Scrabble Words With J

In this article we’ll explore the Scrabble letter tile J to take a closer look at why it’s a valuable letter, what words can be made using the letter J including two- and three-letter words, and how you can strategically use the J tile to score highly in games.

Learn about the J letter tile

In Scrabble, the J letter tile is worth 8 points, making it one of the highest-scoring tiles after the Q and Z (which are worth 10 points each). It’s also one of the rarest letters in the game, with only one J tile being included in a standard Scrabble set.

Depending on the type of player you are, the chances are you either love or hate J. On one hand, the J tile brings good opportunities for players to score some high-point rounds.

However, it’s often considered one of the trickiest letters to play and sometimes leaves novice Scrabble players scratching their head wondering what words they can make with a J.

If you are one of those players, don’t worry as the numbers back up your feelings. Words with the letter J are very rare in the Scrabble dictionary, with only circa 1.5% of Scrabble words containing a J.

But don’t fear as we’re going to go over the most important J words for you to remember to successfully play this letter. As well as touch on some strategies and tactics you can employ to increase your score using this tile.

Short J Words

There are only two valid two-letter words in Scrabble that contain the letter tile J, which are “Jo” and “Ja”, each worth 9 points in total. We’ve broken down each words meaning below for you to find out more about these two-letter J words.

Jo

Points: 9 total (J: 8, O: 1).
Definition & meaning: Jo is used as a term meaning darling or sweetheart when addressing another person whose usually one’s lover.
In a sentence: “Julie is my Jo” or “I played a game of Scrabble with my Jo, Julie”.

Ja

Points: 9 total (J: 8, A: 1).
Definition & meaning: as an adverb ja means yes or as a noun ja is a synonym for the Korean foot (a traditional unit of length equivalent to about 30.3cm).
In a sentence: “Ja, I would like to play Scrabble” or “It’s about a ja long”.

The word Ja on a Scrabble board

Why are two-letter words so important? Many new players often aim to create long and complex words in Scrabble, which can work at times. But it’s important to know these short words to strategically play the board and multiplier squares. A two-letter J word on a triple square will usually beat the score of a 5-7 letter J word.

Longer J Words

At the time of writing this article, 35 total three-letter J words are allowed in the game’s dictionary. These range from 19-point words like “Jiz” to 10-point words such as “Jot” or “Jin”. Below is the points value and meaning for some these words.

Jiz - Scottish slang for the word wig - an artificial head of hair (19 points).
Jak - an East Indian fruit that contains edible pulp and seeds (synonym of jack and jackfruit). Sometimes Jak is used as an English name, a shortened version of the more common name Jack (14 points).
Jow - to ring a bell, especially a church bell, used in Scottish and northern English dialects (13 points).
Joy - an expression, feeling, or emotion of happiness - often great happiness (13 points).
Jaw - the bones which form part of the skull which frames and holds the mouth and teeth (13 points).
Jay - a jay is a type of blue bird (13 points).
Job - to be assigned or take on a piece of work or employment, such as “Bob had a job as a builder” (12 points).
Jam - is a versatile word with multiple meanings, such as a blocked passaged or something(s) pressed tightly together, interfering, or blocking, to crush, to be crowded or packed in, a preservation of crushed fruit (e.g., strawberry jam) (12 points).
Jab - to stab or pierce, for example, a jab punch (12 points).
Jig - a form of dance usually involving kicking or leaping (e.g., the Irish jig) or a fisherman’s lure which is jerked up and down in the water to attract fish (11 points).
Jog - a slow to medium speed run (11 points).
Jag - of sharp, jolt, or prick. Often used in relation to a “jagged” edge (11 points).
Jug - a large bottle or vase-like container for holding and pouring liquids (11 points).
Jud - an abbreviation of “judge” (11 points).
Aji - a chilli pepper, often used in Latin American cuisine (10 points).
Jee - a slang term often used in place of yes (10 points).
Jeu - a game or play (10 points).
Jor - a formal section of composition (10 points).
Jet - a sudden discharge of something (e.g., water, air, liquid) or an aeroplane powered by jet engines (10 points).
Jol - a shortened form of “jolly”, a slang term for a party or social gathering meaning to have fun (10 points).
Jar - a container for holding something, typically a glass container that holds food items (10 points).
Joe - coffee (i.e., “cup of joe”), to describe a man (e.g., “he’s just your average joe”), or common first name, often short for Joseph (10 points).
Jin - a supernatural being made of smokeless flame or subtle matter (10 points).
Jus - a type of thin gravy or sauce (10 points).
Jai - in Hindi, “jai” means victory or conqueror (10 points).
Jun - a unit of currency in North Korea (10 points).
Jut - to extend or project out of something or into a space, i.e., “juts out” (10 points).
Raj - refers to the British rule of India between 1858 and 1947 (10 points).
Jot - to write something down, usually a short note. E.g., “I’m going to jot the Scrabble score down” (10 points).

