Letter dice are physical cubes printed with letters instead of numbers, rolled to produce a random set of letters for word games. They're the core mechanic behind games like Boggle and are commonly used as a DIY substitute in Scattergories-style play. If you don't have a set on hand, an online letter generator or our letter wheel does the same job digitally, with no box to dig out of a closet.
What are letter dice used for?
Most letter dice sets are used for one of two things: drawing a grid of letters to build words from (Boggle-style), or rolling a single die to get one starting letter for a round (Scattergories-style). The second use case is exactly what a random letter generator replaces — instead of rolling a physical die and hoping it doesn't fall off the table, you press generate and get a fair result instantly.
Online letter dice vs. physical dice
Physical letter dice are fixed: each die has the same 6 letters printed on its faces, so certain letters can never come up on a given die, and the letter distribution is set by the manufacturer. An online letter dice alternative like our random letter generator pulls from the full A–Z alphabet with an equal, unbiased chance for every letter, and lets you exclude letters, restrict to vowels or consonants, or generate several letters at once — none of which a boxed set of dice can do.
Letter dice for Scattergories
If you're using letter dice for scattergories, the setup is simple: generate one letter, start a timer, and have everyone fill in a category list with words that start with that letter. See our word games guide for a full category blitz format, or our classroom games guide if you're running this with students.
A visual alternative: the letter wheel
If part of what you like about rolling dice is the physical suspense of not knowing the result yet, our wheel of letters recreates that with a spinning alphabet wheel instead of an instant text result — a closer match to the feel of a dice roll than a plain generator.
Getting started
No sign-up, no box of dice to find: open the random letter generator, set it to draw one letter at a time, and you have an online letter dice replacement that works on any phone, tablet, or classroom projector.