5 letter words
Every five-letter word in the list — 8,621 of them — with a pattern box, letter filters, a page per opening letter, a page per second letter and a page per letter the word contains. Type what you know and rule out what you do not.
How many five-letter words are there?
In the list this site ships, 8,621. That figure is not universal and no honest page can pretend it is: it depends entirely on which dictionary you count. The public-domain ENABLE list is the source here. A tournament list counts differently, an unabridged dictionary counts differently again, and a tool that quotes a much larger number is usually counting inflections that no dictionary lists as headwords.
The distribution across opening letters is nothing like even. S opens 1,053 of them, more than any other letter and roughly 81 times as many as X, which opens 13. There is a page below for each letter with the complete list, because "five letter words starting with S" and "five letter words starting with X" are not the same size of problem.
Second letters are a different map. A sits in the second square of 1,478 of them — the largest slot-2 group — because so many English roots are a consonant plus that vowel. A confirmed second letter is why the pattern pages exist: the opening-letter lists cannot answer "second letter is T".
The shape of a five-letter word
5,658 of the 8,621 use five different letters, which is the property that makes a word a good opening guess: five letters tested for the price of one. 1,143 contain a doubled letter, and those are the ones that quietly waste a guess early on.
2,682 end in S, which is why "ends in S" is the least informative thing you can learn about a five-letter word — it usually just means the word is a plural or a third-person verb. Endings worth more are the rarer ones: E, Y and D between them account for a much smaller share.
36 manage without A, E, I, O or U entirely — XYLYL, FLYBY, MYTHY and PYGMY among them — which is worth remembering the moment you have eliminated every vowel and concluded the puzzle is broken.
Using a list without spoiling the puzzle
There is a version of this that ruins the game and a version that does not. Typing your letters in and taking the answer ends the puzzle. Filtering to the words that fit what you already worked out, then choosing between them yourself, is the same thing a crossword solver does with a dictionary, and it teaches the letter patterns that make the next one easier.
The filters are built for the second version. Set the letters you have confirmed with the pattern box, exclude the letters you have ruled out, and look at what survives. If forty words survive, you have not learned enough yet; if three do, you have.
This site publishes no daily puzzle answers, and it never will. It is a dictionary with a good index, not a spoiler feed.
How five-letter words end
Every final letter, counted across all 8,621 of them, with the three highest-scoring examples for each. Knowing the last letter is worth much more than knowing the first — except when the last letter is S, which most of them are.
| Ends in | Words | Examples |
|---|---|---|
| S | 2,682 | ZAXES, JUJUS, QOPHS |
| E | 930 | TAZZE, KOPJE, QUAKE |
| Y | 906 | JAZZY, FIZZY, FUZZY |
| D | 582 | FAZED, FUZED, HAZED |
| R | 523 | FAQIR, HAZER, VIZIR |
| T | 480 | ZIZIT, ZIBET, FIXIT |
| N | 364 | ZAZEN, HAZAN, WIZEN |
| A | 356 | HUZZA, PIZZA, TAZZA |
| L | 345 | HEXYL, XYLYL, FUZIL |
| H | 255 | ZILCH, NUDZH, AZOTH |
| O | 223 | MEZZO, JOCKO, KAZOO |
| K | 181 | QUACK, QUICK, KYACK |
| I | 142 | HAJJI, GHAZI, ZOMBI |
| M | 125 | ENZYM, XYLEM, BUXOM |
| P | 120 | EQUIP, MIXUP, UNZIP |
| C | 97 | ZEBEC, AZOIC, XEBEC |
| G | 88 | SQUEG, AXING, HYING |
| F | 53 | QUAFF, QUIFF, HOWFF |
| X | 47 | KYLIX, XEROX, AFFIX |
| W | 40 | OXBOW, SQUAW, BYLAW |
| B | 35 | SQUAB, SQUIB, ZINEB |
| U | 25 | KUDZU, HOKKU, QUIPU |
| Z | 18 | WHIZZ, FRIZZ, ABUZZ |
| Q | 2 | UMIAQ, TRANQ |
| V | 2 | SCHAV, GANEV |
Every second letter, counted
How many five-letter words in this list have each letter in the second square. A and E are the large pages; J, Q, X and Z are the short ones.
