Spelling Bee February 22, 2026 answers
All accepted words for today's NYT Spelling Bee, with the pangram revealed, point totals, and progress thresholds for each rank.
Today's letter set · Center: L
Puzzle stats
Total words
43
Total points
226
Pangrams
2
Genius score
158
Center letter
L
Pangrams
Uses all 7 letters
- LURKING
- LURKING
Rank thresholds
Beginner
0 pts
0%
Good Start
4 pts
2%
Moving Up
11 pts
5%
Good
18 pts
8%
Solid
33 pts
15%
Nice
56 pts
25%
Great
90 pts
40%
Amazing
113 pts
50%
Genius
158 pts
70%
Queen Bee
226 pts
100%
All accepted words
- giggling
- gill
- gilling
- girl
- glug
- glugging
- gluing
- grill
- grilling
- gull
- gulling
- gurgling
- inkling
- kill
- killing
- kiln
- knurl
- krill
- liking
- linguini
- lining
- link
- linking
- lugging
- luging
- lull
- lulling
- lulu
- lung
- lunging
- lunk
- luring
- lurk
- lurking
- lurking
- niggling
- null
- riling
- rill
- ruling
- unliking
- unlink
- unlinking
About this puzzle
The NYT Spelling Bee for Sunday, February 22, 2026 uses the seven letters G, I, K, L, N, R, U, with L as the center letter that must appear in every word.
Today's puzzle has 43 accepted words for a total of 226 points. To reach Genius rank, players need 158 points — about 70% of the total. The full Queen Bee score requires every word.
This puzzle has 2 pangrams — words that use all seven letters. Each pangram earns a 7-point bonus on top of its regular score.