7-letter words with U as the 2nd letter and R as the 4th letter

In the frame _ U _ R _ _ _, one decision does most of the sorting: is the third letter also an R, which puts you in the CURRENT family, or is it a T, which almost always means OUTR-? Everything else is a smaller group of Q words and scattered stems.

The U-R frame in brief

• Third letter: R in 51 words, T in 27, A in 16 and E in 10.
• Openers: O begins 24 words, Q begins 19, and M and S begin 15 each.
• QUARTZY scores 28, QUIRKED 21, and QUARTIC and QUORUMS 18.
• 14 matches are common words, including CURRENT, QUARTER and SUPREME.

What does the double R give you?

51 words, about a third of the frame. CURRENT, SURREAL, BURROWS, BURRITO, TURRETS and HURRIED are the common ones, and QUARREL belongs to a related Q group.

Words outside the two big families are few and varied: SUPREME, SUNRISE, GUARDED and QUERIES. Between the double-R words and the OUTR- group, 73 of the 143 are covered, so the long tail is shorter than it looks.

How many words start with OUTR-?

22 of the 27 T-third words open with OUTR-, such as OUTRAGE, OUTRIDE, OUTRANK, OUTRACE and OUTRUNS. OUTRAGE is the only one that is common, so the family is mostly a word-list tool.

Q is the other big opener, with 19 words. QUARTER, QUARTET, QUARREL and QUERIES are the everyday members, and QUARTZY, QUARTIC and QUORUMS give the points.

The Q words are worth a closer look. QUA- gives nine words, including QUARTAN, QUARTES and QUAREST, and QUE- gives five, such as QUERIED, QUERIER and QUERIST. Between them the Q starts add up to 14 of the 19.

Scoring caution