found on the surface of plants, caused by burrowing of insect larvae into the living tissues, especially that of the common oak gall wasp Cynips quercusfolii.

    verb — To impregnate with a decoction of gallnuts in dyeing.

    noun — The gall bladder.

    noun — Great misery or physical suffering, likened to the bitterest-tasting of substances.

    Appeared in 9 recorded puzzles.

  • galled

    No cached definition. Look it up on Wiktionary.

  • game

    No cached definition. Look it up on Wiktionary.

    Appeared in 6 recorded puzzles.

  • gamed

    No cached definition. Look it up on Wiktionary.

  • gamma

    noun — The third letter of the Greek alphabet (Γ, γ), preceded by beta (Β, β) and followed by delta, (Δ, δ).

    noun — A nonlinear operation used to encode and decode luminance or tristimulus values in video or still image systems.

    noun — The Gamma function, symbolized by Γ.

    noun — A constant approximately equal to 0.55721566, symbolized by γ (also known as the Euler–Mascheroni constant).

    noun — A non-SI unit of measure of magnetic flux density, equal to 1 nT.

    noun — (industries) slope of log-log plot of video input and luminance output.

    Appeared in 13 recorded puzzles.

  • gang

    No cached definition. Look it up on Wiktionary.

    Appeared in 12 recorded puzzles.

  • ganged

    No cached definition. Look it up on Wiktionary.

    Appeared in 2 recorded puzzles.

  • gangland

    No cached definition. Look it up on Wiktionary.

    Appeared in 2 recorded puzzles.

  • geld

    No cached definition. Look it up on Wiktionary.

    Appeared in 4 recorded puzzles.

  • gelded

    No cached definition. Look it up on Wiktionary.

    Appeared in 4 recorded puzzles.

  • gelee

    No cached definition. Look it up on Wiktionary.

    Appeared in 9 recorded puzzles.

  • gelled

    No cached definition. Look it up on Wiktionary.

    Appeared in 4 recorded puzzles.

  • gene

    noun — A theoretical unit of heredity of living organisms; a gene may take several values and in principle predetermines a precise trait of an organism's form (phenotype), such as hair color.

    noun — A segment of DNA or RNA from a cell's or an organism's genome, that may take several forms and thus parameterizes a phenomenon, in general the structure of a protein; locus.

    Appeared in 15 recorded puzzles.

  • glad

    No cached definition. Look it up on Wiktionary.

    Appeared in 2 recorded puzzles.

  • gladden

    No cached definition. Look it up on Wiktionary.

  • gladdened

    No cached definition. Look it up on Wiktionary.

  • glade

    No cached definition. Look it up on Wiktionary.

  • glam

    noun — Glamour.

    verb — To make glamorous or more glamorous.

    adjective — Glamorous.

    noun — A style of rock music, glam rock, associated with an androgynous yet masculine look and a driving, pounding bluesy form of psychedelic rock; the fashion and culture associated with this genre.

    Appeared in 5 recorded puzzles.

  • gland

    No cached definition. Look it up on Wiktionary.

    Appeared in 2 recorded puzzles.

  • gleam

    No cached definition. Look it up on Wiktionary.

  • gleamed

    No cached definition. Look it up on Wiktionary.

  • glean

    No cached definition. Look it up on Wiktionary.

    Appeared in 3 recorded puzzles.

  • gleaned

    No cached definition. Look it up on Wiktionary.

  • glee

    No cached definition. Look it up on Wiktionary.

    Appeared in 9 recorded puzzles.

  • glen

    No cached definition. Look it up on Wiktionary.

    Appeared in 6 recorded puzzles.

  • lagged

    No cached definition. Look it up on Wiktionary.

  • ledge

    No cached definition. Look it up on Wiktionary.

    Appeared in 4 recorded puzzles.

  • legal

    No cached definition. Look it up on Wiktionary.

    Appeared in 4 recorded puzzles.

  • legend

    No cached definition. Look it up on Wiktionary.

    Appeared in 3 recorded puzzles.

