# Word Finder

> Find every word that fits what you know — the length, the letters in the right spot, the letters in the wrong spot, and the letters that are not in the word — with starts with, ends with, contains, and crossword patterns across 179,000 words.

- Page: https://linguaholic.com/tools/word-finder/
- Type: free online tool (Word games & fun), no sign-up, runs in the browser
- Publisher: Linguaholic (https://linguaholic.com/), made by Marcel Iseli
- Last updated: October 2, 2026
- Open it pre-filled: https://linguaholic.com/tools/word-finder/?length=5&pattern=s__r_&has=a&not=te
  - `length`: word length, 2 to 15, or any for every length (default 5) (for example `5`)
  - `pattern`: known positions: letters, with _ (or . or %3F for ?) for each unknown letter; 2 to 15 characters; sets the length itself (for example `s__r_`)
  - `has`: letters that must be in the word, anywhere (up to 15) (for example `a`)
  - `not`: letters that must not be in the word (for example `te`)
  - `starts`: only words starting with these letters (for example `qu`)
  - `ends`: only words ending with these letters (for example `ing`)
  - `contains`: only words containing these letters in a row (for example `ou`)

## How to use the word finder

The **Word Finder** lists every English word that fits what you already know about it: how long it is, which letters sit in which spot, which letters it contains, and which letters it doesn’t. It searches about 179,000 words and shows the common ones first. It is made for 5-letter word games and crosswords, and it works for any length from 2 to 15 letters.

1. **Pick the word length.** It starts on 5 letters; tap another length, or open the menu for every length and for Any length.
2. **Right spot (green).** There is one box per letter of the word. Type each letter you are sure of into the box for its position.
3. **In the word, wrong spot (yellow).** Type the letters the word contains. If you also know where they are *not*, tick “I know which spots they are not in” and type each letter under that spot.
4. **Not in the word (gray).** Type every letter you have ruled out.
5. The list updates as you type, with common words first and in darker text. Tap a word to see what it means, tick “Common words only” to hide the rare ones, or copy the whole list.

## 5-letter word finder: a worked example

Say the hidden word is *plant* and your first guess is *stare*. The game colors the guess like this: . Here is what to type, and what is left:

1. Green: A in box 3. Yellow: T (not in spot 2). Gray: S, R, E. That leaves **25 words, 8 of them common**: adapt, await, chant, giant, loath, plant, thank, twang.
2. Green: A, N and T in boxes 3, 4 and 5. Yellow: T (not in spot 2). Gray: S, R, E, C, H. That leaves **5 words, 2 of them common**: giant, plant.

After the first guess the finder suggests *chant* as a good next guess, because it tests the letters most of the remaining words share. That second guess leaves only giant and plant among common words. If you only type the yellow letter and skip its spot, the first step leaves 26 words instead of 25, so the spots are worth entering while the list is still long.

**Repeated letters.** When a guess has the same letter twice, a game can color one copy and gray out the other. Guess *speed* when the word is *abide* and you get : one E is yellow, the other gray. Enter E as yellow *and* as gray. The finder reads that as “exactly one E” and keeps *abide* in the list.

## Crossword solver: find words with missing letters

For a crossword, type what you have into the **Pattern** field with a question mark (or an underscore) for every empty square. The pattern sets the word length for you and fills the letter boxes, so you can keep narrowing the list with the other fields.

| Pattern | Words that fit | Examples |
| --- | --- | --- |
| c?t | 3 | cat, cot, cut |
| b?tt?r | 5 | batter, better, bettor, bitter, butter |
| ?u?z | 7 | buzz, fuzz, quiz |
| ??ght | 14 | eight, fight, light, might, night, ought, right, sight |
| cr?ssw?rd | 1 | crossword |
| ?a?k?n? | 48 | backing, barking, gawking, hawking, marking, packing, tacking, tasking |

