Hi — I’m Bill. This Is a One-Person Site.
I build SpellingBeeFinder, I run it, and I check it every day. Here’s why it exists and exactly how it works.
Why This Site Exists
Every Spelling Bee answer site publishes a word list. Almost none of them tell you the truth about it: perfectly valid dictionary words get rejected by NYT’s editor every single day, and most sites either miss those words entirely or quietly pretend the problem doesn’t exist. You play a word you found on some answer site, the puzzle refuses it, and nobody explains why.
That bothered me enough to build a site around fixing it.
How This Site Actually Works
The moment the puzzle goes live each morning, we publish the complete early word list for the day’s letters — clearly labeled as the early list, so you always know what you’re looking at.
Every evening, the list is checked against NYT’s officially accepted answers. Every valid word the editor rejected gets marked with an orange box. If a word didn’t count, you’ll see exactly which one — honestly.
As far as I know, no other Spelling Bee site shows you this. The daily answers archive carries those verified lists going back through recent puzzles, and reviewing the rejected-but-valid words is quietly one of the best ways to learn how the editor thinks — our strategy guide explains how to use them.
How the Daily Word List Is Built
Here’s the part most sites won’t explain. Two things have to happen before a day’s list is worth trusting.
First, the early list. The moment the puzzle rotates, I take the seven letters straight from the day’s NYT Bee and run them through a full English dictionary — keeping every word that is at least four letters long, uses only those seven letters (repeats allowed), and includes the center letter. That produces the complete set of words that could count, and it goes up right away, clearly labeled as the early list, so anyone checking mid-morning isn’t left waiting for the evening.
Then, the evening check. Later each day I compare that early list against the answers the NYT editor actually accepted. The Bee is famously opinionated — the editor leaves out plenty of legitimate dictionary words — so this is the step where a rough list becomes a real answer key. Crucially, words the editor didn’t accept aren’t deleted and quietly buried; they’re flagged, because “this is a real word the Bee refused” is genuinely useful to know.
One more detail that matters for trust: every day’s page is generated from a single saved data file, and rebuilding a past day reproduces the exact same list. A date you bookmarked won’t silently change under you, and the word counts, Genius score, and pangram on the page always come from the same source.
The Words NYT Rejects — and Why I Show Them
The single most confusing thing about the Spelling Bee is that valid words get turned down. You find ITAI or NAAN or some perfectly real word, the puzzle shrugs, and no explanation appears. Every answer site lists the accepted words; almost none of them tell you which nearby words the editor rejected, so you keep making the same doomed guesses.
That’s what the orange box is for. On every answer page, a word marked with an orange box is a real dictionary word that NYT chose not to accept for that puzzle. Seeing the rejects next to the accepts is the fastest way to internalize the editor’s taste — the obscure plurals, the borderline slang, the variant spellings that never make the cut. If you want the patterns spelled out, the strategy guide and the rules & scoring page cover them in depth.
Everything on the Site
It’s all free and all built for the phone you probably play on. Here’s the quick tour:
- Spelling Bee Solver →
Type the seven letters and see every valid word instantly, with points and pangrams marked. The fastest way out of a stuck puzzle.
- Today’s Hints →
A nudge instead of the answers: how many words start with each letter, at each length, plus the two-letter start list — the classic Bee grid, rebuilt for each puzzle.
- Daily Answers Archive →
Every recent day’s full word list, pangram, Genius threshold, and point total — with the rejected-but-valid words marked in orange.
- Rules & Scoring →
How points, pangrams, and the nine rank tiers from Beginner to Genius actually work.
- Genius Strategy →
A repeatable method for reaching Genius — and, on a good day, Queen Bee — faster.
- Pangram Guide →
How to spot the word that uses all seven letters, which is worth a 7-point bonus and often the difference between ranks.
- Queen Bee →
What it takes to find every single word, and whether it’s worth chasing.
What I Promise
Accuracy, Errors, and Corrections
I get things wrong sometimes — a scraper hiccups, a source lags, a word slips through. What I can promise is that mistakes get caught and fixed rather than left to rot. Each morning’s list is re-checked against the official answers that evening, and an automated health check flags any day whose data looks off (an empty pangram, a word count that’s far too low, a page that failed to build) so it can be corrected quickly.
Because every page is generated from one saved data file per day, a single correction fixes everything downstream at once — the answer page, the hints grid, the archive card, and the totals all update together, so they can never drift out of sync. If you spot something wrong, the contact page reaches a real person, and I’ll fix the page itself, not just send a reply.
The Honest Fine Print
SpellingBeeFinder isn’t affiliated with The New York Times — it’s an independent, unofficial helper for people who love the puzzle. The site stays free because of advertising and Amazon affiliate links on the Books & Gear page; those are always disclosed and never dressed up as anything else. The full details live in the disclaimer and privacy policy.
Stuck on today’s puzzle? The solver is the fastest way to see every word. Want yesterday’s? The archive has every answer — with the rejected words marked in orange.