The Two-Letter Words Every Word Game Player Should Know

Ask any strong tile-game player for their best advice, and you’ll hear the same thing again and again: learn your two-letter words. It sounds almost too simple. But those tiny words are behind some of the biggest scores in the game – and they get you out of trouble when your rack is a mess.

Here’s why they matter so much, which ones are worth learning first, and the complete list our Word Tiles game accepts.

Why two-letter words are so powerful

They let you play alongside other words. When you place a short word right next to one already on the board, every pair of touching letters forms a new two-letter word – and every one of those words scores. One small play can make three or four words at once.

They make high-value tiles easy to use. A Z or an X is worth a lot, but it can be hard to fit into a long word. Two-letter words like ZA and OX let you drop them onto a bonus square with just one other letter.

They rescue awkward racks. Too many vowels? Words like AA, AE and OI let you get rid of them. Stuck with a Q and no U? QI is your friend.

A quick example

Say the word PLANET is on the board, and you’re holding a Z and an A. You could struggle to find a long word for them – or you could put them in the row just above PLANET, with the Z over the first A and the A over the N.

That one move makes three words: ZA across, and ZA and AN going down. The Z is counted in both ZA words – and if it lands on a double-letter square, it’s doubled in both of them too. We set this up in Word Tiles, and it scored 44 points from just two tiles. That’s the power of knowing your two-letter words.

The ones worth learning first

You don’t need to memorise all of them at once. Start with these groups.

The big scorers

These use the highest-value letters, so they’re the ones that win games.

Word	Points	What it means
QI	11	Life force, in Chinese philosophy
ZA	11	Slang for pizza
ZO	11	A Himalayan cross between a yak and a cow
XI	9	A letter of the Greek alphabet
XU	9	A small coin from Vietnam
JO	9	A Scottish word for a sweetheart
OX, AX, EX	9	The animal, the tool (American spelling), and a former partner
KA, KI	6	The spirit in ancient Egyptian belief; another spelling of QI

If you only learn one word from this article, make it QI. It’s the only way to play a Q without a U in two letters, and it turns your worst tile into an 11-point play.

The vowel dumps

Got a rack full of vowels? These words are made almost entirely of them: AA (a type of rough lava), AE (Scots for “one”), AI (a three-toed sloth), OE, OI and IO.

The sounds

Lots of everyday noises count as words: AH, AW, EH, HA, HM, MM, OH, OW, SH, UH, UM and YO. HM, MM and SH are especially useful because they need no vowels at all. OK and EW are newer arrivals in many word lists, and our game accepts both.

Greek letters and musical notes

Two easy families to remember. The Greek letters MU, NU, PI and XI are all valid. So are the notes of the scale – DO, RE, MI, FA, SO, LA, TI – plus UT, an old name for “do”.

Letter names

The spelled-out names of some letters are words too: AR (R), EF (F), EL (L), EM (M), EN (N), ES (S) and EX (X).

Two letters with no two-letter words

Here’s a handy fact: in our word list, C and V are the only letters that don’t appear in a single two-letter word. So there’s no point looking for a short play with them – you’ll need at least three letters. If you’re holding a C or V, keep that in mind when you plan your next move.

Hooks: turning two letters into three

Many two-letter words can be stretched into three-letter words by adding a letter at the front or back. Players call these “hooks”. For example, OX becomes BOX, FOX or POX, and ZA becomes ZAP.

The most flexible two-letter words in our dictionary are IN, AT, AR, AD, AN, EN and HO. Each can be extended in around twenty different ways. If you see one of these on the board, there’s very likely a three-letter play hiding nearby.

The complete list

Here are all 111 two-letter words accepted in Word Tiles, grouped by their first letter:

A	AA AB AD AE AG AH AI AL AM AN AR AS AT AW AX AY
B	BA BE BI BO BY
D	DE DO
E	EF EH EL EM EN ER ES ET EW EX
F	FA FE
G	GO
H	HA HE HI HM HO
I	ID IF IN IO IS IT
J	JO
K	KA KI KO KY
L	LA LI LO
M	MA ME MI MM MO MU MY
N	NA NE NO NU
O	OD OE OF OH OI OK OM ON OP OR OS OW OX OY
P	PA PE PH* PI PO
Q	QI
R	RE
S	SH SI SO ST*
T	TA TE TI TO
U	UH UM UN UP US UT
W	WE WO
X	XI XU
Y	YA YE YO YU
Z	ZA ZO

* PH and ST are accepted in our game because they appear in the general English dictionary it uses, but you won’t find them in official tournament word lists.

A word about word lists

Different word games use different dictionaries, so a word that works in one might not work in another. Official tournament lists, for example, include a few two-letter words that our game doesn’t, and they leave out PH and ST. If you also play other games or enter competitions, it’s worth checking their list too. The core words in this article – QI, ZA, XI, JO, OX and the rest – are accepted almost everywhere.

How to learn them

Start small. Learn the big scorers first – there are only about a dozen.
Learn them in families. Greek letters, musical notes, letter names and sounds are much easier to remember as groups.
Use them in real games. Nothing fixes a word in your memory like scoring 40 points with it.
Check the suggestions. In Word Tiles, the “Suggest words” button often shows clever two-letter plays. When it does, take note.

Put them to work

Ready to try them out? Open Word Tiles and see if you can land a QI or a ZA on a bonus square. For a deeper look at the rules and scoring, see our Word Tiles guide on the Blog. And if you’d like to practise spotting short words quickly, Word Grid is great for training your eye.