Scrabble Letter Values
Complete Tile Points and Counts for All 26 Letters

Tile Chart — All 26 Letters

Each tile shows the letter and its point value (bottom right). Colour indicates point group: blue shades for 1–4 points, orange for 8 points, red-orange for 10 points.

Points by Group — Sorted by Value

Complete A–Z Reference — Every Letter

Standard North American Scrabble (TWL) tile distribution. Values set by Alfred Butts based on letter frequency analysis. Total tiles: 100 (98 letters + 2 blanks). Total point value of all tiles: 187 points.

Scoring Strategy — Using This Reference

The Scrabble tile value chart serves two primary strategic functions: pre-play scoring estimation and rack management. Pre-play, this chart lets you quickly add up a candidate word's base score before placing tiles. A 7-letter bingo using QUINTET (Q=10+U=1+I=1+N=1+T=1+E=1+T=1=16 points) plus the 50-point bingo bonus gives 66 points before any board multipliers. Post-play, this chart helps evaluate whether the tiles used were deployed efficiently — a 7-letter play scoring only 9 base points represents 9/7 = 1.3 points per tile, well below the database average of approximately 2.8 points per tile.

Rack management use: knowing that E tiles score 1 point means you are not losing scoring potential by playing E tiles freely. Knowing that K tiles score 5 points means holding a K for a better play opportunity has value — but holding too long risks being stuck with high-value tiles at game end (when they count against your score). The balance between playing high-value tiles now versus holding for a better placement is a core Scrabble decision this chart supports.

The Scrabble Score Calculator computes exact base scores for any word, showing each letter's contribution individually. The High Scoring Word Research page shows the 25 highest base-scoring words in the database. The Rare Letter Research page explains why Q, J, X, and Z are rare in the vocabulary and high-scoring in the game.

Historical Context — How Tile Values Were Set

Alfred Butts, the inventor of Scrabble, determined the letter values and tile counts through frequency analysis of newspaper front pages in the 1930s. Common letters (E, A, I, O, N, R, T, L, S, U) received the lowest values (1 point) and the most tiles. Rare letters (Q, Z) received the highest values (10 points) and only one tile each. Butts's frequency analysis predates modern corpus linguistics, but his judgements align closely with both newspaper corpus data from his era and contemporary digital corpus analysis.

The tile counts reflect a deliberate design balance: the game should have enough common letters to form words, but not so many of any single letter that it becomes trivially easy. 12 E tiles means you will always have access to the most common vowel; 1 Q tile means you will encounter the rarest consonant infrequently enough that it presents a genuine challenge. The 100-tile total was a practical decision fitting the original Scrabble board design.

The blank tile was a particularly clever design decision. Scoring 0 points but representing any letter, blanks function as a pressure valve for difficult rack situations. A rack with Q, Q, X, J, and three unhelpful vowels is nearly unplayable; a blank in that rack enables a high-scoring play using the J or Q with whatever vowel the blank represents. The decision to award 0 points for blanks rather than the value of the represented letter creates a meaningful tradeoff — blanks provide flexibility at the cost of scoring power.

The tile values have remained unchanged since Scrabble was first sold commercially in 1948. Various proposed revisions (adjusting for changes in English vocabulary since the 1930s, adding new words that change optimal strategies) have been discussed in the competitive Scrabble community but not implemented in the official game. The 1948 values are canonical for all official tournament play.

Letter Values Across Game Variants — Scrabble vs Words With Friends

While the standard North American Scrabble values are fixed as shown in this reference, other word games use different tile values. Words With Friends (the mobile word game) differs in several letter values: C is worth 4 points in WWF vs 3 in Scrabble; M is worth 4 vs 3; V is worth 5 vs 4; and several other letters differ by 1 point. The board layout in WWF also differs — premium squares appear in different positions. This chart applies to standard Scrabble only. For WWF-specific scoring, verify tile values in the game itself.

International Scrabble sets for non-English languages have completely different tile distributions and values reflecting the letter frequency of each language. French Scrabble has more A tiles and different rare-letter values. German Scrabble includes tiles for Ä, Ö, Ü, and ß. Spanish Scrabble includes CH, LL, Ñ, and RR as single tiles in older editions. The values in this reference are specific to English-language North American Scrabble (TWL word list).

The total point value of all tiles in a standard English Scrabble set is 187 points, calculated by summing points × tile count for all 100 tiles. A full game typically scores 500–900 total points across all plays by both players. Average scores depend heavily on skill level: casual players average 200–300 points per game; competitive tournament players average 350–500 per game; top players can achieve 600+ points against challenging opponents.

Blank Tiles — Special Case

The two blank tiles are the most strategically valuable tiles in the Scrabble set despite scoring 0 points. A blank can substitute for any letter, enabling plays that would otherwise be impossible with the current rack. The optimal use of a blank depends on the board position: using it to complete a high-scoring word (QUIZZING with a blank as the second Z) is generally better than saving it for an uncertain future opportunity. Common guidance is to hold a blank only if a bingo (using all 7 tiles) becomes achievable within one or two draws. Using a blank for a modest 15-20 point play when a 70-80 point bingo opportunity is imminent is a known strategy error.