81 Best Word Riddles to Exercise Creative Thinking
Playing word riddles works as a quick getaway from daily pressures and workload tensions. Who doesn’t love to take a short break? Having a quick word riddles session with your close ones or your colleagues helps you in refreshing your mind.
The best part about word riddles is that they do not require you to think a lot. However, there are also some hard riddles. The answers to such hard riddles seem pretty obvious but are not.
You can even try such word riddles on your own by keeping a list of word riddles with answers. You can read them one by one and think of an answer. After that, you can see the answer to know if it was correct or not.
Word riddles are good to be played alone and with a group of people as well. Go and try these riddles to have a little time off.
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Table of Contents
Best Word Riddles
There are multiple kinds of word riddles. Well, you may find it hard to choose the best ones. Here is the solution. You can choose the best word riddles from the list here.
1. What is one thing that all wise men, regardless of their politics or religion, have to agree is between heaven and earth?
Answer: The word “and.”
2. What 8 letter word can have a letter taken away and it still makes a word.
Take another letter away and it still makes a word. Keep on doing that until you have one letter left. What is the word?
Answer: The word is starting! starting, staring, string, sting, sing, sin, in, I.
Cool, huh?
3. Forward I am heavy, but backward I am not. What am I?
Answer: The word “ton”.
4. What word contains 26 letters but only has three syllables?
Answer: The Alphabet.
5. Name an English word of more than 2 letters that both begins and ends with the letters “he” in that order, there are two possible answers. What is it?
Answer: Headache or Heartache.
6. What word has kst in the middle, in the beginning, and at the end?
Answer: Inkstand.
7. I lack much reason, but often rhyme and require logic to pass the time. To get the words to tell your kin, look for clues that lie within, Though all are different, they act the same. The answer is practically in the name.
Answer: Riddle.
8. Which is the word in English that has nine letters, and remains a word at each step even when you remove one letter from it, right up to a single letter remaining. List each letter as you remove them, along with the resulting word at each step?
Answer: ‘Startling’ is the word. Begin by removing ‘l’, which makes it ‘starting’, then take away the ‘t’, making it ‘staring’, and so on – string; sting; sing; sin; in; and, I.
9. I’m a six letter word. If I did not exist, you wouldn’t either. With my first letter omitted I’m an alternative. The last three letters are feminine. The first four letters make an insect. Who am I?
Answer: Mother. other = an alternative, her = feminine, moth = an insect.
10. If in the END is D? Then, what was in the BEGINNING?
Answer: E (in word end d is in the end and e in the beginning).
Funny Word Riddles
Every riddle is fun. To make the game night much more fun, you can add these funny word riddles to your list as well. The word puzzles riddles are also perfect for kids and somehow even for adults.
1. What is the longest word in the English language?
Answer: Smiles – Because there’s a ‘mile’ between the two S’s.
2. Which word in the English language becomes shorter when it is lengthened?
Answer: Short.
3. What is 3/7 chicken, 2/3 cat and 2/4 goat?
Answer: Chicago.
4. What is red and smells like paint?
Answer: Red paint.
5. If a fella met a fella in a field of beans, could a fella tell a fella what a fella means? How many “f’s” in that?
Answer: There are zero “f’s” in “that.”
6. What is in seasons, seconds, centuries, and minutes but not in decades, years, or days?
Answer: The letter N.
7. Which word in the dictionary is spelled incorrectly?
Answer: Incorrectly.
8. What two words, added together, contain the most letters?
Answer: Post office.
9. Pepsi has 5 letters spell that in 4 letters.
Answer: T-H-A-T.
10. I am the biggest alphabet, as I contain the most water in the world. Who am I?
Answer: Alphabet ‘C’.
Word Riddles with Answers
If you are alone and looking for something fun to do, you can open this list of word riddles with answers and play on your own. It is fun and a pretty good way to enjoy your free time.
1. What four-letter word can be written forward, backward or upside down, and can still be read from left to right?
Answer: NOON.
2. Granny looked up from her rocking chair and said: As far as I can tell, there is only one anagram of the word trinket. What is it?
Answer: The word knitter.
3. What word is pronounced the same if you take away four of its five letters?
Answer: Queue.
4. If you throw me out the window, You’ll leave a grieving wife. But leave me in the middle of the door, And you might just save a life. What am I?
Answer: The letter “N.”
5. What word begins with an E, ends with an E, but has only one letter?
Answer: An envelope.
6. Spelled forwards I’m what you do every day, spelled backwards I’m something you hate. What am I?
Answer: Live.