| Second letter | 5-letter words |
|---|---|
| A | 1,478 |
| O | 1,333 |
| E | 1,063 |
| I | 963 |
| U | 789 |
| R | 645 |
| L | 508 |
| H | 377 |
| N | 239 |
| T | 166 |
| Y | 164 |
| P | 150 |
| C | 122 |
| M | 116 |
| W | 97 |
| S | 65 |
| D | 58 |
| K | 55 |
| B | 53 |
| G | 49 |
| X | 44 |
| V | 39 |
| Z | 15 |
| F | 14 |
| Q | 12 |
| J | 7 |
Every letter, counted by the words that contain it
How many five-letter words in this list include each letter at least once. E is in most of them; Q, J, X and Z are the short pages.
| Contains | 5-letter words |
|---|---|
| S | 3,988 |
| E | 3,878 |
| A | 3,493 |
| R | 2,669 |
| O | 2,529 |
| I | 2,423 |
| L | 2,166 |
| T | 2,082 |
| N | 1,846 |
| U | 1,593 |
| D | 1,566 |
| C | 1,367 |
| Y | 1,321 |
| P | 1,275 |
| M | 1,220 |
| H | 1,145 |
| G | 1,003 |
| B | 967 |
| K | 879 |
| F | 689 |
| W | 673 |
| V | 455 |
| Z | 211 |
| X | 202 |
| J | 170 |
| Q | 75 |
Common questions
How many 5 letter words are in this list?
8,621, which is every five-letter word in the public-domain ENABLE dictionary apart from a short blocklist of slurs. Other sites quote different totals because they use different dictionaries.
What five-letter words have no vowels?
36 five-letter words here contain no A, E, I, O or U: XYLYL, FLYBY, MYTHY, PYGMY, THYMY and LYMPH. Most of them lean on Y or a syllabic consonant instead.
Which five-letter words make the best first guess?
Words using five different common letters test the most ground at once — the ones built from the letters that appear in the most words rather than the ones that score highest. A high-scoring word is usually high-scoring because its letters are rare, which is the opposite of what a first guess wants.
Every word, grouped by how long it is
The complete list at each length. Three letters is a page you memorise; nine is a page you search.
Five-letter words by opening letter
The complete list for each letter, with how many there are. S is a page you scroll; X is a page you read.
- A 497
- B 589
- C 662
- D 455
- E 192
- F 429
- G 414
- H 334
- I 118
- J 133
- K 205
- L 401
- M 443
- N 200
- O 181
- P 565
- Q 53
- R 419
- S 1,053
- T 547
- U 117
- V 161
- W 295
- X 13
- Y 94
- Z 51
Five-letter words by second letter
The same length, a different known square. A is the large page; J is the short one.
- A 1,478
- B 53
- C 122
- D 58
- E 1,063
- F 14
- G 49
- H 377
- I 963
- J 7
- K 55
- L 508
- M 116
- N 239
- O 1,333
- P 150
- Q 12
- R 645
- S 65
- T 166
- U 789
- V 39
- W 97
- X 44
- Y 164
- Z 15
Five-letter words by a letter they contain
A yellow tile, not a green one. E is in most of them; Q and J are the short pages.
- A 3,493
- B 967
- C 1,367
- D 1,566
- E 3,878
- F 689
- G 1,003
- H 1,145
- I 2,423
- J 170
- K 879
- L 2,166
- M 1,220
- N 1,846
- O 2,529
- P 1,275
- Q 75
- R 2,669
- S 3,988
- T 2,082
- U 1,593
- V 455
- W 673
- X 202
- Y 1,321
- Z 211