Words Ending With IC
100 wordsWords ending in IC form one of English's most productive adjective-making patterns. This suffix transforms nouns into descriptors—atom becomes atomic, hero becomes heroic. Here you'll find thousands of these versatile words, from simple three-letter plays to scientific mouthfuls.
3-letter words
24-letter words
35-letter words
116-letter words
207-letter words
148-letter words
269-letter words
1310-letter words
511-letter words
312-letter words
215-letter words
1Pattern Guide
Insights and recommendations for these words.
The IC ending dominates English adjectives, making it essential territory for word game players and vocabulary builders alike.
Vocabulary & Language
Linguistic patterns and usage statistics
The suffix -IC comes from Greek -ikos and Latin -icus, both used to create adjectives meaning 'relating to' or 'characterized by.' This explains why scientific and medical terminology relies so heavily on IC endings—systematic, genetic, neurotic. The pattern also absorbs whole Greek words like magic and music, where the IC was already built in.
Total Words
4,026
1.3% of dictionary
Avg Length
9.9 letters
3.9 syllables
Top Scrabble
PSYCHOPHARMACOLOGIC
41 points
Longest Word
ADRENOCORTICOTROPHIC
20 letters
Parts of Speech
With 85% adjectives, IC words are overwhelmingly descriptive—one of the most lopsided part-of-speech distributions you'll find. The average length of nearly 10 letters reflects how IC tends to attach to longer root words, especially in technical vocabulary.
Ancient Greek dominates this pattern, which makes sense given that -ikos was the original adjective-forming suffix. Latin adopted the pattern as -icus, and French passed it along as -ique before English simplified it to IC. The etymology chain for CHOLERIC traces this path beautifully: from Middle English colerik through Old French colerique to Latin cholericus.
Word Games
High-value words for board games
Short (2-4)
pertaining to animals or animal life or action
elegance by virtue of being fashionable
Medium (5-7)
of or relating to or causing fermentation
Long (8+)
Short (2-4)
pertaining to animals or animal life or action
elegance by virtue of being fashionable
Medium (5-7)
of or relating to or causing fermentation
Long (8+)
having an effect similar to that resulting from stimulation of the parasympathetic nervous system
HYPOXIC and ENZYMIC are your premium medium-length plays, both leveraging Y's strong scoring. In WWF, Z is worth 10 points versus Scrabble's 10, so ZYMOTIC plays equally well in both games. The real scoring monsters are the long scientific compounds—PSYCHOPHARMACOLOGIC hits 41 points in Scrabble and 46 in WWF, though you'll rarely have the board space or tiles to play it.
Wordle
5-letter words for daily puzzles
Good Starters (E, A, R, S, T)
ARTIC and SERIC both test the common R placement and give you different vowel coverage—A versus E. ARTIC checks the frequent T-I-C ending pattern that appears in many five-letter IC words.
Length Extremes
Longest and shortest valid words
Short IC words like HIC, MIC, and SIC are rare because the suffix needs a root to attach to. The longest words balloon because scientific terminology stacks Greek and Latin roots before adding IC—ADRENOCORTICOTROPHIC piles on prefixes describing hormone pathways.
Hidden Gems
Rare but valid words to surprise opponents
not centered or having no center
"an acentric chromosome fragment"
characterized by or given to telling anecdotes
"he was at his anecdotic best"
a person suffering from anorexia nervosa
"an anorectic (or anorexigenic) drug"
ANECDOTIC means 'characterized by or given to telling anecdotes.' While ANECDOTAL is the common form, ANECDOTIC is equally valid and might catch opponents off guard. It's useful when you need an IC ending rather than an AL ending to fit your board position.
Popular crossword answers
Words frequently used in crossword puzzles with common clues.