7. In the below puzzle, a word starts and ends with the same letter. Can you figure out what the word is? _rus_
Answer: Trust.
8.What is a word made up of 4 letters, yet is also made up of 3. Sometimes is written with 9 letters, and then with 4. Rarely consists of 6, and never is written with 5?
Answer: The word ‘what’ has 4 letters in it, ‘yet’ has three, ‘sometimes’ has 9, ‘then’ has 4, ‘rarely’ has 6, and ‘never’ has 5.
9. “I may command where I adore; but silence, like a Lucrece knife, with bloodless stroke my heart doth gore: M, O, A, I, doth sway my life.” This riddle is dropped in the way of whom, as part of a trap?
Answer: Malvolio.
10. How do you spell candy in 2 letters?
Answer: C and Y, c(and)y.
Easy Word Riddles
Easy word riddles are perfect for kids and the dumb ones in your group. Word play riddles are also a very interesting kind of riddles. You can also play such riddles with your kids.
1. What word of five letters has only one left when two letters are removed?
Answer: Stone Remove ‘St’ and you’re left with ‘One’.
2. I am a word of letters three; add two and fewer there will be. What word am I?
Answer: Few.
3. Angry and hungry are both words that end in gry. The English language has three words. What is the third?
Answer: Language.
4. I am a bird, I am a fruit and I am a person. What am I?
Answer: KIWI is a bird, a fruit and a person from New Zealand are called as KIWI’s.
5. What 4 days of the week start with the letter ‘t’?
Answer: Tuesday, Thursday, today and tomorrow.
6. What comes once in a minute, twice in a moment, but never in a thousand years?
Answer: The letter “m”.
7. I am thinking of a seven letter word which we read almost daily. Letter 5 6 and 7 increases every year. Letter 3 and 4 are the same. Letter 3 2 and 5 covers about 70 percent of the world. What word I am thinking of?
Answer: Message.
8. What do the letter ‘T’ and an island have in common?
Answer: They are both in the middle of water. The letter ‘t’ is in the middle of the word ‘water’ and an island is surrounded by water, therefore, in the middle of water.
9. What is in the middle of Tokyo?
Answer: The letter “K”.
10. What letter adds great value to a pear?
Answer: The letter L (pear + l = pearl).
Hard Word Riddles
Hard word riddles are for the nerdy and smart ones. These riddles work as word puzzles brain teasers. The best part is that the smart ones enjoy such brain teasers.
1. Which word is the odd one out—stun, ton, evil, letter, mood, bad, snap, straw?
Answer: Letter. If you read each word backward, letter is the only one that does not make another valid word.
2. There is a word in the English language in which the first two letters signify a male, the first three letters signify a female, the first four signify a great man, and the whole word, a great woman. What is the word?
Answer: Heroine.
3. A word I know, six letters it contains, remove one letter and 12 remains. What is it?
Answer: Dozens.
4. What can you keep after giving it to someone?
Answer: Your word.
5. When is four half of five?
Answer: When it’s in Roman numerals — the letters IV are half of the word “five”.
6. I am a word with two meanings. With one I can be broken, with the second I hold on. What am I?
Answer: A tie.
7. I am a fruit, but also a shape. If you had two of me, I would sound just the same. If you rearrange my letters, it could be a crime. Add me to a montage and I can become a different fruit. Remove my head and you can still listen; take away the end and I can still be eaten. Without a piece of the centre, I am still a word; take away all of the middle and I am just an acronym. What am I?
Answer: Pear.
8. Her pretty wings, as still as stone, as she waits on the wall, Once bright with vibrant summer hues, are now brown as fall. The word you seek, the former tint of her and her sisters’ wings, On Orchid Island can be found, at the beginning of all things. What is it?
Answer: Blue.
9. We hurt without moving. We poison without touching. We bear the truth and the lies. We are not to be judged by our size. What are we?
Answer: Words.
10. What five-letter word can be read the same upside down or right side up?
Answer: Swims.
11. What country is hidden in the paragraph below? As defendants, we deny all involvement in the unscrupulous dealings which have come to light in the recent government investigation.
Answer: Sweden. “defendantS, WE DENny”
Word Riddles and Brain Teasers
There are some kinds of word riddles that are pretty disturbing and require a lot of attention. There is no harm in calling such riddles as word brain teasers. Go try some of these if you are a smart person.
1. I am a solitary word, 5 letters long. Behead me once, I am the same. Behead me again, I am still the same.
Answer: Alone.
2. Can you name three consecutive days without using the words Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, or Sunday?
Answer: Yesterday, Today, and Tomorrow.
