Hidden inside asterisk sit asterisk and sarkiest, eight-letter plays tied at the top of this rack with 12 points in Scrabble apiece. In all, 309 valid words come out of this rack, grouped by length below and checked for Words With Friends as well as Scrabble.
asterisk and sarkiest tie for the highest Scrabble score from asterisk at 12 points. The top 10 of 309 words are shown here, with the full list organized by length below.
There are 2 eight-letter words hiding in asterisk: one comes from rearranging its letters, and asterisk itself is already a playable word with no unscrambling required. No common everyday answer stands out among these eight-letter results, so let the score decide: the highest-scoring words are asterisk and sarkiest, each worth 12 points in Scrabble.
Rearranging the letters in asterisk produces 8 valid seven-letter words. If a familiar word is all you need, start with strikes. For points, 6 words tie at 11 points, including strikes, kaisers and skaters.
Unscrambling asterisk turns up 46 six-letter words. If a familiar word is all you need, start with kisser, raises and resist. For points, 26 words tie at 10 points, including kisser, skates and skirts.
There are 90 five-letter words that can be made by unscrambling the letters in asterisk. If a familiar word is all you need, start with kites, raise and rates. For points, 43 words tie at 9 points, including kites, risks and sakes.
Rearranging the letters in asterisk produces 91 valid four-letter words. If a familiar word is all you need, start with airs, arts and asks. For points, 36 words tie at 8 points, including asks, kiss and kite.
Unscrambling asterisk turns up 55 three-letter words. If a familiar word is all you need, start with air, are and art. For points, 13 words tie at 7 points, including ask, kit and ski.
There are 17 two-letter words that can be made by unscrambling the letters in asterisk. If a familiar word is all you need, start with as, at, is, and it. For points, the strongest plays are ka and ki — each worth 6 points in Scrabble.
6 nine-letter words can be made using all the letters in asterisk plus one additional letter.
Swap a single tile in asterisk and you get a different eight-letter rack with its own word list. None of these appear in the results above — they share 7 of the 8 letters, not all of them.
asterisk is in the NWL, the official Scrabble word list for North America, and in the Words With Friends dictionary, so it's playable exactly as it stands and needs no unscrambling.
Both totals match, because every tile in asterisk carries the same value on a Scrabble board and on a Words With Friends board.
Dictionaries record two senses for asterisk. Scrabble and Words With Friends score tiles and not meanings, so every sense below is worth the same 12 points on a Scrabble board:
asterisk is one of two eight-letter words the same letters produce. No arrangement of the same tiles scores higher in Scrabble, so playing asterisk unchanged also takes the maximum points these letters offer.
The highest-scoring plays from these letters are asterisk and sarkiest, worth 12 points in Scrabble, and nothing else built from asterisk earns more points in Scrabble. Words With Friends prices the same letters differently, so the top of the list changes on a Words With Friends board. Both scores count tile values only and exclude premium squares.
The letters in asterisk produce 309 valid words in the Scrabble and Words With Friends dictionaries. The word count by length is: 2 eight-letter words, 8 seven-letter words, 46 six-letter words, 90 five-letter words, 91 four-letter words, 55 three-letter words and 17 two-letter words.