How the words are picked
Every word comes from a list of 3,096 everyday English words, written out by hand for this site, with the part of speech and the topic of each word assigned by us. It leaves out proper nouns and brand names, abbreviations, plurals of words that are already listed, hyphenated and two-word terms, anything obscure, and anything that would be out of place in a game played with children. No list of this size is perfect, and it makes no claim to hold every word in English: a dictionary has hundreds of thousands. The pool the generator draws from is whatever matches your filters, and the line under the words says how many that is.
| List | Words |
|---|---|
| Nouns | 1,710 |
| Verbs | 668 |
| Adjectives | 576 |
| Adverbs | 225 |
| All words (a word that is both a noun and a verb counts once) | 3,096 |
To pick one word from a pool of n, the generator asks your browser's cryptographically secure random number generator for a 32-bit number1 and takes it modulo n. One extra step matters: a number from the sliver at the very top of the range, the part that does not fill a whole extra lap of n, is thrown away and another is drawn. Without that step the first few words in the pool would come up a little more often than the rest. With it, every word has exactly the same chance, and the page's tests prove that by counting every outcome of a small random source rather than by sampling.
With "No repeated words in a list" on, the words are drawn without replacement, like cards from a deck, so a word cannot appear twice and every possible set of words is equally likely. Turn it off and each word is an independent draw, so repeats can happen.
| Topic | Words | A few of them |
|---|---|---|
| Animals | 213 | aardvark, albatross, alligator, alpaca, ant |
| Food and drink | 196 | almond, apple, apricot, artichoke, asparagus |
| Home and objects | 187 | alarm, apron, armchair, attic, backpack |
| Nature and weather | 139 | acorn, autumn, avalanche, bamboo, bark |
| Places and buildings | 95 | airport, alley, apartment, aquarium, arcade |
| People and jobs | 123 | actor, adult, artist, astronaut, athlete |
| Body and clothes | 107 | ankle, arm, back, bandana, beard |
| Transport | 45 | airplane, airship, ambulance, bicycle, boat |
| Sports and hobbies | 61 | aerobics, archery, athletics, badminton, ballet |
| Music and art | 48 | album, band, banjo, canvas, cartoon |
| School and office | 46 | algebra, alphabet, answer, atlas, blackboard |
| Things to act out | 111 | bake, balance, bounce, bow, brush |
Filter by type, topic, length and letters
The four boxes above the button work together. "Word type" limits the list to nouns, verbs, adjectives or adverbs; a word that is used in more than one way, such as light or open, is in each list it belongs to. "Topic" limits it to one of twelve groups. Open "More filters" to set the shortest and longest length in letters, a first letter or several (the words that start with "st"), a last letter or ending, or letters that must be somewhere inside the word.
Filters add up, so the pool can shrink fast. These are the sizes of the pool for some combinations; when a combination leaves nothing, the page says so instead of showing an empty list:
| Filters | Words left |
|---|---|
| Nouns | 1,710 |
| Verbs | 668 |
| Adjectives | 576 |
| Adverbs | 225 |
| Topic: animals | 213 |
| Topic: things to act out | 111 |
| Words of exactly 5 letters | 592 |
| Words that start with s | 430 |
| Adjectives that end in y | 124 |
| Nouns of 4 to 6 letters that start with b | 79 |
| Words that contain ight | 29 |
| Adverbs within the animals topic | 0 |
The topics are lists of nouns, except "Things to act out", which is all verbs, so asking for adverbs within the animals topic leaves nothing, as the last row shows. The list is in US spelling (color, neighbor). There is no syllable filter: the list carries no syllable data, and a guessed count would be wrong often enough to be worse than none.
Keep a word and generate the rest
Click a word and it turns dark and says "kept". Generate again, or change a filter, and the kept words stay put while every other slot is drawn afresh, never repeating a kept word when "No repeated words" is on. It is the quickest way to build a set of words you like one at a time: keep two, reroll three, keep one more. "Unlock all words" appears once anything is kept. Change "Letters" to show the words in lowercase, Capitalized or UPPERCASE; that redraws the same words, not new ones.
Random words for games
Pictionary and charades
Choose a topic and the word type follows. "Things to act out" gives verbs you can mime without a sound (111 of them), and Animals (213), Food and drink, Home and objects and Transport give nouns that are easy to draw. Set the count to the number of rounds, generate once, and copy the list as one word per line so nobody sees the next word before their turn.
