Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/2025 February 25

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February 25

Word website thing

For a project I'm involved in, I seek some website/app that enables me to input a valid word, and it returns all the cases where the addition of one extra letter results in a new valid word, even if the letters have to be rearranged to get that result.

Example: I input the, and I get heat (a), beth (b), echt (c), meth (m), then (n), Theo (o), Seth (s), thew (w), they (y), and probably some others.

Obviously I can do this myself by trial and error, but life's too short. Ideally, I would like to start with a seed word, such as "the", and each of the 4-letter results would become the seeds for a new search, and so on, producing a set of word strings from an original seed. E.g. the > heat > heart > hearts > ..., and the > meth > theme > themes ...

Does such a thing exist? -- Jack of Oz ^{[pleasantries]} 07:13, 25 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@JackofOz I use this site. If for example you enter "the" and specify you want a fixed length of four-letter words, it lists twelve results. The second part of your request is more tricky. Shantavira|^{feed me} 09:20, 25 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I suspect that, like crossword aids, there is a website or app featuring this, because it's part of a type of puzzle that features in UK newspapers (such as my own local Hampshire Chronicle), called 'Brickwork' – here's an online version.

I've never looked for a solving aid (I'll leave that to you) because for me the puzzle's point is the mental exercise, rather than obsessively completing it. {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 94.8.123.129 (talk) 12:05, 25 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Another option is this site, which allows you to look for anagrams with one or more wildcards. You could enter “the?” and it will find the four-letter words that consist of T, H, E, and another letter. Enter “the??” and it will find the five-letter words that consist of T, H, E, and two other letters. And so forth. John M Baker (talk) 04:35, 26 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks all. These are very helpful. -- Jack of Oz ^{[pleasantries]} 10:07, 26 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]