GOUGE

Meaning

Senses relating to cutting tools. A chisel with a curved blade for cutting or scooping channels, grooves, or holes in wood, stone, etc. A bookbinder's tool with a curved face, used for blind tooling or gilding. An incising tool that cuts blanks or forms for envelopes, gloves, etc., from leather, paper, or other materials.

• nounA chisel with a curved blade for cutting or scooping channels, grooves, or holes in wood, stone, etc.
• nounA bookbinder's tool with a curved face, used for blind tooling or gilding.
• verbTo cheat or impose upon; in particular, to charge an unfairly or unreasonably high price.

GOUGE as a word-puzzle answer

GOUGE is a 5-letter word with 3 vowels (O, U, E) and 2 consonants (G, G). It repeats 1 letter, which is a classic trap — guessers who assume five distinct letters get stuck.

It leans on high-frequency letters (O, E), so a strong vowel-and-common-consonant opener tends to light up quickly. There are no rare letters here, so it is a fair, mid-difficulty answer for the daily Classic puzzle.

GOUGE by the numbers

Across the 1,734 curated answers in the Wordocious bank, E appears in 50% of answers (the 1st most common letter), O appears in 30% of answers (the 5th most common letter), U appears in 18% of answers (the 12th most common letter). 5 other answers share the opening “GO-”, so two green tiles up front still leave real guessing to do.

Difficulty: 3/5 — moderate, because the repeated letter hides one position.

Near misses

One letter away in the answer bank: GAUGE, ROUGE. Each of these turns four tiles green against GOUGE — the classic endgame squeeze where spending a guess on the differing letter beats burning attempts on hope.

Put it to use

Words like GOUGE are exactly what the daily puzzles throw at you. Warm up in Practice, race the clock in the Daily Challenge, or study the best starting words before your next run. New to the multi-board modes? The mode guides cover all nine.