  • legged

    No cached definition. Look it up on Wiktionary.

    Appeared in 4 recorded puzzles.

  • mage

    No cached definition. Look it up on Wiktionary.

    Appeared in 6 recorded puzzles.

  • magma

    noun — The molten matter within the earth, the source of the material of lava flows, dikes of eruptive rocks, etc.

    noun — A basic algebraic structure consisting of a set equipped with a single binary operation.

    noun — Any soft doughy mass.

    noun — The residuum after expressing the juice from fruits.

    Appeared in 13 recorded puzzles.

  • manage

    No cached definition. Look it up on Wiktionary.

    Appeared in 6 recorded puzzles.

  • managed

    No cached definition. Look it up on Wiktionary.

  • manga

    noun — A comic originating in Japan.

    noun — A covering for a crucifix.

    noun — An artistic style heavily used in, and associated with, Japanese comics, and that has also been adopted by a comparatively low number of comics from other countries.

    noun — A comic in manga style, regardless of the country of origin.

    Appeared in 9 recorded puzzles.

  • mange

    No cached definition. Look it up on Wiktionary.

    Appeared in 6 recorded puzzles.

  • mangle

    No cached definition. Look it up on Wiktionary.

  • mangled

    No cached definition. Look it up on Wiktionary.

  • mega

    No cached definition. Look it up on Wiktionary.

    Appeared in 6 recorded puzzles.

  • megadeal

    No cached definition. Look it up on Wiktionary.

  • melange

    No cached definition. Look it up on Wiktionary.

  • nagged

    No cached definition. Look it up on Wiktionary.

    Appeared in 2 recorded puzzles.

mangled is a perfect pangram — all seven letters, each used exactly once.

Hints, no spoilers

Words by first two letters

  • ad×1
  • ag×3
  • al×5
  • am×1
  • an×3
  • da×5
  • ea×2
  • ed×2
  • eg×2
  • en×3
  • ga×16
  • ge×5
  • gl×12
  • la×1
  • le×4
  • ma×8
  • me×3
  • na×1

Words by first letter and length

456789Σ
a 2542·· 13
d 1·22·· 5
e 2322·· 9
g 1377321 33
l ·23··· 5
m 23231· 11
n ··1··· 1
Σ 2020211231 77

The numbers

Genius today takes 259 points of 370 available. The average answer runs 5.5 letters.

Total points vs. all 411 recorded puzzles
97th percentile
Word count vs. all recorded puzzles
100th percentile

Word lengths, today vs. 18583 recorded answers

420 today34.5% all-time520 today23.0% all-time621 today20.0% all-time712 today12.0% all-time83 today6.2% all-time91 today2.6% all-time101.3% all-time110.3% all-time120.1% all-time130.0% all-time

History

Today's letters, last seen

LetterLast in a puzzleLast as center
a Friday, December 19, 2025 Friday, December 12, 2025
d Wednesday, December 17, 2025 Thursday, December 4, 2025
e Friday, December 19, 2025 Friday, December 5, 2025
g ● Monday, December 15, 2025 Wednesday, December 10, 2025
l Friday, December 19, 2025 Tuesday, December 9, 2025
m Thursday, December 11, 2025 Tuesday, November 18, 2025
n Thursday, December 18, 2025 Monday, November 17, 2025

Most common answers, all recorded puzzles

  1. noon 44
  2. naan 33
  3. nana 33
  4. onion 31
  5. toot 29
  6. loll 29
  7. mama 27
  8. mamma 27
  9. nene 25
  10. cocoon 24
  11. acacia 24
  12. acai 24
  13. loon 24
  14. olio 24
  15. imam 23
  16. maim 23
  17. cancan 23
  18. canna 23
  19. mini 23
  20. minim 23
  21. neon 23
  22. none 23
  23. aria 22
  24. mitt 22
  25. bill 22

Valid words the Bee rejected

Dictionary words the Bee never takes

Legitimate words (per the ENABLE list) that fit the letters but aren't official answers — usually judged too obscure.