6-letter words with E as the 4th letter and S as the 5th letter

The pattern is _ _ _ E S _: the middle pair stays fixed while the first three letters and the final tile stay open. ACCESS, FOREST, LATEST, and PRIEST all fit, but their endings differ. Every entry is recognised by at least one tournament list, so the set runs well past everyday vocabulary.

The E-S pattern at a glance

• There are 159 six-letter entries with E fourth and S fifth.
• The final letter is T for 114 entries, making T the dominant ending.
• S is the most frequent first letter, with 16 words; F follows with 13.
• Just 30 entries count among the 25,000 most common English words.

Which familiar words fit this letter pattern?

ACCESS, ASSESS, and EXCESS make the repeated S at the end easy to spot; each has E in the fourth position and S in the fifth. HONEST, FOREST, and PRIEST show the same fixed pair with different first three letters.

The first-letter counts are spread across several choices: S leads at 16, followed by F at 13 and C at 11. Examples such as STRESS, FINEST, and CHEESE illustrate those openings. When solving, keep the known E-S pair in place and test the remaining slots rather than shifting the clue.

Score high, but check uncommon entries

JAKEST scores 17 points and JIVEST scores 16 in the Scrabble scoring. Both end in T, the final letter shared by 114 of these words. EXCESS and WHEESH score 15, while CHEESY scores 14, so the best-scoring options are not necessarily the words you would guess first.

Only 30 of the 159 entries count as common English words; many are far less familiar. Counts also vary by dictionary: Collins includes 148, NWL2023 includes 129, and ENABLE includes 115. Check the word list used by your game before playing an uncommon entry.