GLOOM

Meaning

Darkness, dimness or obscurity.

“the gloom of a forest, or of midnight”

• verbTo be dark or gloomy.

GLOOM as a word-puzzle answer

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

It leans on high-frequency letters (O), 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.

GLOOM by the numbers

Across the 1,734 curated answers in the Wordocious bank, O appears in 30% of answers (the 5th most common letter), L appears in 26% of answers (the 8th most common letter), G appears in 12% of answers (the 16th most common letter). 10 other answers share the opening “GL-”, 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: GROOM, BLOOM. Each of these turns four tiles green against GLOOM — the classic endgame squeeze where spending a guess on the differing letter beats burning attempts on hope.

Put it to use

Words like GLOOM 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.