Friday, January 10, 2025

Answers to yesterday's Bee

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The official answers for today's puzzle are:

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Number of Pangrams: 1

Maximum Puzzle Score: 124

Number of Answers: 34

Points Needed for Genius: 87

Genius requires between 14 and 30 words. You need at least a 6-letter word to reach genius. If you don't get the pangram, you need 80% of the total points to reach genius. If you get the pangram, you only need 66% of the remaining points to reach genius.

Other days with this pangram:

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 124 was in the 27th percentile of all puzzles.
The last time there was a score this low was on January 2, 2025.
The highest score ever was 537 on January 22, 2021.
The lowest score ever was 47 on March 27, 2023.

This puzzle's 34 possible answers rank it in the 38th percentile of all puzzles.
The last time there were fewer answers than this was on January 2, 2025.
The highest number of answers was 81 on June 8, 2019.
The lowest number of answers was 16 on March 27, 2023.

It takes a 6-letter word for genius.
The last time this happened was on January 4, 2025.

Today's puzzle has an average word length of 4.9.
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 190
  • loll 181
  • toot 176
  • naan 166
  • nana 166
  • lilt 131
  • till 131
  • tilt 131
  • tint 128
  • mama 123
  • mamma 123
  • nene 122
  • acacia 115
  • acai 115
  • onto 115
  • toon 115
  • anal 110
  • onion 110
  • anon 107
  • boob 107
  • booboo 107
  • olio 104
  • papa 103
  • baba 102
  • lull 102
  • lulu 102
  • mitt 101
  • poop 101
  • tact 101
  • dodo 100
  • allay 99
  • ally 99
  • call 99
  • calla 99
  • ratatat 99
  • tart 99
  • tartar 99
  • attar 98
  • tattoo 97
  • tatty 97
  • tutu 97
  • cocci 96
  • mono 96
  • moon 96
  • ammo 95
  • momma 95
  • epee 94
  • peep 94
  • loon 91
  • nanny 91


How long are words in the Bee?

There have been 95,644 answers ever accepted in the Bee - with 10,406 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*:

  • lilliput
  • limuli
  • limy
  • litu
  • lumpily
  • milium
  • milt
  • milty
  • pili
  • pily
  • plumply
  • plumpy
  • plumy
  • pullup
  • pulpily
  • tumuli
  • yill

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

ilium

noun
  1. The upper and widest of the three bones that make up each side of the hipbone and pelvis.
  2. The ileum, part of the small intestine.

illy

No Definition Found.

imply

verb
  1. (of a proposition) to have as a necessary consequence
  2. (of a person) to suggest by logical inference
  3. (of a person or proposition) to hint; to insinuate; to suggest tacitly and avoid a direct statement
  4. To enfold, entangle.

lilt

noun
  1. Animated, brisk motion; spirited rhythm; sprightliness.
  2. A lively song or dance; a cheerful tune.
  3. A cheerful or melodious accent when speaking.
verb
  1. To do something rhythmically, with animation and quickness, usually of music.
  2. To sing cheerfully, especially in Gaelic.
  3. To utter with spirit, animation, or gaiety; to sing with spirit and liveliness.

lily

noun
  1. Any of several flowers in the genus Lilium of the family Liliaceae, which includes a great many ornamental species.
  2. Any of several species of herbaceous flower which may or may not resemble the genus Lilium in some way, and which are not closely related to it or each other.
  3. The flower used as a heraldic charge; also commonly used to describe the fleur-de-lis.
  4. The end of a compass needle that should point north, traditionally often ornamented with the figure of a lily or fleur-de-lis.
  5. (usually in the plural) A royal spade in auction bridge.
  6. The thirtieth Lenormand card, representing calmness and maturity.
adjective
  1. White (as a racial epithet).

limit

Etymology 1

noun
  1. A restriction; a bound beyond which one may not go.
  2. A value to which a sequence converges. Equivalently, the common value of the upper limit and the lower limit of a sequence: if the upper and lower limits are different, then the sequence has no limit (i.e., does not converge).
  3. Any of several abstractions of this concept of limit.
  4. The cone of a diagram through which any other cone of that same diagram can factor uniquely.
  5. Fixed limit.
  6. The final, utmost, or furthest point; the border or edge.
  7. The space or thing defined by limits.
  8. That which terminates a period of time; hence, the period itself; the full time or extent.
  9. A restriction; a check or curb; a hindrance.
  10. A determining feature; a distinguishing characteristic.
  11. The first group of riders to depart in a handicap race.
  12. (as "the limit") A person who is exasperating, intolerable, astounding, etc.
adjective
  1. Being a fixed limit game.

