How to
Play
Words with Friends
The primary objective of Words with Friends is to score more points than your opponent(s) by placing letters in your bag strategically on the board. You can place letters either horizontally or vertically to form words. It’s important to balance trying to score the most points each turn and forecasting how the game will unfold based on the tiles in your bag and on the board. This way you’ll score the maximum points at the end of the game.
Rules and
Scoring
So here’s a brief overview of the Words With Friends rules and scoring criteria. Each player takes turns creating words on the board. You can use the letters on the tiles in your bag or play off of letters and words already on the board.
When the game starts, the first word must be placed so that one of the tiles is on the star in the center of the board.
After that, every word must be placed horizontally or vertically so that one of the tiles/letters is shared with an existing word already on the board.
You can create more than one word during a single turn to maximize your points if you place the word strategically using neighboring tiles.
Valid vs.
Invalid Words
The official Words With Friends dictionary has more than 173K valid words based on the Enhanced North American Benchmark Lexicon (ENABLE).
Proper nouns, abbreviations, and standalone prefixes and suffixes are invalid or “illegal” in Words With Friends, as well as words with hyphens or apostrophes.
But unlike some other words games such as region-specific Scrabble games, using parts of speech from another language or era is permitted in Words With Friends.
You can not place a word that creates an invalid or illegal word with neighboring tiles already on the board.
Specialty
Spaces and Bonuses
Once a DL, TL, DW or TW space is covered, it cannot be applied as a “bonus space” in subsequent rounds. In other words, these spaces only benefit the first player that covers them.
Double Letter
You score twice the points for placing a tile on a DL space on the board.
DLDouble Word
If any tiles are placed on a DW space, then double the value of the word. If you place a word on two DW spaces during a single turn, double the value of the word and then double it AGAIN.
DWTriple Letter
You earn triple the value of any letter/tile placed on a TL space on the board.
TLTriple Word
This is like hitting the moneyball. A TW space triples the value of the word. If you hit two TW spaces with a single word, triple the value of the word and then triple it AGAIN.
TW7 in One
If you use all 7 tiles on your Words With Friends rack during a single turn, you get 35 bonus points.
7/1