## Words that start with, end with or contain letters

Set the length to **Any length** to search the whole list at once, grouped by word length. **Starts with** and **Ends with** take one letter or several, and **Contains** looks for letters in a row. You can combine them: words that start with UN and end in LY give 338 results (unduly, unruly, uneasily, unevenly…), and 365 words contain a double Z (buzz, fizz, fuzz, jazz, dizzy, fizzy…). The rare letters are where a list helps most:

| Search | Words | Examples |
| --- | --- | --- |
| [Words that start with X](https://linguaholic.com/tools/word-finder/?length=any&starts=x) | 144 | xylophone, xenophobia, xylophones, xi, xu, xis, xyst, xebec |
| [Words that start with Z](https://linguaholic.com/tools/word-finder/?length=any&starts=z) | 559 | zip, zoo, zany, zeal, zero, zest, zeta, zinc |
| [Words that start with Q](https://linguaholic.com/tools/word-finder/?length=any&starts=q) | 836 | qua, quay, quip, quit, quiz, quack, quail, quake |
| [Words with Q and no U](https://linguaholic.com/tools/word-finder/?length=any&has=q&not=u) | 26 | qi, aeq, qadi, qaid, qoph, faqir, qaids, qanat |
| [Words that end in J](https://linguaholic.com/tools/word-finder/?length=any&ends=j) | 7 | haj, raj, taj, hadj, hajj, svaraj, swaraj |
| [Words that end in Q](https://linguaholic.com/tools/word-finder/?length=any&ends=q) | 4 | aeq, suq, umiaq |
| [Words that end in V](https://linguaholic.com/tools/word-finder/?length=any&ends=v) | 19 | rev, dev, guv, lev, luv, tav, vav, derv |
| [Words that end in Z](https://linguaholic.com/tools/word-finder/?length=any&ends=z) | 88 | fez, wiz, buzz, fizz, fuzz, jazz, quiz, whiz |

## 5-letter words by starting letter

The list has 8,791 five-letter words, and 3,466 of them are common, everyday words. S starts the most (1,059) and X the fewest (13). To see every word for a letter, type it into box 1 or into Starts with.

| Starts with | 5-letter words | Common | Examples |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| a | 501 | 154 | abide, adult, alert, amaze, appal, aside |
| b | 603 | 256 | badge, baths, bible, block, bored, brief |
| c | 674 | 277 | cable, chase, chuck, clone, count, crisp |
| d | 460 | 180 | daily, deity, dined, dodge, drawn, drink |
| e | 197 | 83 | eager, eaten, embed, enjoy, erase, event |
| f | 439 | 219 | faced, fence, final, flesh, force, fries |
| g | 422 | 170 | gates, given, going, grant, greed, group |
| h | 336 | 143 | habit, happy, havoc, hence, honor, hotel |
| i | 122 | 39 | ideal, idiom, inane, index, input, irate |
| j | 132 | 37 | jacks, jawed, jetty, joint, judge, jumbo |
| k | 212 | 38 | karat, keyed, kinds, kitty, kneel, known |
| l | 412 | 165 | label, laugh, lemon, links, lobby, loved |
| m | 458 | 181 | magic, marks, mercy, metro, model, mount |
| n | 205 | 59 | naive, names, nerve, night, noisy, notes |
| o | 184 | 61 | occur, offer, onion, orbit, other, owing |
| p | 580 | 230 | pains, party, photo, plain, power, prone |
| q | 53 | 23 | quack, qualm, queen, quest, quill, quite |
| r | 428 | 170 | rabid, rapid, refer, rhyme, river, round |
| s | 1,059 | 485 | sadly, sharp, sixth, songs, spray, stock |
| t | 561 | 227 | table, terms, those, today, trail, truck |
| u | 118 | 35 | uncle, undid, unite, until, urban, using |
| v | 169 | 63 | vague, valve, vicar, visit, voice, voter |
| w | 302 | 143 | wages, weeks, while, wired, works, would |
| x | 13 | 0 | xebec, xenia, xenic, xenon, xeric, xerus |
| y | 99 | 21 | yacht, yarns, yeast, yeses, yokel, young |
| z | 52 | 7 | zebra, zeros, zests, zincs, zoned, zones |

