Words that end in ZA

What is in this list

This list holds 33 words, under 0.1% of the 172,634 words this site keeps from the ENABLE word list. They run from 5 to 13 letters, and the most common length is 5 letters with 11 words (33.3% of the list). The shortest are BAIZA, BRAZA, COLZA, HAMZA, HUZZA and MATZA; the longest is PARAINFLUENZA. Of the 12 lists in this group it is the 10th largest: “words that end in ED” leads with 13,318 and “words that end in J” has the fewest, 7.

Points and vowels

Using this site's letter values, the average word here scores 19 points (median 18); words of the same lengths across the whole list average 12.7, so this list runs 6.3 points richer. The top scorers are EXTRAVAGANZA (32), PARAINFLUENZA (27), LOLLAPALOOZA (25), MYCORRHIZA (25). Point for point, HUZZA earns the most per letter: 22 points over 5 letters, 4.4 each. ZA itself is worth 9 points here, which is why so many of these words outscore their length.

Vowels (A, E, I, O, U) make up 41.7% of the letters, against 38% across the whole list. 1 word is more than half vowels: BAIZA.

How the words are built

The letter just before the final ZA is most often N (30.3% of words), followed by I (12.1%). 6 words have a doubled letter (18.2%); the most common doubles are ZZ (4), LL (1), OO (1). The most common three-letter openings are COL- (2, as in COLEORHIZA), BAI- (1, as in BAIZA), BON- (1, as in BONANZA).

Word play in this list

No two words in this list are anagrams of each other. The longest word with no letter repeated is MESTIZA (7 different letters). CHALAZA is the longest word here that uses only one kind of vowel, ahead of KWANZA.

97% of these words take an S on the end and stay a word (BAIZA, BONANZA and BRAZA among them); after S, the most useful end letter is H, which extends 4 words. None of them can take a single letter in front and still be a word.

Using this list

The full list is short enough to read in one go: BAIZA, BONANZA, BRAZA, CADENZA, CHALAZA, COLEORHIZA, COLZA, CORYZA, CREDENZA, CZARITZA, EXTRAVAGANZA, HAMZA, HUZZA, INFLUENZA, KWANZA, LESPEDEZA, LOLLAPALOOZA, MATZA, MESTIZA, MEZUZA, MIRZA, MYCORRHIZA, ORGANZA, PARAINFLUENZA, PIAZZA, PIZZA, PLAZA, STANZA, TAZZA, TRISTEZA, TSARITZA, TZARITZA and ZANZA. Ranked by points it runs from EXTRAVAGANZA (32) down to STANZA (13), a spread of 19 points.