What a blank tile is

A blank tile carries no printed letter. When you play it, you declare which letter it represents for the rest of the game, and it stays that letter wherever it sits on the board. This flexibility lets you complete words you could not otherwise spell, which is why blanks are considered among the most valuable tiles available.

How blanks are scored

The trade-off for that flexibility is points: a blank is worth zero. It contributes nothing to the letter total, even when it represents a normally high-value letter and even when it sits on a double- or triple-letter square. A word multiplier still applies to the whole word, so the rest of your tiles are unaffected; the blank simply adds no value of its own.

How the optimizer places blanks

When your rack includes one or more blanks (entered as ?), the optimizer treats each blank as a wildcard that can complete a word. Because a blank scores zero regardless of position, it will use a blank to spell a word that would otherwise be impossible, and it clearly labels which letter each blank is standing in for so you can play it correctly. It will not, for example, waste real tiles trying to score points from a blank.

Practical examples

Suppose your rack is C A T ?. The blank can become an S to make CATS, scoring C (3) + A (1) + T (1) + S (0 from the blank) = 5 points. The same blank could instead become an H to make CHAT, again with the blank contributing zero.

Now suppose your rack is Q U I ? Z and you can reach a double-word square. If the blank becomes an A to spell QUIZA-style words, the Q and Z still carry their full value and the double-word square still doubles the whole word; only the blank contributes nothing. This is why players often use a blank to unlock a high-scoring arrangement of their other tiles rather than to score directly.

Playing blanks well

Use a blank to enable a seven-tile play. The 50-point bonus usually far outweighs the zero the blank scores.
Let your valuable tiles land on premium squares, and let the blank fill an ordinary square.
Hold a blank for a decisive turn if the current board offers little, since a blank can rescue an awkward rack later.

Enter a ? in the optimizer to watch how a single blank expands your options, and see how scoring works for the full order of operations.