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

The -TES, -TER and -TED tails account for 135 of the 162 matches, which is why so many look like plain past-tense or agent forms. Fifty entries are common words and 24 are Wordle answers, among them after, water, later, hotel and often. The average score is 7.0, with rare letters supplying most of the lift at the top.

Where the -TE- list lands

• One hundred sixty-two matches put T third and E fourth.
• S ends 55, R ends 43 and D ends 37, which is 135 of the 162.
• Fifty entries are common English words.
• Twenty-four matches are Wordle answers.
• Vitex leads at 15 points, and six others share 12.
• M and L are the busiest openers, with 18 and 14 matches.

Which -TE- words are Wordle answers?

Twenty-four of the 162 are answers. Sixteen end in -TER: after, alter, cater, deter, eater, enter, ester, hater, inter, later, meter, otter, outer, utter, voter and water.

The other eight spread wider across the list: betel, eaten, hotel, matey, motel, octet, often and totem. Nearly all of them are words a player already knows, which is why this half of the answer set feels so familiar.

Why do rare letters decide the top scores?

Vitex tops the list at 15 points, where the 8-point X does the heavy lifting. Latex, jutes, oxter, jetes, kytes and wyted follow on 12, and wytes scores 11. Jutes and jetes lean on the 8-point J, one of the few high-value tiles that shows up here.

Vitex also shows the dictionary problem: Collins is the only tournament list that accepts it, while NWL2023 keeps 136 of the 162 matches and ENABLE keeps 130. Two entries, retes and atted, are not even legal Wordle guesses, since the game's allowed list skips them. Check your game's word list once before you build a plan around a rare form.