Word of the Day · Tuesday, June 25, 2024
/ˈbʊli/noun
A person who is intentionally, physically, or emotionally cruel to others; especially to those who are weaker or have less power or privilege.
“A playground bully pushed a girl off the swing.”
Similarhenchman, thug, pimp, push around, ride roughshod over, dashing, excellent
BULLY is a 5-letter word with 1 vowel (U) and 4 consonants (B, L, L, Y). It repeats 1 letter, which is a classic trap — guessers who assume five distinct letters get stuck.
There are no rare letters here, so it is a fair, mid-difficulty answer for the daily Classic puzzle.
Across the 1,734 curated answers in the Wordocious bank, L appears in 26% of answers (the 8th most common letter), U appears in 18% of answers (the 12th most common letter), Y appears in 14% of answers (the 14th most common letter). 14 other answers share the opening “BU-”, so two green tiles up front still leave real guessing to do.
Difficulty: 4/5 — tricky, because the repeated letter hides one position, and 4+ near-miss answers compete for the same greens.
One letter away in the answer bank: FULLY, BELLY, GULLY, BULKY. Each of these turns four tiles green against BULLY — the classic endgame squeeze where spending a guess on the differing letter beats burning attempts on hope.
Words like BULLY 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.
Definitions adapted from Wiktionary via the Free Dictionary API (CC BY-SA). Letter statistics, difficulty ratings, and near-miss analysis are original Wordocious research computed from our curated answer list.