Our Chosen J Words

We’ve hand-selected some J words we really like to play in our Scrabble games or just find interesting from the dictionary. Check them out below:

Jivy

17 points and 4 letters.
Meaning: an adjective to describe something lively, upbeat, and fun.
Why we like it: in Scrabble the J, V, and Y tiles are usually considered difficult to play, meaning a lot of players don’t particularly like drawing them from the tile bag. Jivy is the perfect example of how 3 difficult letters can be made into a winning word without making life difficult.

Jedi

12 points and 4 letters.
Meaning: a member of the mystical knightly order in the Star Wars movies who use the power of the Force for good.
Why we like it: Jedi combines our love for Scrabble with our love for Star Wars. What more can we say?

The word “Jedi” played on a Scrabble board

Jazzy

33 points and 5 letters.
Meaning: an adjective to describe something lively, colourful, and stylish. Often associated with jazz music but its meaning can be extended further. For example, “Are we ready to have a jazzy evening tonight?” or “Your dress looks jazzy”.
Why we like it: a high scorer of a word, “Jazzy” could fetch up to nearly 100 points on a triple bonus square or above 60 on just a double. Plus, who doesn’t love a bit of jazz?

Juxtaposition

29 points and a whopping 13 letters long.
Meaning: bring two things or items close together or side by side, often used to show the contrast between two things.
Why we like it: a rare word in Scrabble, but a great word that uses unique letters. You would probably most likely see this played if “position” was first laid on the board, only to be extended later with “Juxta” at the beginning.

Jovial

16 points and 6 letters.
Meaning: to be cheerful and friendly, for example, “Hannah was in a jovial mood as she was playing Scrabble”.
Why we like it: we think jovial is a great word because of its happy and joyful connotations that are used to describe people who bring happiness to a situation.

Bingo J Words

A Scrabble bingo, for those not aware, is when a player can play all 7 of their letter tiles in one turn creating a 7-letter word that hooks onto another on the board. These are great moves as they score the player an additional 50 bonus points for that round.

Like all other letters in Scrabble, it’s possible to get a bingo using the J letter tile. We’ve listed some of the potential 7-letter bingo opportunities you could score with the J tile below to give you some inspiration.

Jackpot - an award, typically of the highest amount available, for winning a game such as poker (22 points).
Jinxing - a jinx is a person who brings bad luck; hence jinxing is to bring bad luck upon somebody. It’s an excellent use of the J and X characters with the suffix “ing” (22 points).
Jetpack - a style of backpack containing jet engines that can be used for human flight, often a prototype product (22 points).
Jukebox - an automatic record player, now considered somewhat old-fashioned (27 points).
Skyjack - to hijack an aircraft (27 points).
Jumbler - a person who makes things untidy, i.e., jumbles items (18 points).
Journey - to travel from one place to another (17 points).
Joiners - a profession involving word work, i.e., joining pieces of wood (14 points).
Jesters - a type of clown or entertainer (14 points).
Jellies - a substance having the consistency of jelly, “jellies” is sometimes used to refer to sweets or sweeties (14 points).
Jealous - to be envious or show suspicious of somebody else or something (14 points).