Etymology 2

verb
  1. To restrict; not to allow to go beyond a certain bound, to set boundaries.
  2. To have a limit in a particular set.
  3. To beg, or to exercise functions, within a certain limited region.

limp

Etymology 1

noun
  1. An irregular, jerky or awkward gait.
  2. A scraper for removing poor ore or refuse from the sieve.
verb
  1. To walk lamely, as if favouring one leg.
  2. (of a vehicle) To travel with a malfunctioning system of propulsion.
  3. To move or proceed irregularly.
  4. To call, particularly in an unraised pot pre-flop.

Etymology 2

noun
  1. A scraper of board or sheet-iron shaped like half the head of a small cask, used for scraping the ore off the sieve in the operation of hand-jigging.
verb
  1. To be inadequate or unsatisfactory.
adjective
  1. Flaccid; flabby, like flesh.
  2. Lacking stiffness; flimsy
  3. (of a penis) not erect
  4. (of a man) not having an erect penis
  5. Physically weak

Etymology 3

verb
  1. To happen; befall; chance.
  2. To come upon; meet.

limply

No Definition Found.

lippy

Etymology 1

adjective
  1. Having prominent lips.
  2. Having a tendency to talk back in a cheeky or impertinent manner.

Etymology 2

noun
  1. Lip gloss or lipstick; a stick of this product.

Etymology 3

noun
  1. An old dry measure amounting to one quarter of a peck (for goods sold by weight, 1¾ pounds or about four-fifths of a kilogram); also, a container of that capacity.

lull

noun
  1. A period of rest or soothing.
  2. A period of reduced activity; a respite
  3. A period without waves or wind.
  4. An extended pause between sets of waves.
verb
  1. To cause to rest by soothing influences; to compose; to calm
  2. To become gradually calm; to subside; to cease or abate.

lulu

noun
  1. A remarkable person, object or idea.
  2. A very attractive or alluring person.
  3. A very bad mistake or error.
  4. A fixed allowance paid to a legislator in lieu of reimbursement for actual expenses.

lump

noun
  1. Something that protrudes, sticks out, or sticks together; a cluster or blob; a mound or mass of no particular shape.
  2. A group, set, or unit.
  3. A small, shaped mass of sugar, typically about a teaspoonful.
  4. A dull or lazy person.
  5. (as plural) A beating or verbal abuse.
  6. A projection beneath the breech end of a gun barrel.
  7. A kind of fish, the lumpsucker.
  8. Food given to a tramp to be eaten on the road.
verb
  1. To treat as a single unit; to group together in a casual or chaotic manner (as if forming an ill-defined lump of the items).
  2. To bear a heavy or awkward burden; to carry something unwieldy from one place to another.
  3. To hit or strike (a person).

lumpy

adjective
  1. Full of lumps, not smooth.
  2. Of a water surface: covered in many small waves as a result of wind; choppy.

