6-letter words with O as the 2nd letter and I as the 6th letter

The fixed pattern is _O___I: O sits second, and every match ends in I. BONSAI and ROTINI are familiar examples, while BORZOI leads the scoring list. None of the 36 words meet the common-word frequency threshold, so expect a specialist vocabulary mix rather than a bank of everyday guesses.

At a glance: the O-to-I pattern

• There are 36 six-letter matches across the tournament dictionaries.
• All 36 end in I; the final letter never varies in this pattern.
• K starts 6 matches, while B and M start 5 each.
• Zero matches fall within our common-word frequency group.
• BORZOI tops the scoring list at 17 points.

How many 6-letter words have O second and I sixth?

There are 36 matches. Their dictionary coverage overlaps: 35 appear in Collins, 20 in NWL2023, and 17 in ENABLE, so those source counts should not be added together. BONSAI, ROTINI, and YOGINI give you recognizable starting points among entries that otherwise skew obscure.

The initial-letter spread narrows a search quickly. K leads with 6 words; B and M follow with 5 apiece, and S contributes 4. If your first letter is known, try those clusters before scanning all 36 candidates.

Which matching words score the most?

BORZOI scores 17, ahead of JOWARI and KOWHAI at 16 each. ROMAJI and MOKIHI score 15 apiece. These are stronger board-play candidates than BONSAI, but the unusual vocabulary means you should confirm a word is accepted in your game before relying on it.

The pattern also changes sharply when you add a letter: the corresponding seven-letter page has 246 matches, compared with 36 here. For this exact six-letter clue, lock in O and final I first, then use the first-letter counts to cut down the search.