Tuesday, August 18, 2026

Answers to yesterday's Bee

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The official answers for today's puzzle are:

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Number of Pangrams: 2

Maximum Puzzle Score: 228

Number of Answers: 42

Points Needed for Genius: 160

Genius requires between 21 and 36 words. You need at least a 7-letter word to reach genius. If you don't get the pangrams, you need 82% of the total points to reach genius. If you get the pangrams, you only need 65% of the remaining points to reach genius.

The button below will reveal a chart with the number of words by each letter. Red bars indicate that there is a pangram(s) starting with that letter.


How does this puzzle compare to other puzzles?

Today's score of 228 was in the 74th percentile of all puzzles.
The last time there was a score this high was on August 16, 2026.
The highest score ever was 537 on January 22, 2021.
The lowest score ever was 47 on March 27, 2023.

This puzzle's 42 possible answers rank it in the 55th percentile of all puzzles.
The last time there were more answers than this was on August 16, 2026.
The highest number of answers was 81 on June 08, 2019.
The lowest number of answers was 16 on March 27, 2023.

It takes a 7-letter word for genius.
The last time this happened was on August 16, 2026.

Today's puzzle has an average word length of 5.9.
For all Bees, the average word length has been 5.3.



Haven't I seen these letters before?

Hover over a letter to see its first and most recent appearance in the Bee!



Haven't I seen these words before?

The most common words in the Bee are:

  • noon 248
  • loll 228
  • toot 220
  • nana 207
  • naan 207
  • tilt 160
  • till 160
  • nene 160
  • mamma 160
  • mama 160
  • lilt 160
  • tint 156
  • onion 153
  • acai 150
  • acacia 150
  • toon 147
  • onto 147
  • olio 140
  • anon 139
  • anal 139
  • tact 130
  • dodo 130
  • papa 129
  • baba 129
  • mitt 128
  • lulu 126
  • lull 126
  • loon 124
  • poop 122
  • calla 122
  • call 122
  • booboo 122
  • boob 122
  • cocci 121
  • tartar 119
  • tart 119
  • ratatat 119
  • moon 119
  • mono 119
  • tattoo 118
  • attar 118
  • tutu 115
  • cancan 115
  • momma 114
  • aria 114
  • ammo 114
  • ally 114
  • allay 114
  • meme 113
  • roar 112


How long are words in the Bee?

There have been 121,969 answers ever accepted in the Bee - with 11,092 unique words.
Below are the distributions of the lengths of these words.



Valid dictionary words not in today's official answers

You may be wondering why these words aren't here*:

  • abba
  • abbe
  • anabaena
  • banda
  • baned
  • bedad
  • beebee
  • begad
  • bended
  • bendee
  • bene
  • benne
  • bhang
  • dahabeah
  • debag
  • debagged
  • gabba
  • gangbang
  • gangbanged
  • hebe
  • nabe

*Because the New York Times considers them obscure or offensive.

abed

adverb
  1. In bed, or on the bed; confined to bed.
  2. To childbed

baaed

No Definition Found.

baba

No Definition Found.

babe

No Definition Found.

bade

verb
  1. To issue a command; to tell.
  2. To invite; to summon.
  3. To utter a greeting or salutation.

badge

noun
  1. A distinctive mark, token, sign, emblem or cognizance, worn on one's clothing, as an insignia of some rank, or of the membership of an organization.
  2. A small nameplate, identifying the wearer, and often giving additional information.
  3. A card, sometimes with a barcode or magnetic strip, granting access to a certain area.
  4. Something characteristic; a mark; a token.
  5. (thieves' cant) A brand on the hand of a thief, etc.
  6. A carved ornament on the stern of a vessel, containing a window or the representation of one.
  7. A distinctive mark worn by servants, retainers, and followers of royalty or nobility, who, being beneath the rank of gentlemen, have no right to armorial bearings.
  8. A small overlay on an icon that shows additional information about that item, such as the number of new alerts or messages.
  9. An icon or emblem awarded to a user for some achievement.
verb
  1. To mark or distinguish with a badge.
  2. To show a badge to.
  3. To enter a restricted area by showing one's badge.

badged

verb
  1. To mark or distinguish with a badge.
  2. To show a badge to.
  3. To enter a restricted area by showing one's badge.

baggage

noun
  1. (usually uncountable) Luggage; traveling equipment
  2. Factors, especially psychological ones, which interfere with a person's ability to function effectively.
  3. A woman.
  4. An army's portable equipment; its baggage train.

bagged

verb
  1. To put into a bag.
  2. To catch or kill, especially when fishing or hunting.
  3. To gain possession of something, or to make first claim on something.
  4. To furnish or load with a bag.
  5. (African American Vernacular) To bring a woman one met on the street with one.
  6. (African American Vernacular) To laugh uncontrollably.
  7. To criticise sarcastically.
  8. To provide with artificial ventilation via a bag valve mask (BVM) resuscitator.
  9. To fit with a bag to collect urine.
  10. To (cause to) swell or hang down like a full bag.
  11. To hang like an empty bag.
  12. To drop away from the correct course.
  13. To swell with arrogance.
  14. To become pregnant.
adjective
  1. Having been placed in a bag.
  2. Having been caught or successfully hunted.

