7 Tips on How to Play Words With Friends

Though Words With Friends looks and feels like a Scrabble clone, there are some key differences that make it unique. As such, there are a few distinct strategies how to play Words With Friends and win almost every time. I say “almost” because there are times where you are simply dealt bad tiles and now amount of swapping will help. Nonetheless, some of these strategies include how to organize the board, which types of words get the most points, learning a new dictionary, and so much more detailed below.

How to Play Words With Friends the Right Way

If you really want to learn how to play Words With Friends with winning strategies, this list is the way to go. If you can’t take my word for it, there is one guaranteed way to play the best game ever: Our Words With Friends Cheat.

However, if using our cheat makes you feel like you have an unfair advantage, check out these tips on how to play Words with Friends. Show your opponents you’ve got the skills to win!

1. Placement Strategy

How you place your tiles on the board has everything to do with how the game will turn out. If done incorrectly, you can play yourself into a corner with each turn limiting how many letters you can use. Trust me, it’s not fun to have half a bag of tiles left and only able to use two letter words.

Instead, it is important to occasionally sacrifice points in order to open up the board. You can do this by playing words perpendicular to each other or parallel, but at the last one or two letters. This place strategy is especially important if you’re playing with someone who insists on playing into a corner; you have to lead the game elsewhere or the fun will run dry before you are able to finish the game.

2. Checkmate

Though it is very important to play fairly and keep the board open, there are more aggressive strategies on how to play Words with Friends. In this case, I am referring specifically to making sure the other person fails.

Much like a checkmate in chess, you can create openings that you know you can take advantage of, but the other player is forced to either pass or make a poor play. Sometimes this means being able to reach a TL or TW before the other player can, or purposefully putting down a word with a letter you plan to use later.

This strategy is a lot more like chess; you need to calculate a few moves ahead. Of course, this strategy also depends on the letters you are dealt. As such, please keep in mind that sometimes you just get all the wrong letters and you will not be able to use this trick.

3. X Y Z

Don’t shell out your 10 point tiles just because you can’t fathom a word other than ZOO or AXE. It is not always good practice to horde letters, but the letters worth 10 points can be very handy near the end of the game or when there is access to a special tile. In short, keep 10 point tiles around for those tough spots where a TL or DL is close by. It’s an automatic 30 or 20 points, so keep those aces in your pocket.

4. What’s In The Bag?

Words With Friends explicitly tells you which tiles are left in the bag; in the traditional Scrabble game, this is strictly forbidden – no attempts at YOLO are permitted. This is an enormous strategy everyone should be taking advantage of. By taking a peek at what’s in the bag, you can plan which words use.

For example, if you know there are no more Es left, it would behoove you to start recalling words that don’t have Es in them (good luck!). Or better yet, when certain tiles run out within the bag (like S, vowels, blanks, and high point tiles) start strategizing how to keep the letters you need, like vowels, open on the board. This is one of the most important tips on how to play Words with Friends, so please keep in mind during every game.

5. Condense

This might seem like a direct contradiction to the first strategy on this list, but there is more to Words With Friends than being friendly. The idea behind this strategy is to play your words towards the center of the board. That means a lot of parallel words and trying to stick as close to the center star as possible. It may not make much sense, but playing in a more condensed way can keep both players from locking themselves in a single corner. In addition, if you play a little less friendly than number one on this list implies, you can hit that sweet TL and TW combo long before the other player realizes the opportunity is there.

6. The Art of 2 and 3 Letter Words

Another very important tip on how to play Words With Friends is to study the list of two and three letter words. Doing so will help a lot in making those parallel plays I keep talking about. The more words you can make in one turn, the more points you will earn – even better if you do so with all 7 tiles! For your convenience, word-grabber has a list of all the 2 letter words possible in Words With Friends right here.

Memorizing even a few of the unusual 2 or 3 letter words will go a long way to playing better. For example, AA or ED can provide a much needed space on the board for you to place the perfect word. Making more than one word with your letters is the number one way to get way too many points, besides a TW of course. The longer your word can run parallel to another, the better. Seriously, this can equal over 100 points if done correctly.

Swap Dem Tiles

Swapping tiles in Words With Friends will force you to lose a turn and it might seem like a terrible idea to risk losing your turn in favor of new tiles. However, I can assure you that it is much better to swap your bad tiles for better ones (hopefully) than it is to continue struggling with gradually worse words.

Swapping tiles is 110% one of the best strategies on this list – especially if you find yourself with 3 tiles of the same letter. I’ve been there; it is a real pain to play like there are all kinds of words with three Us in them besides UNUSUAL. It is much easier for you and the other player in the long run if you swap tiles for a better selection.

Winning Words With Friends should be a lot easier if you follow these 7 tips on how to play Words With Friends!