Reference

Scrabble Words

Word lists worth reading whole rather than looking up one at a time. Every list below is drawn from the NWL23 and Collins CSW24 dictionaries the tools use.

Short words

The best return on memorisation in the game. Two- and three-letter words are what let you play parallel to an existing word, block a lane, or empty an awkward rack in the endgame - and there are few enough of them to actually learn.

Two-Letter Scrabble Words All 107 in NWL23, 127 in Collins CSW24 · scored and defined Three-Letter Scrabble Words All 1,085 in NWL23, 1,351 in Collins CSW24

Bingo stems

A stem is six letters that combine with a seventh to make a seven-letter word - a bingo, and the 50-point bonus that comes with it. Learn the stems in this order: SATIRE alone yields 99 bingos in Collins.

SATIRE (AEIRST) 99 bingos in Collins, 73 in NWL23 SATINE (AEINST) 97 bingos in Collins, 73 in NWL23 STALER (AELRST) 73 bingos in Collins, 60 in NWL23 RETAIN (AEINRT) 71 bingos in Collins, 56 in NWL23 INSERT (EINRST) 63 bingos in Collins, 48 in NWL23 EASTER (AEERST) 62 bingos in Collins, 53 in NWL23 SALTIE (AEILST) 56 bingos in Collins, 46 in NWL23 SENIOR (EINORS) 55 bingos in Collins, 38 in NWL23 LISTEN (EILNST) 53 bingos in Collins, 41 in NWL23 STONER (ENORST) 51 bingos in Collins, 36 in NWL23 SERIAL (AEILRS) 46 bingos in Collins, 37 in NWL23 SALINE (AEILNS) 45 bingos in Collins, 40 in NWL23 LINEAR (AEILNR) 39 bingos in Collins, 31 in NWL23 INSOLE (EILNOS) 39 bingos in Collins, 26 in NWL23 STRAIN (AINRST) 38 bingos in Collins, 30 in NWL23 RUSTLE (ELRSTU) 38 bingos in Collins, 30 in NWL23 TIRADE (ADEIRT) 35 bingos in Collins, 31 in NWL23 SENILE (EEILNS) 28 bingos in Collins, 22 in NWL23

High-value tiles

Q, Z, X and J are worth 8 to 10 points each and are the hardest tiles to unload on a tight board. K and V are cheaper but awkward - V has no valid two-letter word in either dictionary.

All Q Words 4,259 in Collins, 2,835 in NWL23 All Z Words 11,440 in Collins, 8,024 in NWL23 All X Words 7,258 in Collins, 5,252 in NWL23 All J Words 4,210 in Collins, 2,909 in NWL23 All K Words 22,675 in Collins, 15,518 in NWL23 All V Words 22,711 in Collins, 16,398 in NWL23 Q Without U The 50 NWL23 and 89 Collins words that need no U

Tools and further reading

Scrabble Word Finder Enter your rack and find every valid play, scored and sorted Anagram Generator Every word and multi-word phrase your letters can spell Q without U: the full story Why these words exist, where they come from, and the QI hook

Every list on these pages is generated directly from the two dictionaries LexiLab ships: NWL23 (196,601 words), the standard for North American club and tournament play, and Collins CSW24 (280,887 words), used in most of the rest of the world.

Collins is the larger book, but it is not a strict superset - 3,698 NWL23 words are not valid under Collins. Where the two disagree, both counts are shown so you can learn the list that matches the game you actually play.