3 Letter Word Finder

The jump from two letters to three is the biggest proportional leap in the whole dictionary: 96 two letter words explode into 972 three letter words, roughly a tenfold expansion. Nobody memorizes that whole tier, and nobody needs to. Enter your tiles above, add a question mark for each blank you hold, and this 3 letter word finder returns every playable option at once, sorted by points.

Hooks, the fastest way to profit from this list

A hook is a single letter added to a word already on the board. Three letter words are the natural hooks for the two letter tier, and the X family shows why. AX alone extends to FAX, LAX, MAX, PAX, RAX, SAX, TAX, WAX, and ZAX in front, and to AXE behind. Nine front hooks and a back hook from one humble word. When you scan your results, favor entries that contain a word already sitting on the board, because those plays score the new word and the old one together.

Scores worth carrying in your head

• ZAX, the slate cutting tool, tops the tier at 19 points.
• ZEK, a prison camp inmate, brings 16.
• FEZ, FIZ, PYX, and WIZ each land 15.
• QAT and SUQ are the rare Q plays that never need a U, and both dump the hardest tile in the bag for solid points.

When a blank changes everything

Blanks matter more at short lengths than anywhere else, because a single wildcard covers a third of the word. Type a question mark for each blank tile, up to three, and the finder shows everything within reach. A blank scores nothing, so when two results tie, choose the one that saves your high value tiles for a later turn.

Every count on this page, including the total in the opening paragraph, is computed from the ENABLE list when the site is built. The number in the copy always matches what the search actually returns, and the dictionary page documents the source list in full.