## 5-letter words by ending

The same count for the endings people look up most, from single letters to -ER and -GHT:

| Ends in | 5-letter words | Common | Examples |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| -e | 951 | 391 | abide, clone, halve, phase, serve, table |
| -y | 920 | 299 | agony, dirty, fully, hurry, nasty, shiny |
| -t | 488 | 230 | abort, burst, fault, least, reset, spout |
| -a | 384 | 49 | alpha, circa, delta, extra, media, pizza |
| -o | 231 | 37 | audio, cameo, forgo, macho, photo, rodeo |
| -i | 147 | 10 | alibi, cacti, fungi, khaki, multi, radii |
| -h | 260 | 123 | batch, cough, flesh, month, slash, trash |
| -n | 370 | 118 | acorn, brown, drown, grown, onion, shown |
| -l | 352 | 138 | angel, fatal, loyal, royal, spell, trail |
| -r | 529 | 214 | actor, deter, humor, major, polar, sugar |
| -d | 587 | 335 | added, bound, dined, greed, owned, third |
| -er | 365 | 153 | after, deter, infer, lover, owner, super |
| -el | 76 | 35 | angel, hotel, level, model, panel, vowel |
| -en | 75 | 29 | alien, eaten, green, queen, seven, token |
| -or | 52 | 33 | actor, error, honor, major, minor, razor |
| -al | 126 | 39 | appal, fatal, local, moral, rural, trial |
| -it | 48 | 18 | admit, befit, fruit, merit, split, unfit |
| -le | 95 | 32 | ample, bible, eagle, smile, style, uncle |
| -et | 64 | 24 | asset, cadet, facet, inlet, rivet, tenet |
| -ue | 25 | 12 | argue, issue, queue, rogue, vague, venue |
| -ght | 14 | 9 | eight, fight, might, night, right, sight |

## 5-letter words with the most vowels, and with none

No five-letter word in the list is made of vowels only. 21 have four vowels: the common ones are audio, eerie, queue, and the less common ones are aalii, adieu, aecia, aerie, aioli, aquae, areae, aurae, aurei, cooee, looie, louie, miaou, oidia, oorie, ourie, uraei, zoeae. At the other end, 36 have no A, E, I, O or U at all and lean on Y instead, such as crypt, cysts, dryly, hymns, lymph, myths, nymph, psych, slyly, and less common words like shyly, wryly, flyby, glyph, myrrh, sylph, tryst, stymy.

In between, here are five-letter words by the vowel in the middle (letter 3):

| Middle letter | 5-letter words | Common | Examples |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| ??a?? | 858 | 420 | adapt, cease, exact, irate, scarf, stall |
| ??e?? | 578 | 260 | agent, chess, fleet, piece, sneak, sweet |
| ??i?? | 748 | 354 | abide, chips, fries, pride, slice, tribe |
| ??o?? | 684 | 326 | abort, broke, floor, known, shock, spots |
| ??u?? | 447 | 205 | acute, cough, fault, mount, souls, truck |

## The most common letters in 5-letter words

Counting the 3,466 common five-letter words, S appears in 50% of them, followed by E (48%), A (37%), R (32%), O (28%), L (27%), T (26%), I (26%). Where a letter tends to sit matters as much: 35% of these words end in S, most of them plurals and verb forms such as *books* and *makes*.

| Position | Most common letters there |
| --- | --- |
| Letter 1 | S 14%, C 8%, B 7%, P 7%, T 7% |
| Letter 2 | A 17%, O 15%, I 11%, E 11%, R 9% |
| Letter 3 | A 12%, I 10%, O 9%, R 8%, E 8% |
| Letter 4 | E 23%, T 8%, N 7%, L 7%, R 6% |
| Letter 5 | S 35%, E 11%, D 10%, Y 9%, T 7% |

A first guess tells you the most when it is made of five different letters that many words share. Scored that way, the top first guesses among everyday words are arose, laser, rates, stare, tears, arise.

