6-letter words with N as the 1st letter and R as the 3rd letter

The fixed pattern is N _ R _ _ _: N begins each word, and R sits in the third slot. NORMAL, NARROW, and NERVES are familiar anchors, while NARKED tops the scoring examples. Only six matches rank among common English words, so start with recognizable examples and use the fixed letters to narrow the search before considering less familiar entries.

At a glance: the N–R pattern

• Forty tournament-dictionary words have N first and R third.
• Collins includes all 40 matches; ENABLE includes 22, and NWL2023 includes 23.
• Only six entries fall among the most common English words.
• S is the most frequent reported final letter, with 11 matches; D follows with eight.

Which N–R words are easiest to recognize?

NORMAL, NARROW, NERVES, and NURSES are familiar starting points for the N _ R _ _ _ frame. NORDIC and NORMAN also make the pattern easy to spot, while NURSED and NORMED show how a short ending can change a recognizable base. Try these before scanning the full set for less familiar forms.

For a word-game clue, check each fixed letter first, then test the remaining three spaces against the examples. NARKED scores 11 points in the scoring list, ahead of NERVED and NERKAS at 10 each. The average score is 7.4, so the highest-value answers stand apart from the typical entry rather than representing the whole group.

The dictionary overlap is uneven: Collins has 40 matching words, compared with 22 in ENABLE and 23 in NWL2023. A word accepted in Collins may not appear in the other lists. Confirm your game's dictionary before committing to an unfamiliar answer, especially when a close-looking form is all you have.

Which endings appear most often?

S, D, and E lead the reported final-letter groups, with 11, eight, and seven matches respectively. L accounts for five, while only two end in R. NORMAL and NARROW finish differently, so the third-letter clue alone does not predict the word ending; keep the last position open until another clue fixes it.