๐ NYT Spelling BeeGuides, Codes & Tips
NYT Spelling Bee is a daily word puzzle from The New York Times where you build as many words as possible from a honeycomb of seven letters, always including the center letter. Published online since May 2018 and edited by Sam Ezersky, it has grown into one of the most-played daily word games alongside Wordle and the Crossword. This hub collects daily answers, pangram reveals, spoiler-free hints, scoring breakdowns, and strategy guides to help you reach Genius โ or the coveted Queen Bee rank.
How to Play NYT Spelling Bee
Each puzzle presents a hexagonal hive of seven letters: one center letter surrounded by six outer letters. Your goal is to find as many valid words as possible using only those seven letters, with two hard rules: every word must be at least four letters long, and every word must contain the center letter. Letters can be reused freely within a single word. Proper nouns, hyphenated words, and obscure terms are excluded โ the word list is curated by the puzzle editor, so some common words may be missing while unexpected ones appear.
Scoring and Ranking: Beginner to Queen Bee
Four-letter words are worth exactly 1 point. Words of five or more letters are worth one point per letter. Pangrams โ words that use all seven letters at least once โ earn the word's letter count plus a 7-point bonus, making them the highest-value finds in any puzzle. Your score unlocks ten progressive ranks: Beginner, Good Start, Moving Up, Good, Solid, Nice, Great, Amazing, Genius, and Queen Bee. Each threshold is a dynamic percentage of that day's maximum possible score, so the raw points needed shift daily. Genius requires roughly 70% of the maximum; Queen Bee requires finding every accepted word in the puzzle.
What Is a Pangram โ and Why It Matters
A pangram is any accepted word that uses all seven letters in the hive at least once. Every Spelling Bee puzzle is guaranteed to contain at least one pangram, and some days have two or more. Finding the pangram is the single biggest point swing available and often unlocks the mental framework you need to discover smaller words you had overlooked. A pangram that uses each of the seven letters exactly once is sometimes called a 'perfect pangram,' though the puzzle itself does not label them differently.
Hints: How to Get Help Without Full Spoilers
The New York Times does not provide in-game hints beyond the letter hive itself. The broader Spelling Bee community has settled on a spoiler-aware hints format: the total number of words and points available, a count of words by starting letter, and a grid showing how many words of each length start with each letter. This lets you confirm whether you have found everything starting with a given letter without revealing the actual words. Our daily hints page follows this convention โ spoiler-free letter counts first, with full answers available one click further in.
Strategies for Reaching Genius
Experienced solvers recommend a few consistent approaches. First, scan for the pangram early: try common prefixes and suffixes using the center letter and see which combinations use all seven letters. Second, work verb endings systematically โ adding -ing, -ed, -er, and -s to words you already found often reveals additional accepted entries. Third, use the shuffle button to reorder the outer letters; seeing the hive in a new arrangement resets your visual pattern-matching. Finally, do not overlook short plurals and past tenses of four-letter roots, which count as separate words and are easy to miss.
Today's Answers and Daily Archive
A new Spelling Bee puzzle publishes daily at midnight Eastern Time, replacing the previous day's puzzle entirely โ there is no catch-up mode within the official app. Our daily answers page is updated each morning with the full word list, the pangram highlighted, point totals, and a breakdown by starting letter and length. The archive section covers past puzzles for players who want to practice on historical hives or verify a word they found after the puzzle rotated.
NYT Spelling Bee FAQ
Does every Spelling Bee puzzle have a pangram?
Yes. Every puzzle is built around at least one pangram โ a word that uses all seven letters at least once. Some puzzles contain two pangrams. The NYT does not publish a puzzle without one.
What is the difference between Genius and Queen Bee?
Genius requires scoring approximately 70% of the day's maximum possible points. Queen Bee requires finding every single accepted word in the puzzle โ 100% of the word list. Queen Bee is significantly harder and many dedicated players reach Genius daily without ever hitting Queen Bee.
Can I reuse letters in a word?
Yes. Each of the seven letters can appear multiple times in a single word. For example, if 'A' is in the hive, you can use it twice or more in one entry as long as the word is real and includes the center letter.
Why did the puzzle reject a word I know is real?
The Spelling Bee word list is hand-curated by editor Sam Ezersky, not drawn from a standard dictionary. Common words are sometimes excluded because they are considered offensive, too obscure, or overly technical. Proper nouns and hyphenated words are always excluded. Accepted words occasionally surprise solvers in both directions.
What time does the new Spelling Bee puzzle go live?
A new puzzle publishes every day at midnight Eastern Time. There is no carryover โ once the new puzzle is live, the previous day's puzzle is no longer playable in the official NYT Games app or website.
Is Spelling Bee free or does it require a subscription?
As of 2026, the NYT Spelling Bee requires a New York Times Games subscription or an all-access NYT subscription. It is not available on the free tier, unlike some other NYT puzzle products that offer a limited number of free plays.