mill

Etymology 1

noun
  1. A grinding apparatus for substances such as grains, seeds, etc.
  2. The building housing such a grinding apparatus.
  3. A machine used for expelling the juice, sap, etc., from vegetable tissues by pressure, or by pressure in combination with a grinding, or cutting process.
  4. A machine for grinding and polishing.
  5. The raised or ridged edge or surface made in milling anything, such as a coin or screw.
  6. A manufacturing plant for paper, steel, textiles, etc.
  7. A building housing such a plant.
  8. An establishment that handles a certain type of situation or procedure routinely, or produces large quantities of an item without much regard to quality, such as a divorce mill, a puppy mill, etc.
  9. An institution awarding educational certificates not officially recognised
  10. An engine.
  11. A boxing match, fistfight.
  12. (die sinking) A hardened steel roller with a design in relief, used for imprinting a reversed copy of the design in a softer metal, such as copper.
  13. An excavation in rock, transverse to the workings, from which material for filling is obtained.
  14. A passage underground through which ore is shot.
  15. A milling cutter.
  16. A treadmill.
  17. A typewriter used to transcribe messages received.
verb
  1. To grind or otherwise process in a mill or other machine.
  2. To shape, polish, dress or finish using a machine.
  3. To engrave one or more grooves or a pattern around the edge of (a cylindrical object such as a coin).
  4. (followed by around, about, etc.) To move about in an aimless fashion.
  5. To cause to mill, or circle around.
  6. (of air-breathing creatures) To swim underwater.
  7. (of a whale) To swim suddenly in a new direction.
  8. To beat; to pound.
  9. To pass through a fulling mill; to full, as cloth.
  10. To roll (steel, etc.) into bars.
  11. To make (drinking chocolate) frothy, as by churning.
  12. To undergo hulling.
  13. To take part in a fistfight; to box.
  14. To fill (a winze or interior incline) with broken ore, to be drawn out at the bottom.
  15. (thieves' cant) To commit burglary.

Etymology 2

noun
  1. An obsolete coin worth one thousandth of a US dollar, or one tenth of a cent.
  2. One thousandth part, particularly in millage rates of property tax.

Etymology 3

noun
  1. An angular mil, a unit of angular measurement equal to 1⁄6400 of a complete circle. At 1000 metres one mil subtends about one metre (0.98 m). Also 1⁄6000 and 1⁄6300 are used in other countries.
  2. A unit of measurement equal to 1⁄1000 of an inch, usually used for thin objects, such as sheets of plastic.
  3. A former subdivision (1/1000) of the Maltese lira
  4. (plural "mil") Abbreviation of million.
noun
  1. A unit of measure of capacity, being one thousandth of a litre. Symbol: ml

Etymology 4

noun
  1. A line of three matching pieces in nine men's morris and related games.

Etymology 5

noun
  1. (trading card games) Discarding a card from one's deck.
  2. (trading card games) A strategy centered on depleting the opponent's deck.
verb
  1. (trading card games) To move (a card) from a deck to the discard pile.
  2. (Hearthstone) To destroy (a card) due to having a full hand.

mull

Etymology 1

noun
  1. A thin, soft muslin.
  2. Marijuana that has been chopped to prepare it for smoking.
  3. A stew of meat, broth, milk, butter, vegetables, and seasonings, thickened with soda crackers.
  4. The gauze used in bookbinding to adhere a text block to a book's cover.
  5. An inferior kind of madder prepared from the smaller roots or the peelings and refuse of the larger.
verb
  1. (usually with over) To work (over) mentally; to cogitate; to ruminate.
  2. To powder; to pulverize.
  3. To chop marijuana so that it becomes a smokable form.
  4. To heat and spice something, such as wine.
  5. To join two or more individual windows at mullions.
  6. To dull or stupefy.

Etymology 2

noun
  1. A promontory.
  2. A snuffbox made of the small end of a horn.

Etymology 3

noun
  1. Dirt; rubbish

multiply

Etymology 1

noun
  1. An act or instance of multiplying.
verb
  1. To increase the amount, degree or number of (something).
  2. (with by) To perform multiplication on (a number).
  3. To grow in number.
  4. To breed or propagate.
  5. To perform multiplication.
  6. To be a factor in a multiplication with (another factor).

Etymology 2

adverb
  1. In many or multiple ways.

pill

Etymology 1

noun
  1. A small, usually round or cylindrical object designed for easy swallowing, usually containing some sort of medication.
  2. (definite, i.e. used with "the") Contraceptive medication, usually in the form of a pill to be taken by a woman; an oral contraceptive pill.
  3. A comical or entertaining person.
  4. A contemptible, annoying, or unpleasant person.
  5. A small piece of any substance, for example a ball of fibres formed on the surface of a textile by rubbing.
  6. A baseball.
  7. A bullet (projectile).
  8. A rounded rectangle indicating the tag or category that an item belongs to.
verb
  1. Of a woven fabric surface, to form small matted balls of fiber.
  2. To form into the shape of a pill.
  3. To medicate with pills.
  4. To persuade or convince someone of something.

