motherly needs no unscrambling at all — the eight-letter word is already the strongest play its own letters allow, banking 16 points in Scrabble as it stands. In all, 162 valid words come out of this rack, grouped by length below and checked for Words With Friends as well as Scrabble.
motherly is the highest-scoring word from motherly, worth 16 points in Scrabble. The top 10 of 162 words are shown here, with the full list organized by length below.
Only one eight-letter word uses the letters in motherly — and it is motherly itself. No unscrambling is needed: the word is already playable as written, worth 16 points in Scrabble.
Rearranging the letters in motherly produces 2 valid seven-letter words. No common everyday answer stands out among these seven-letter results, so let the score decide: the highest-scoring word is mothery, worth 15 points in Scrabble.
Unscrambling motherly turns up 11 six-letter words. If a familiar word is all you need, start with mother and theory. For points, the strongest plays are homely, methyl, and thymol — each worth 14 points in Scrabble.
There are 24 five-letter words that can be made by unscrambling the letters in motherly. If a familiar word is all you need, start with hotel, motel, other, and rhyme. For points, the strongest plays are homey, mothy, rhyme, and thyme — each worth 13 points in Scrabble.
Rearranging the letters in motherly produces 54 valid four-letter words. If a familiar word is all you need, start with hero, hole and holy. For points, the strongest plays are homy and myth — each worth 12 points in Scrabble.
Unscrambling motherly turns up 48 three-letter words. If a familiar word is all you need, start with her, hey and hot. For points, the strongest plays are hey, hoy, thy, and yeh — each worth 9 points in Scrabble.
There are 22 two-letter words that can be made by unscrambling the letters in motherly. If a familiar word is all you need, start with eh, he and hm. For points, the strongest plays are hm and my — each worth 7 points in Scrabble.
Swap a single tile in motherly 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.
motherly 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 motherly carries the same value on a Scrabble board and on a Words With Friends board.
Dictionaries record two senses for motherly. Scrabble and Words With Friends score tiles and not meanings, so every sense below is worth the same 16 points on a Scrabble board:
motherly is the only eight-letter word the same letters produce. No arrangement of the same tiles scores higher in Scrabble, so playing motherly unchanged also takes the maximum points these letters offer.
The highest-scoring play from these letters is motherly, worth 16 points in Scrabble, and no other word from motherly 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 motherly produce 162 valid words in the Scrabble and Words With Friends dictionaries. The word count by length is: 1 eight-letter word, 2 seven-letter words, 11 six-letter words, 24 five-letter words, 54 four-letter words, 48 three-letter words and 22 two-letter words.