What is the best strategy for solving scrambled words?

Answer 1

A useful strategy is to look for letters that go together, such as "cr," "sh," "ph," and so on, or to identify common prefixes or suffixes.

Because unscrambling can require extensive English proficiency, reading often will help improve your vocabulary.

Also....

If I need to unscramble a word, the first thing I do is to write down the vowels in one group, and the consonants in another. Seeing the letters in this way helps me to see new possible arrangements.

If you own a set of Scrabble, or wordfinder or something similar, using the letter tiles and mixing them around is a good way to solve anagrams.

Also

I find it very helpful to write the letters down in a roughly circular pattern, as in 10:30, 1:30, 9:00, 3:00, 7:30 and 4:30 clock positions for a six letter jumbled word. Somehow, associations among the different letters can become clear. Sometimes a word I've been struggling with just jumps out at me using this method.

If the word has 3 consonants and I'm really stumped, I will take the consonants and quickly jot them down in all possible sequences. There are only 6. Then I'll study the sequences with the vowels in mind. For example, take the word ampere. The consonants have to be in one of these orders: mpr prm rmp, mrp, rpm, pmr. It works best with consonants, but when I am desperate I will try vowels.