## How many words are there of each length?

| Length | Common words | All words |
| --- | --- | --- |
| 2 letters | 42 | 113 |
| 3 letters | 477 | 1,013 |
| 4 letters | 1,874 | 3,986 |
| 5 letters | 3,466 | 8,791 |
| 6 letters | 5,334 | 15,479 |
| 7 letters | 6,769 | 23,537 |
| 8 letters | 6,626 | 29,049 |
| 9 letters | 5,585 | 26,959 |
| 10 letters | 4,246 | 22,484 |
| 11 letters | 2,749 | 17,337 |
| 12 letters | 1,539 | 12,610 |
| 13 letters | 786 | 8,668 |
| 14 letters | 342 | 5,679 |
| 15 letters | 129 | 3,509 |
| **Total** | 39,964 | 179,214 |

## Word list and privacy

The finder uses the same list as our other word tools: the public-domain ENABLE word list combined with the SCOWL English word lists, with slurs and profanity left out. It includes plurals and verb forms such as *tables* and *jumped*. Every word game keeps its own list, so a rare word shown here may not be accepted everywhere. Definitions come from WordNet (Princeton University) and our own dictionary. The search runs in your browser: the letters you type are never sent anywhere.

Have a rack of letters and no pattern? The [Word Unscrambler](https://linguaholic.com/tools/word-unscrambler/) starts from the letters you hold and finds every word they can make. More word tools: make your own puzzle with the [Word Search Maker](https://linguaholic.com/tools/word-search-maker/), find rhymes with the [Rhyming Words finder](https://linguaholic.com/tools/rhyming-words/), get practice words from the [Random Word Generator](https://linguaholic.com/tools/random-word-generator/), or play [Hangman](https://linguaholic.com/games/hangman/).

## Frequently asked questions

**How do I find a 5-letter word with certain letters?**

Leave the length on 5, type the letters you know into the boxes for their positions, then add the letters that are in the word but in the wrong spot and the letters that are not in the word. The list of matching words updates as you type, with common words first.

**What do green, yellow and gray mean?**

In 5-letter word games, green means the letter is in the right spot, yellow means it is in the word but in a different spot, and gray means it is not in the word. The finder has one input for each, so you can copy the colors straight from your game.

**How do I enter a letter that appears twice in my guess?**

If the game colors one copy of a letter and grays out the other, enter the letter as green or yellow and also as gray. The finder then keeps only words with exactly that many copies of the letter.

**Can I use it as a crossword solver?**

Yes. Type the pattern with a question mark or an underscore for each empty square, for example c?t or s__r_, and it lists every word that fits. The pattern c?t gives cat, cot and cut.

**Can I find words that start with, end with or contain certain letters?**

Yes. Use Starts with, Ends with and Contains, alone or together, with a fixed length or with Any length to search all 179,000 words. For example, 144 words start with X and 7 end in J.

**Does it work for 6-letter, 7-letter and longer words?**

Yes. Pick any length from 2 to 15 letters and the letter boxes change to match. The list has 15,479 six-letter words and 23,537 seven-letter words.

**How many 5-letter words are there?**

The word list used here has 8,791 five-letter words, and 3,466 of them are common, everyday words. Every word game keeps its own list, so other counts differ.

**Which 5-letter words have the most vowels?**

No five-letter word in the list is made of vowels only. Twenty-one have four vowels, including audio, eerie, queue, adieu and aioli.

**What is the difference between the Word Finder and the Word Unscrambler?**

The Word Finder starts from a pattern: the length and the letters you know or have ruled out. The Word Unscrambler starts from a set of letters and finds every word you can make from them.

**Is it free and private?**

Yes. It is free with no sign-up, and the search runs in your browser, so the letters you type are never sent anywhere.

## Data sources

Word data: Linguaholic’s English dictionary, built from the open ENABLE and SCOWL word lists, the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary (pronunciation and syllables) and Princeton WordNet (meanings). Licenses and notices: https://linguaholic.com/tools/data/dict/v1/NOTICE.txt

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