Menu
Find words

child

/tʃaɪld/
noun

CHILD Scrabble score: 11 points; CHILD means a person who has not reached adulthood or someone's offspring, and it is a valid Wordle answer.

NWL Collins ENABLE Wordle answer list

Noun 4 meanings

  1. A person who has not yet reached adulthood, whether natural (puberty), cultural (initiation), or legal (majority).

    “Go easy on him: he is but a child.”

  2. One's direct descendant by birth, regardless of age; one's offspring; a son or daughter.

    “My youngest child is forty-three this year.”

  3. The thirteenth Lenormand card.

  4. A figurative offspring

    “the children of Israel”

Definitions: Wiktionary (CC BY-SA) via Kaikki/Wiktextract

Where it comes from

Etymology

From Middle English child, from Old English ċild, from Proto-West Germanic *kilþ, *kelþ, from Proto-Germanic *kelþaz (“womb; fetus”), from Proto-Indo-European *ǵelt- (“womb”), perhaps from Proto-Indo-European *gel- (“to ball up, amass”).

Similar and opposite words

Similar
kiddescendantproductsondaughterboyprogenyhybrid
Opposite
fathermotherparentadultgrownup

CHILD is an everyday five-letter word, not an obscure rack-filler, and it scores 11 points. Its frequency rank is 473, with 151,864 corpus occurrences. Collins, NWL2023, and ENABLE recognize it, and Wordle accepts it both as an answer and as a guess.

CHILD at a glance

  • CHILD has five letters and scores 11 points before board bonuses.
  • Its letter values are C=3, H=4, I=1, L=1, and D=2.
  • No anagrams are recorded for CHILD.
  • CHILL, CHILE, and CHILI are its three one-letter neighbors.
  • Twelve words rhyme with CHILD, including BUILD, WILD, MILD, and GUILD.

What does CHILD mean?

CHILD usually means a person who has not reached adulthood. The definition can refer to someone who has not yet reached puberty, is not considered an adult by their culture, or has not reached legal adulthood.

CHILD also means a person's direct descendant, regardless of age. An adult can still be the child of a parent, so the word does not always mean a minor.

A less everyday sense is the thirteenth Lenormand card. In ordinary conversation, though, the young-person and offspring meanings are the ones you are most likely to meet.

How does CHILD score and fit in word games?

The CHILD Scrabble score is 11: C contributes 3, H contributes 4, I and L contribute 1 each, and D adds 2. H supplies the largest share, so placing it on a bonus square matters more than chasing a small bonus for I or L.

CHILD is both an allowed Wordle guess and an answer. Its familiar spelling makes it easy to recognize, but the H is worth checking carefully: CHILL, CHILE, and CHILI each change only the final letter.

There are no anagrams to rearrange into another word. For sound matches, BUILD, WILD, MILD, and GUILD share the rhyme; the longer list also includes REBUILD, GRANDCHILD, and STEPCHILD.

Rhymes with child

All rhymes

One letter away

Change one letter, keep the rest

Questions people ask

Is CHILD a valid Scrabble word?
Yes, CHILD is accepted in Collins, NWL2023, and ENABLE. It scores 11 points before premium squares, with H worth 4 and C worth 3. Check your game's word list if you are playing with a different dictionary.
What does CHILD mean?
CHILD means a person who has not reached adulthood, and it also means someone's direct descendant at any age. The second sense is why an adult can still be described as someone's child. A less common definition names a Lenormand card.
Does CHILD have any anagrams?
No anagrams are recorded for CHILD. Its letters are C, H, I, L, and D; changing one letter instead gives close neighbors such as CHILL, CHILE, and CHILI. BUILD and WILD rhyme with CHILD but are not anagrams.

Keep going