Double J Words

Words with a back-to-back double “J” are extremely rare. In fact, there are only 6 in total which are valid to be played in Scrabble. Here they are:

Hajj - a pilgrimage to the holy city of Mecca in Saudi Arabia. This definition is shared across the following similar words listed below (21 points, 4 letters).
Hajji - 22 points, 5 letters.
Hajjis - 23 points, 6 letters.
Hajjes - 23 points, 6 letters.
Hajjah - 26 points, 6 letters.
Hajjahs - 27 points, 7 letters.

One caveat players should bear in mind when playing double letter words that use the higher scoring tiles is to consider the score may not always be as high as you first thought.

Why do you ask? This is because there is only one J tile available in the game as per the letter distribution. As a result, it is still possible to play a double J word, but you’ll need a blank tile to do so.

Unfortunately, this immediately caps the points you can score as the blank tile value always remains at zero points regardless of which letter it’s substituted for. This means, for any double J word, you should immediately deduct 8 points from the score you’d get by adding up every letter.

This doesn’t mean double J words are not worth playing. But it does mean you should carefully consider if you can use the blank tile for a better cause.

How to find more words with a J

There are plenty of ways players can find more J words to play in Scrabble. Dictionary searchers and word finders are tools that let players search the Scrabble dictionary to find more words for their next game.

Check out our dictionary cheat tool to filter by words beginning, containing, and ending with J or search for any word using our word checker.

J word strategies

As we’ve previously discussed in this article, the J tile is one of the highest scoring in the game at 8 points. Therefore, it’s important to play it strategically to maximize your chance of winning.

Two and three-letter words

In Scrabble, the number of two-letter J words is sparse as there are only two in total (“Jo” and “Ja”). It’s a must that you remember these as two-letter words are perfect for when you land in a tricky situation, such as being stuck with a J during the endgame.

Because two-letter J words are sparse, three-letter words become very important too. Luckily for Scrabble players, there are a total of 35 three-letter J words you can play.

When thinking up a game strategy in relation to the J tile, memorizing the three-letter words is fairly easy. Our handy tip for doing so is that the majority of Scrabble J words begin with a J, have a vowel in the middle, and then commonly a consonant (but sometimes another vowel at the end). For example, jab, job, jog, jet, jak, etc. If you keep this in mind, you’ll always be equipped to play this tile without getting trapped with this tricky letter.

Letter and word multipliers

Letter and word multipliers are the bonus squares on a Scrabble board that can double or triple an individual letter or whole word value.

As the J tile is already worth a total of 8 points, this makes it a powerful winning letter when combined with multiplier squares. This is because the points value of J doubles to 16 or triples to 24.

Because J is rare in Scrabble, players only get 1 chance per game to use this letter. Consequently, its scoring potential can be wasted if it’s not strategically played on a bonus square.

If you manage to pick the J tile from the bag, always be on the lookout for a spot you’ll be able to play it on the board. Plan ahead and try to work towards a bonus square with your other tiles to set yourself for a multiplier - ideally, you want the J to land on a triple-letter square or any of the letters of the word to hit a triple word square.

By employing these tactics successfully, you’ll be hitting 30-point rounds in no time with your J words.

Summary

Now having newfound knowledge of the J letter tile and what words can be played with it in Scrabble we hope you are better equipped for using this tricky letter in your next game.

Always remember “Jo” and “Ja” are valid words you can use if you become stuck with a J and go for those multipliers where possible. Happy playing!

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Stephen Lunt is Word Checker's founder and primary content writer. He loves to share his experiences and knowledge of word games through writing and creating handy online tools for players to use.

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