Softonic

Anagram Solver

Step 1 / 2

Paste a set of jumbled letters, a Scrabble rack or a cryptic crossword fodder and the solver lists every dictionary word those letters can form. Supports wildcards for blank Scrabble tiles, filters by minimum and maximum length, and sorts output by length so the longest plays or answers float to the top.

How to solve an anagram

  1. 1

    Paste the scrambled letters

    Up to about 15 letters for interactive speed. Blanks or wildcards are represented by ? or * depending on the mode.

  2. 2

    Add pattern constraints if needed

    For crosswords, type the known letters in their positions (e.g. _A__LE for 6-letter word with A in position 2 and LE at the end).

  3. 3

    Choose dictionary

    Standard English, Scrabble (TWL or SOWPODS), or UK-specific wordlists yield different candidate counts.

  4. 4

    Scan results by length

    Longest matches are shown first — essential for crosswords and for maximising Scrabble/Words With Friends scores.

Scrabble dictionaries

The two major competitive Scrabble dictionaries differ:

Dictionary Used in Approximate size
TWL US, Canada, Thailand ~187,000 words
SOWPODS UK, Europe, Australia ~267,000 words

SOWPODS is the superset — any TWL word is also in SOWPODS, but not vice versa. Some officially-valid SOWPODS words (QI, ZA, ZE) are worth knowing: they save racks that would otherwise have no play.

Wildcards in Scrabble vs. anagrams

In Scrabble, the blank tile scores zero but counts as any letter. In anagram solvers, ? or * behaves the same way. One wildcard in a 7-letter rack opens up dozens of extra plays but also balloons the candidate list — filter by minimum length to cut noise.

Solving cryptic crossword fodder

A cryptic clue often gives the fodder (the letters to rearrange) explicitly with an anagram indicator:

  • “Broken heart (5)” → fodder HEART, anagram indicator BROKEN → EARTH
  • “Wild parties in spring (8)” → fodder IN PARTIES with “wild” as indicator → PERTAINS
  • “Confused editor regrets (8)” → fodder EDITOR + RETS… pick the indicator carefully

The solver speeds up step 2: once you’ve identified the fodder, paste it and you get every 5-letter word that matches.

Practical tips

  • 14-15 letters max. Combinatorial explosion past that.
  • Exclude plurals and tenses if you need base forms for crosswords.
  • Use pattern matching (_A__LE) when you have constraints — it cuts 10,000 candidates to 20.
  • Check the dictionary if a “common” word is missing; some solvers skip proper nouns and obscure valid Scrabble words.

Frequently Asked Questions

Dictionary coverage varies. The standard English wordlist skips most proper nouns and very rare scientific terms. Switch to SOWPODS for maximum coverage (about 267,000 words) if you need to match Scrabble rules.

Yes. A ? or * stands for any one letter. Two wildcards in a 7-letter input expands the search significantly — filter by length to keep results manageable.

Classic single-word solvers return only single words. Switch to phrase mode (if available) to split the letter set into combinations of two or more dictionary words.

Wordle has a fixed length (5) and known letter positions. Paste the known letters in their positions with underscores for unknowns (e.g. R_N), and the solver filters all 5-letter words matching that pattern.

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