The Two Letter Words That Win Scrabble Games

Why Two Letter Words Matter So Much

Two letter words are what make parallel plays possible. A parallel play lays a word alongside one already on the board, so every pair of touching tiles forms its own two letter word. Each of those small words scores too. A five letter word laid this way can easily outscore a seven letter word laid somewhere open, because it scores four or five times.

They also solve the problem every player has had: a rack with a J, Q, X or Z and nowhere to put it. A two letter word gets a heavy tile onto a premium square without needing a long word to carry it.

Learn The Heavy Tiles First

If you only learn a handful, learn the ones that use the high value tiles. Every one of these is valid in both the North American tournament list and Collins:

• QI: the life force in Chinese philosophy. The single most useful word in the game, because it plays the Q without a U.
• ZA: short for pizza. Puts a 10 point Z on a double or triple letter square.
• XU: a former coin of Vietnam.
• XI: a letter of the Greek alphabet.
• AX, EX and OX: three ways to place an X next to a vowel already on the board.
• JO: a Scottish word for a sweetheart. The only two letter word with a J in the North American list.
• KA and KI: the spiritual self in Egyptian belief, and another spelling of qi.

The Lists Do Not Agree

The North American list (used in the US and Canada) and Collins (used in most other countries) are different. Collins accepts every two letter word in the North American list and adds more, including ZO, JA, KY, CH and EE. If you play online, check which dictionary your game uses before you rely on one of these. Our full two letter word list covers both.

Hooks: The Other Half Of The Trick

A hook is a letter added to the front or back of a word already on the board to make a new word. Two letter words are full of them. QI takes an S to make QIS, and ZA takes one to make ZAS. OX takes letters at the front to make BOX, FOX, LOX and POX. Learning which two letter words take an S, and which take letters at the front, is the step after learning the words themselves.

A practical way to start: every time you see a two letter word on the board, ask whether any of your tiles makes it three letters. Over a few games it becomes automatic.

How To Actually Learn Them

Do not try to memorise the whole list at once. Learn them by first letter, a few letters a week, and play them on purpose in casual games until they feel normal. Most strong players report the same thing: the words that felt like cheating when they first learned them become the moves they reach for without thinking.

When you are stuck with a rack in a real game, the Scrabble Word Finder scores every play from your tiles, which is a quick way to see the two letter options you missed.