CHILE

Meaning

The pungent, spicy fresh or dried fruit of any of several cultivated varieties of capsicum peppers, used in cooking.

• nounA dish made with chili peppers and other ingredients, such as beans and beef.

CHILE as a word-puzzle answer

CHILE is a 5-letter word with 2 vowels (I, E) and 3 consonants (C, H, L). Every letter is distinct, so it rarely punishes a clean opening guess.

It leans on high-frequency letters (I, 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.

CHILE by the numbers

Across the 1,734 curated answers in the Wordocious bank, E appears in 50% of answers (the 1st most common letter), I appears in 29% of answers (the 6th most common letter), L appears in 26% of answers (the 8th most common letter). 32 other answers share the opening “CH-”, so two green tiles up front still leave real guessing to do.

Difficulty: 2/5 — approachable, because 5+ near-miss answers compete for the same greens.

Near misses

One letter away in the answer bank: CHILL, CHIME, WHILE, CHILD, CHILI. Each of these turns four tiles green against CHILE — the classic endgame squeeze where spending a guess on the differing letter beats burning attempts on hope.

Put it to use

Words like CHILE 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.