How to Score a Blank Tile: Zero for the Letter, Not for the Word

What a blank is actually worth

A blank tile is worth zero points for whatever letter you name it as. It keeps that zero for the rest of the game even if you call it a Z or a Q. It is still a tile inside the word, though, so a word multiplier anywhere in that word multiplies the whole total, and the blank rides along inside it. A letter multiplier underneath a blank is worth nothing at all, because two times zero is zero and three times zero is zero.

That last sentence is the one tables argue about, so the rest of this is the arithmetic.

One word, every kind of square

Take ZEBRA. With real tiles it is Z at 10, E at 1, B at 3, R at 1, A at 1, which totals 16 points.

Play the same five letters using a blank as the Z and it is 0 + 1 + 3 + 1 + 1, which is 6. The blank hands you the word, and the word is usually the point, but the 10 does not come with it.

Now put that blank Z on a double letter square. The square doubles the value of the tile standing on it, that tile is worth zero, and zero doubled is zero. The word is still 6. A triple letter square under the blank behaves the same way and is also worth 6. You have landed the best letter premium on the board on the one tile that cannot use it.

Compare what the same square does under a real letter. If the layout gives you a choice and the B lands on that double letter instead, the word is 0 + 1 + 6 + 1 + 1, which is 9. Three points, out of the same square, purely because something other than the blank is standing on it. Put the B on a triple letter and it is 0 + 1 + 9 + 1 + 1, which is 12. Twice the score of the blank version, same tiles, same word.

The word multipliers are a different story, because they are not attached to the tile. A double word square anywhere under that play takes the whole 6 and doubles it to 12. A triple word takes it to 18. The blank does not block that and does not reduce it. It just contributes its zero to the sum before the multiplication happens. A real Z on that same triple word would have been 16 times 3, or 48.

Naming the letter

You say which letter the blank stands for when you play it, and standard rules keep it as that letter for the rest of the game. The name is doing real work: it is what makes the word a word. Rack Up reads the letter you named, so ZEBRA gets checked as ZEBRA and not as four letters and a hole. That check never blocks the play. The list it reads is bundled into the app and works with the network switched off: the public-domain ENABLE list, 168,501 playable words once a short blocklist comes out and a handful of modern two-letter words go in. Rack Up carries a public-domain list rather than a licensed tournament one, which is why a word it cannot find comes back as not in the word list rather than not a word. That is the smaller and more honest claim, and the turn scores either way.

The name does not do anything to the score, and it does not do anything to the tile count either. A hundred-tile set holds exactly one Z and two blanks, so a blank standing as a Z leaves the real Z still sitting in the bag. Rack Up tracks it that way on purpose: its Tiles Unseen tab subtracts a blank, not a Z, so nobody talks themselves into believing the Z is gone.

Each premium square, one at a time

The order those multipliers apply in, and what happens when one play covers two of them, is its own article. What follows is only what changes when the tile under the square is a blank.

1. Double letter under the blank: 0 times 2 is 0. The word total does not move.
2. Triple letter under the blank: 0 times 3 is 0. The word total does not move.
3. Double word with a blank anywhere in the word: the whole word doubles. ZEBRA with a blank Z goes from 6 to 12.
4. Triple word, same word: 6 becomes 18.
5. Letter x4, the deluxe-board square Rack Up keeps behind the three-dot button: 0 times 4 is 0, same as the others.

Rack Up will not let you mark one tile as both a blank and a letter multiplier. Tapping Blank clears any letter premium on that tile, and setting a letter premium clears the blank flag, because the combination cannot change a score.

The fifty, and the leftover rack

A blank still counts as one of the seven tiles for the all-seven bonus. Play RETINAS using a blank for the S and the tiles are worth 1 + 1 + 1 + 1 + 1 + 1 + 0, which is 6, and the bonus takes the turn to 56. If that play also covers a double word square, the word doubles first and the bonus is added flat afterward: 6 doubles to 12, plus 50, which is 62. It is not 112. The bonus is not multiplied by anything, ever.

At the end of the game, when everyone subtracts their leftovers, a blank left unplayed on your rack costs you nothing, because it is still worth zero sitting there. Rack Up reads that leftover box letter by letter, so type the blank as a question mark, or leave it out, and it adds nothing. Type it as the Z you had been hoping to use it as and the app takes 10 points off you, which is the only way a blank ever costs anybody real points.

The two variants worth naming

Everything above is the standard rule, and it is the rule Rack Up scores by. Two house variants come up often enough to name, and neither is universal.

The first is the swap: some tables let a player who holds the real Z trade it for a blank already on the board that was named as a Z. That is a house rule, not a standard one, and if your table plays it, agree on it before the first blank goes down rather than after.

The second is the argument this article exists to settle: a table deciding a blank should score its letter's value, or at least score on a letter multiplier. No standard ruleset supports it. If your table has voted for it anyway, that is your table's call, and the honest way to run it in the app is to type the letter and not flag the tile as a blank at all. Understand the tradeoff: Tiles Unseen will then subtract a Z instead of a blank, so for the rest of the game it shows a Z gone that is still in the bag, and a blank in the bag that is already on the board. Rack Up gives you the standard arithmetic and a clear number. It does not enforce anything, and the table decides.

I built Rack Up because I got tired of doing this arithmetic in my head while four other people watched and disagreed. It does the letter premiums, the word premiums, the fifty, and the endgame rack math, and it says what it counted. Try it without paying anything first. The browser version runs this same engine and plays a whole game start to finish, and it will still have your game when you come back to the tab. What it has no memory of is any game before this one. Past games, statistics across games and a running head to head are the $2.99.