Etymology 2

noun
  1. The peel or skin.
verb
  1. To peel; to remove the outer layer of hair, skin, or bark.
  2. To peel; to make by removing the skin.
  3. To be peeled; to peel off in flakes.
  4. To pillage; to despoil or impoverish.

Etymology 3

noun
  1. An inlet on the coast; a small tidal pool or bay.

pimply

No Definition Found.

plum

Etymology 1

noun
  1. The fruit and its tree.
  2. Extended senses.
adjective
  1. Of a dark bluish-red colour.
  2. Choice; especially lavish or preferred.

Etymology 2

verb
  1. To plumb.
adjective
  1. Plumb
adverb
  1. Completely; utterly.

plummy

adjective
  1. Of, pertaining to, containing, or characteristic of plums
  2. Desirable; profitable; advantageous
  3. (of a voice) rich, mellow and carefully articulated, especially with an upper-class accent

plump

Etymology 1

verb
  1. To grow plump; to swell out.
  2. To make plump; to fill (out) or support; often with up.
  3. To cast or let drop all at once, suddenly and heavily.
  4. To give a plumper (kind of vote).
  5. To give (a vote), as a plumper.
  6. To favor or decide in favor of something.
adjective
  1. Having a full and rounded shape; chubby, somewhat overweight.
  2. Fat.
  3. Sudden and without reservation; blunt; direct; downright.

Etymology 2

noun
  1. The sound of a sudden heavy fall.
verb
  1. To drop or fall suddenly or heavily, all at once.
adverb
  1. Directly; suddenly; perpendicularly.

Etymology 3

noun
  1. A knot or cluster; a group; a crowd.

puli

noun
  1. One of a breed of Hungarian sheepdog with a distinctive thick, corded coat.

pull

noun
  1. An act of pulling (applying force)
  2. An attractive force which causes motion towards the source
  3. Any device meant to be pulled, as a lever, knob, handle, or rope
  4. Something in one's favour in a comparison or a contest; an advantage; means of influencing.
  5. Appeal or attraction (e.g. of a movie star)
  6. The situation where a client sends out a request for data from a server, as in server pull, pull technology
  7. A journey made by rowing
  8. A contest; a struggle.
  9. Loss or violence suffered.
  10. The act of drinking; a mouthful or swig of a drink.
  11. A kind of stroke by which a leg ball is sent to the off side, or an off ball to the side.
  12. A mishit shot which travels in a straight line and (for a right-handed player) left of the intended path.
  13. A single impression from a handpress.
verb
  1. To apply a force to (an object) so that it comes toward the person or thing applying the force.
  2. To gather with the hand, or by drawing toward oneself; to pluck.
  3. To attract or net; to pull in.
  4. To persuade (someone) to have sex with one.
  5. To remove (something), especially from public circulation or availability.
  6. To retrieve or generate for use.
  7. To do or perform.
  8. (with 'a' and the name of a person, place, event, etc.) To copy or emulate the actions or behaviour that is associated with the person or thing mentioned.
  9. To toss a frisbee with the intention of launching the disc across the length of a field.
  10. To row.
  11. To achieve by rowing on a rowing machine.
  12. To draw apart; to tear; to rend.
  13. To strain (a muscle, tendon, ligament, etc.).
  14. To draw (a hostile non-player character) into combat, or toward or away from some location or target.
  15. To score a certain number of points in a sport.
  16. To hold back, and so prevent from winning.
  17. To take or make (a proof or impression); so called because hand presses were worked by pulling a lever.
  18. To strike the ball in a particular manner. (See noun sense.)
  19. To draw beer from a pump, keg, or other source.
  20. (rail transportation, of a railroad car) To pull out from a yard or station; to leave.
  21. To pluck or pick (flowers, fruit etc.).
interjection
  1. Command used by a target shooter to request that the target be released/launched.

pulp

noun
  1. A soft, moist, shapeless mass or matter.
  2. A magazine or book containing lurid subject matter and characteristically printed on rough, unfinished paper.
verb
  1. To make or be made into pulp.
  2. To beat to a pulp.
  3. To deprive of pulp; to separate the pulp from.
adjective
  1. Of or pertaining to pulp magazines; in the style of a pulp magazine or the material printed within such a publication.

