5-letter words with I as the 3rd letter and T as the 4th letter

The frame is __IT_, and it concentrates its endings hard. S endings dominate with 40 words, ahead of E on 19 and H on 12, which together cover 71 of the 88 entries and leave S as the most common opening letter at 18. The pattern has two clear faces, the -ITS plurals and verbs such as UNITS, SUITS and WAITS, and the -ITE group behind ELITE, SUITE, UNITE, WHITE and QUITE.

The __IT_ pattern in numbers

• 88 five-letter words hold I third and T fourth.
• The S ending covers 40 words, with E on 19 and H on 12.
• S opens 18 words; B and F follow with 8 each.
• Sixteen are Wordle answers and all 88 are accepted guesses.
• FRITZ scores 17, ahead of BLITZ and SPITZ on 16.

The -ITS and -ITE halves

Plurals and verb forms supply the S endings: UNITS, SUITS, WAITS, BRITS, EXITS, EDITS, QUITS, SPITS and EMITS are each one stem plus S. The E endings take the silent-e route, and ELITE, SUITE, UNITE, WHITE, QUITE, SPITE and AXITE show how little changes between them.

A third group ends in H, and it is smaller but distinctive. Twelve words close that way, and SMITH and FAITH are the only recognisable pair among them, since the rest run from BAITH to SWITH.

Which __IT_ words score best?

FRITZ heads the list at 17, and BLITZ and SPITZ follow on 16. GLITZ reaches 15, while QUITE, QUITS and WHITY each score 14. The Z and Q tiles carry those totals, and four of the 88 entries end in Z.

Collins carries 87 of the 88 words, but NWL2023 stops at 69 and ENABLE at 63, so a large slice of this pattern is unavailable in North American play. Verify the lexicon your game allows before you build a rack around a Z-heavy entry.