Hangman and word puzzles
Set the shortest and longest length to the same number to get words of exactly that size: there are 592 five-letter words in the list. Add a "Starts with" letter for a puzzle that begins with a clue.
Starting-letter games
For a game where everyone writes words that start with the same letter, type the letter under "Starts with" and generate: there are 430 words that start with s, so the letter you pick decides how hard the round is.
Icebreakers and word association
Generate one word with the count set to 1 and let the group call out the first word it brings to mind, or generate three and make the group tell a story that uses all of them. Using adjectives for one round and nouns for the next keeps the answers varied.
Random words for writing and brainstorming
A random word is a way of being surprised on purpose. Pick one adjective, one noun and one verb, and write a short scene that has to include all three; the awkward fit is where the idea comes from. For names and titles, generate ten nouns with "No repeated words" on, keep the two that make a good pair and reroll the rest. For a daily habit, set the count to 1, write for five minutes about what the word brings to mind, and move on without choosing a second one.
Can I use random words as a passphrase?
The idea is sound and old: a passphrase of several words chosen at random from a known list is easy to remember and, if the list is large and the words are chosen with real randomness, hard to guess. The strength depends on two numbers, the size of the list and the number of words. The Electronic Frontier Foundation's long list has 7,776 words, which is about 12.9 bits of strength per word, and it recommends six words from it for 77 bits.2
This list has 3,096 words, which is 11.6 bits a word: five different words from the whole list are about 58.0 bits and six are about 69.6. To reach the 77 bits EFF quotes for six words you would need 7 (81.2 bits). A filtered pool is smaller, so it is weaker: never filter a passphrase. This page is for games and writing; for an account, let a password manager generate the password, or use EFF's own list with dice.
Frequently asked questions
How does the random word generator work?
It filters a list of 3,096 everyday English words down to the ones that match your type, topic, length and letter choices, then picks from that pool with your browser's secure random number generator. A rejection step makes sure every word in the pool is exactly as likely as every other.
Is it really random?
The numbers come from the browser's cryptographically secure generator, the one the browser offers for security uses. The picks are unbiased: a number that would favour the words at the front of the list is thrown away and redrawn. The list itself is not random, of course; it is the set of words the generator can choose from.
Can the same word appear twice?
Not by default. "No repeated words in a list" is on, so the words are drawn without replacement. Turn it off and every word is an independent draw, so a repeat can happen, more often when the pool is small.
How many words can I generate at once?
From 1 to 100. With "No repeated words" on you get at most as many words as match your filters; the line under the words tells you when fewer came back.
Can I get only nouns, verbs or adjectives?
Yes. Choose the word type. The list has 1,710 nouns, 668 verbs, 576 adjectives and 225 adverbs. A word used in more than one way, such as light, is in each list it belongs to.
Can I get words that start with a certain letter, or have a certain length?
Yes. Open "More filters" and set the shortest and longest length, or type the letters a word must start with, end with or contain. There are 592 five-letter words and 430 words that start with s.
How do I keep one word and generate the rest again?
Click the word. It turns dark and is marked "kept"; generating again, or changing a filter, draws new words for every slot that is not kept. "Unlock all words" lets go of them.
Can I use it for Pictionary or charades?
Yes. The topics Animals, Food and drink, Home and objects and Transport give nouns that are easy to draw, and "Things to act out" gives verbs you can mime. Set the count to the number of rounds and copy the list one per line.
Can I use it to make a password or passphrase?
It is meant for games and writing. The list has 3,096 words, so each word adds about 11.6 bits, against about 12.9 for the Electronic Frontier Foundation's 7,776-word list, and it would take 7 words here to match EFF's six. For a real account use a password manager's generator.
Are there other languages, or a syllable filter?
No. The list is English only, in US spelling, and carries no syllable counts. A syllable filter built on guessed counts would be wrong often enough to be worse than none, so it is left out.
Is what I type or generate sent anywhere?
No. The words are chosen in your browser and the filters you set are not sent to a server. We count page visits with our own analytics on our own server, and those events carry no words, filters or inputs.
Sources
- MDN Web Docs, Crypto: getRandomValues() method (page last modified August 19, 2025): the method returns cryptographically strong random values.
- Electronic Frontier Foundation, Joseph Bonneau, EFF's New Wordlists for Random Passphrases (July 19, 2016): the 7,776-word list, about 12.9 bits of strength per word, and six words for 77 bits.
The word lists were written for this site and are not copied from a dictionary or another site's list. The word counts and bit figures on this page are computed from them by the generator's own code, which is checked against an independent implementation in the site's test suite.