banana

noun
  1. An elongated curved tropical fruit that grows in bunches and has a creamy flesh and a smooth skin.
  2. The tropical tree-like plant which bears clusters of bananas. The plant, usually of the genus Musa but sometimes also including plants from Ensete, has large, elongated leaves and is related to the plantain.
  3. A yellow colour, like that of a banana's skin.
  4. (mildly) A person of Asian descent, especially a Chinese American, who has assimilated into Western culture or married a Caucasian (from the "yellow" outside and "white" inside). Compare coconut or Oreo.
  5. A banana equivalent dose.
  6. A catamorphism (from the use of banana brackets in the notation).
  7. The penis.
  8. A banana kick.
adjective
  1. Curved like a banana, especially of a ball in flight.

band

No Definition Found.

bandage

No Definition Found.

bandaged

No Definition Found.

bandana

No Definition Found.

bandanna

No Definition Found.

banded

No Definition Found.

bane

Etymology 1

noun
  1. A cause of misery or death.
  2. Poison, especially any of several poisonous plants.
  3. A killer, murderer, slayer.
  4. Destruction; death.
  5. A disease of sheep.
verb
  1. To kill, especially by poison; to be the poison of.
  2. To be the bane of.

Etymology 2

noun
  1. Bone

bang

No Definition Found.

banged

No Definition Found.

banned

verb
  1. To summon; to call out.
  2. To anathematize; to pronounce an ecclesiastical curse upon; to place under a ban.
  3. To curse; to execrate.
  4. To prohibit; to interdict; to proscribe; to forbid or block from participation.
  5. To curse; to utter curses or maledictions.
adjective
  1. Forbidden; not allowed.

bead

noun
  1. Prayer, later especially with a rosary.
  2. Each in a string of small balls making up the rosary or paternoster.
  3. A small, round object.
  4. (heading) A ridge, band, or molding.
  5. Knowledge sufficient to direct one's activities to a purpose.
  6. A glassy drop of molten flux, as borax or microcosmic salt, used as a solvent and color test for several mineral earths and oxides, as of iron, manganese, etc., before the blowpipe.
  7. Front sight of a gun.
verb
  1. To form into a bead.
  2. To apply beads to.
  3. To form into a bead.
  4. To cause beads to form on (something).

beaded

verb
  1. To form into a bead.
  2. To apply beads to.
  3. To form into a bead.
  4. To cause beads to form on (something).
adjective
  1. Made from, or decorated with, beads.
  2. Having formed in beads or a bead-like shape.

bean

No Definition Found.

beanbag

noun
  1. A piece of soft furniture consisting of a leather or vinyl covering stuffed with dry beans or other similar pellets.
  2. A small cloth bag filled with dry beans, used as a toy or for exercising the hands.
  3. A type of juggling ball usually made from leather or cloth stuffed with dry beans.
  4. (usually in the plural) A testicle.
  5. An idiot.

beaned

No Definition Found.

bedded

No Definition Found.

bedhead

No Definition Found.

been

noun
  1. A flying insect, of the clade Anthophila within the hymenopteran superfamily Apoidea, known for its organised societies (though only a minority have them), for collecting pollen and (in some species) producing wax and honey.

began

verb
  1. To start, to initiate or take the first step into something.
  2. To be in the first stage of some situation
  3. To come into existence.

begged

verb
  1. To request the help of someone, often in the form of money.
  2. To plead with someone for help, a favor, etc.; to entreat.
  3. In the phrase beg the question: to assume.
  4. In the phrase beg the question: to raise (a question).
  5. To ask to be appointed guardian for, or to ask to have a guardian appointed for.

behead

No Definition Found.

beheaded

verb
  1. To remove the head of; to cut someone's head off.
adjective
  1. Having had one's head cut off.

bend

No Definition Found.

dabbed

verb
  1. To press lightly in a repetitive motion with a soft object without rubbing.
  2. To apply a substance in this way.
  3. To strike by a thrust; to hit with a sudden blow or thrust.
  4. To apply hash oil to a heated surface for the purpose of efficient combustion.
  5. To perform the dab dance move, by moving both arms to one side of the body parallel with your head.

ebbed

No Definition Found.

gabbed

verb
  1. To jest; to tell lies in jest; exaggerate; lie.
  2. To talk or chatter a lot, usually on trivial subjects.
  3. To speak or tell falsely.

handbag

noun
  1. (mainly Commonwealth) A small bag used by women (or sometimes by men) for carrying various small personal items.
  2. An subgenre of house music of the late 1980s, often with booming vocals.
verb
  1. Figuratively, to hit with a handbag; to attack verbally or subject to criticism (used of Margaret Thatcher).

headband

noun
  1. A strip of fabric worn around the head.
  2. A hair-accessory, made of a flexible material and curved like a horseshoe, for holding one's hair back.
  3. A strip of fabric attached to the top of the spine of a book; used as decoration and reinforcement.
  4. A thin slip of iron on the tympan of a printing-press.

henbane

noun
  1. A poisonous plant, Hyoscyamus niger, used sometimes as a drug that causes at least hallucinations, dilated pupils, restlessness, and flushed skin.
  2. Any other plant of the genus Hyoscyamus.

nabbed

No Definition Found.

headbang

No Definition Found.

headbanged

No Definition Found.