3. What 7 letter word is spelled the same way backwards and forwards?
Answer: Racecar.
4. Where are the lakes always empty, the mountains always flat and the rivers always still?
Answer: A map.
5. What is a word comprised of 4 letters, still is also made of 5. Occasionally written with 12 letters and later with 5. Never written with 5 but happily with 7.
Answer: What, Still, Occasionally, Later, Never, Happily.
6. Name two different words using following words only: Without me 60% of living beings can’t survive. Without me nothing (living or non-living things) can survive. Both have five letters each but both r anagrams of each other.
Answer: Earth and heart.
7. What letters express the most agreeable people in the world?
Answer: U and I.
8. Can you tell me a 3 letters word that will change a girl into a woman
Answer: Age.
9. I’m a thing, The fishermen love me, The doctors hate me, Kids want to eat me, I’m a 13 letter word. What am I?
Answer: Chathuringmes (It is a technical word for worms).
10. I am an odd number, take away two letters and I am even.
Answer: Eleven.
Word Riddles for Adults
Some pretty good hard riddles are perfect for adults. You can take some ideas from the list of word riddles for adults mentioned here and enjoy playing this with your friends, family and colleagues.
1. Pronounced as one letter and written with three, two letters there are and two only in me. I’m double. I’m single. I’m black, blue, and gray. I’m read from both ends, but the same either way. What am I?
Answer: Eye.
2. Which word that begins with the letter I, and by adding the letter A, becomes another word that is pronounced the same?
Answer: Isle and Aisle.
3. It is a 5 letter word if you take away first letter it is something you get from sun, if you remove second letter you will get something to eat, if you remove third letter you get a word you use in pointing at and if you remove the fourth letter you get something to drink. What is it?
Answer: Wheat.
4. What word in the English language uses all five vowels plus Y in alphabetical order, and uses each only once?
Answer: Facetiously.
5. What six letter word if you add two s’s to it makes a new word?
Answer: Prince + ss = princess.
6. What do these words have in common: Madam, civic, eye, level?
Answer: If you read them all backwards, they make the same word.
7. Using the four letters below only, create a seven letter word. UMNI
Answer: Minimum.
8. My Friend name is so special that his name is formed by using 1st letters of 5 consecutive months
Answer: JASON, July(J), August(A), September(S), October(O), November(N).
9. What is a phrase that’s formed of 4 letters, but consists of 3, sometimes is written with 9, never with 5, and occasionally is made up of 12.
Answer: ‘HNY everyone’.
Word Riddles for Kids
Playing riddles with kids is one of the best ways to enjoy time with your kids. You can make a list of multiple riddles categories like word riddles for kids and play with each category every day.
1. What word, describing a job title, has three consecutive double letters?
Answer: Bookkeeper.
2. I am a word. I become longer when the third letter is removed. What am I?
Answer: Lounger.
3. What word of five letters has one left when two are removed?
Answer: Stone.
4. Which of the following words don’t belong in the group and why? Corset, Coster, Sector, Escort, Courts.
Answer: Courts. All of the others are anagrams of each other.
5. What is the only English word, with two synonyms that are antonyms of each other?
Answer: Cleave.
6. Tear one off and scratch my head, what once was red is black instead. What am I?
Answer: A Match stick. You tear a match out of a matchbook and scratch the head to light it, then the red tip turns black from the flame.
7. What are the next two letters in the following series and why?
W A T N T L I T F S _ _.
Answer: A and W. The letters are the first letters of the words in the question. Thus, the next two letters are A and W.
8. I am a 6 letter word. Letters 6-5-2 spell out a drink, letters 4-5-2-3 spell out a fruit, letters 1-2-6 spell out a pet, letters 3-2-6 spell out a pest, which often gets eaten by 1-2-6. What am I?
Answer: Carpet.
9. How do you make the number one disappear by adding to it?
Answer: Add the letter ‘G’ and it becomes Gone.
10. What has ten letters and starts with gas?
Answer: An Automobile.
Final Thoughts on Word Riddles
It will always be fun to challenge people around you. Playing word riddles is a go-to game for such challenges. These word riddles are not very difficult to answer and are fun to play.
Word riddles game can always be played in casual get together or night stays. You can easily sparkle up a boring event with such word riddles and trust us, it will literally add energy to the environment!
If you have a lot of kids or you love to be around kids, you must keep a list of word riddles with answers always ready. It is the perfect game for kids as it is fun and brain-boosting at the same time.
Word riddles are mostly easy and can be played with any age group. So what are you waiting for? Go make a list of such word riddles and play the first person you meet.
