Which Letters Make the Most Anagrams? The Record Is 12 Words

ByWordUnscramblerPro Team

The letters A, E, P, R and S make more words than any other set of letters in our dictionary: 12 anagrams, including SPARE, SPEAR, PEARS, PARSE, REAPS, PARES and RAPES. Among common everyday words, the record is six: LEAST, SLATE, STALE, STEAL, TALES and TESLA.

Key facts

  • A-E-P-R-S makes 12 valid words, the most of any set of letters.
  • A-E-L-R-S-T makes 11 (ALERTS, ALTERS, SALTER, SLATER, STALER and more).
  • 17% of all words in our dictionary have at least one anagram.
  • The longest anagram pairs have 15 letters, such as ALGORITHMICALLY and LOGARITHMICALLY.
Bar chart of the letter sets with the most anagrams
Letter sets that make the most valid words in our 168,352-word dictionary.

The top letter sets

Letters Number of words Examples
A E P R S 12 SPARE, SPEAR, PEARS, PARSE, REAPS, PARES
A E L R S T 11 ALERTS, ALTERS, SALTER, SLATER, STALER
A E L S T 10 LEAST, SLATE, STALE, STEAL, TALES, TEALS
A E I N R S T 9 NASTIER, RETAINS, RETINAS, STAINER, RETSINA
A C E P R S 9 CAPERS, SCRAPE, SPACER, PACERS, RECAPS
E I N R S T 9 INSERT, INTERS, SINTER, NITERS, TRINES

The common-word champions

If you only count words most people know, these sets win:

  • LEAST, SLATE, STALE, STEAL, TALES, TESLA (6)
  • ASCOT, COAST, COATS, COSTA, TACOS (5)
  • CARTE, CATER, CRATE, REACT, TRACE (5)
  • MATE, MEAT, META, TAME, TEAM (5)
  • POST, POTS, SPOT, STOP, TOPS (5)
  • REINS, RESIN, RINSE, RISEN, SIREN (5)
  • ALTERING, INTEGRAL, RELATING, TRIANGLE (4 eight-letter words!)

Why these letters?

Every record holder is built from the most common letters: E, S, A, R, T, L, N and I. These letters combine freely, appear in many endings (-ER, -ES, -ST) and are all worth 1 point, which is why players call them good “rack” letters. Our article on the best six-letter stems shows how the same letters help you play all seven tiles at once.

How common are anagrams?

In our dictionary, 28,547 words (17%) share their exact letters with at least one other word. The share falls quickly with length: short words have lots of anagrams, and long words rarely do. You can find the anagrams of any word with our anagram solver, which also shows two-word anagrams.

Sources

  • Our own analysis of every word in the ENABLE word list. Common words identified with wordfreq.

Similar Posts