7-letter words with R as the 3rd letter and D as the 4th letter

The pattern fixes two adjacent middle letters: R occupies position three and D position four, leaving the first two and final three letters open; GARDENS, BORDERS, and BURDENS show how naturally the sequence fits familiar word forms; The catch is coverage: just 10 of 187 entries rank among the most common English words, so solvers will meet many specialist entries.

At a glance for the R-D pattern

• Exactly 187 seven-letter words have R third and D fourth.
• H is the most common first letter, with 31 words; C has 24 and B has 21.
• S leads the endings with 67 words; E and G each finish 22.
• HORDOCK tops the Scrabble scores at 17; BURDOCK and HERDBOY score 16.
• GARDENS, BORDERS, HARDEST, and VERDICT are recognizable examples.

Which matches score highest in Scrabble?

HORDOCK earns the top score, 17, while BURDOCK and HERDBOY sit one point behind at 16. Those scores make the K-ending options worth noticing, but a rack still has to support every letter. Lock in the R-D pair first, then test your remaining tiles around it instead of treating the pattern as a prefix or suffix.

Letter positions narrow the search more than an opening-letter guess: H leads 31 entries, while the next two starts, C and B, account for 24 and 21. At the other end, 67 entries close with S, so checking a plural ending can reveal candidates such as GARDENS, BORDERS, or BURDENS.

Do all games accept these matches?

Only 10 of the 187 matches rank as common by frequency, and tournament-dictionary coverage differs: Collins includes 184, NWL2023 135, and ENABLE 123. These source counts overlap, so they are not separate piles to add together. A word in one list is not guaranteed in another; check your game's dictionary before committing an unfamiliar entry.

For a narrower comparison, 7-letter words with R as the 3rd letter and D as the 4th letter number fewer than the R-I pattern's 366 and R-A pattern's 339. The 187 matches sit closer to A-D's 163. Use neighboring patterns when a clue changes one fixed square, not as substitutes when both letters are locked.