pulpit

noun
  1. A raised platform in a church, usually enclosed, where the minister or preacher stands when giving the sermon.
  2. Activity performed from a church pulpit, in other words, preaching, sermons, religious teaching, the preaching profession, preachers collectively or an individual preaching position; by extension: bully pulpit.
  3. A raised desk, lectern, or platform for an orator or public speaker.
  4. The railing at the bow of a boat, which sometimes extends past the deck. It is sometimes referred to as bow pulpit. The railing at the stern of the boat is sometimes referred to as a stern pulpit; other texts use the term pushpit.
  5. A bow platform for harpooning.
  6. A plane's cockpit.

pulpy

adjective
  1. Having the characteristics of pulp
  2. Having the characteristics of pulp fiction; thus, having a garish focus on sex and violence

pupil

Etymology 1

noun
  1. A learner under the supervision of a teacher or professor.
  2. An orphan who is a minor and under the protection of the state.

Etymology 2

noun
  1. The hole in the middle of the iris of the eye, through which light passes to be focused on the retina.
  2. The central dark part of an ocellated spot.

till

Etymology 1

preposition
  1. Until; to, up to; as late as (a given time).
  2. To, up to (physically).
  3. To make it possible that.
conjunction
  1. Until, until the time that.

Etymology 2

noun
  1. A cash register.
  2. A removable box within a cash register containing the money.
  3. The contents of a cash register, for example at the beginning or end of the day or of a cashier's shift.
  4. A tray or drawer in a chest.

Etymology 3

verb
  1. To develop so as to improve or prepare for usage; to cultivate (said of knowledge, virtue, mind etc.).
  2. To work or cultivate or plough (soil); to prepare for growing vegetation and crops.
  3. To cultivate soil.
  4. To prepare; to get.

Etymology 4

noun
  1. Glacial drift consisting of a mixture of clay, sand, pebbles and boulders
  2. Manure or other material used to fertilize land

Etymology 5

noun
  1. A vetch; a tare.

tilt

Etymology 1

noun
  1. A slope or inclination.
  2. The inclination of part of the body, such as backbone, pelvis, head, etc.
  3. The controlled vertical movement of a camera, or a device to achieve this.
  4. A jousting contest.
  5. An attempt at something, such as a tilt at public office.
  6. A thrust, as with a lance.
  7. A tilt hammer.
verb
  1. To slope or incline (something); to slant.
  2. (jousting) To charge (at someone) with a lance.
  3. To be at an angle.
  4. To point or thrust a weapon at.
  5. To point or thrust (a weapon).
  6. To forge (something) with a tilt hammer.
  7. To play worse than usual (often as a result of previous bad luck or losses).
  8. (of a machine) To intentionally let the ball fall down to the drain by disabling flippers and most targets, done as a punishment to the player when the machine is nudged too violently or frequently.

Etymology 2

noun
  1. A canvas covering for carts, boats, etc.
  2. Any covering overhead; especially, a tent.
verb
  1. To cover with a tilt, or awning.

tulip

noun
  1. A type of flowering plant, genus Tulipa.
  2. The flower of this plant.

tumult

noun
  1. Confused, agitated noise as made by a crowd.
  2. Violent commotion or agitation, often with confusion of sounds.
  3. A riot or uprising.
verb
  1. To make a tumult; to be in great commotion.

uplit

No Definition Found.

uptilt

No Definition Found.

utility

noun
  1. The state or condition of being useful; usefulness.
  2. Something that is useful.
  3. The ability of a commodity to satisfy needs or wants; the satisfaction experienced by the consumer of that commodity.
  4. Well-being, satisfaction, pleasure, or happiness.
  5. A service provider, such as an electric company or water company; or, the securities of such a provider.
  6. A software program designed to perform a single task or a small range of tasks, often to help manage and tune computer hardware, an operating system or application software.
  7. The ability to play multiple positions.
adjective
  1. Having to do with, or owned by, a service provider.
  2. Designating of a room in a house or building where mechanical equipment is installed; such as a furnace, water tank/heater, circuit breaker, and/or air conditioning unit; and often equipped with hookups for laundry equipment (washer/dryer).