allow

[əˈlaʊ]

/[əˈlaʊ]/ verb

By · According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA) ·

The verdict

“allow” is uncommon German (frequency #98,070 among 6,976 “A” headwords), classed as a verb. The kind of spelling people second-guess.

#98,070
frequency rank, German
6,976
“A” headwords

According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - erlauben

Corpus desk

Index DE-allow · allow · German

allow · rank #98,070 · 0 variants · 0 confusables

  • FREQ-RARE #98,070
  • LEN-MID 5 letters
  • VOW-2 2 vowels
  • CONFUS-0 No pairs
  • VAR-0 0 variants
  • BOOK-DENSE 6,976
  • PHOTO-FINISH Allmende

Nearest frequency peer: Allmende (-1 rank slots)

Desk codes from Wiktionary headword shape, FrequencyWords rank tier, confusable-pair count, generated misspelling depth, letter-cohort book size, and photo-finish peer. Not a difficulty grade.

Langschwanz-Ränge nahe „allow“

Dünnes Band: Balken invertieren den Rang, seltenere Formen wirken kürzer

corpus weight

What this shows Langschwanz-Sicht: wo „allow“ gegen ähnlich seltene deutsche Ränge sitzt.

Source FrequencyWords open word-frequency list As of September 3, 2026
Key facts for allow
PropertyValue
Headwordallow
LanguageGerman
Part of speechVerb
IPA[əˈlaʊ]
Letters5
Frequency rank#98,070
Misspellings tracked0
Confusable pairs0
SourceWiktionary (kaikki.org)

Langschwanz-Rang von „allow“ im Deutschen

Diese Skala geht vom Kern des Alltagdeutschen (links) bis zum seltenen Langschwanz (rechts).allowfällt in diesen Seltenheitsbereich:

#1#100#1K#10K#100K
← used constantlyrarely used →

Die Achse ist logarithmisch: jeder Tick markiert etwa zehnfach geringere Häufigkeit. Seltene Nachbarn derselben Bandbreite: „Allmende“ (#98,069), „almond“ (#98,071), „alphabetischen“ (#98,072). Unter 6,976 „A“-Lemmata liegt „allow“ bei #98,070. Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list.

Rare enough to double-check

allow is uncommon German at frequency #98,070 among 6,976 “A” headwords, classed as averb, transcribed [əˈlaʊ]. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. 2 senses are on record.

Our edit-distance generator produced no likely misspellings for allow, since its letter sequence doesn't invite the usual edit-distance slips. This entry stands alone in our confusable dataset, which typically means the spelling is too distinctive to be mistaken for another word.

No explicit etymology string is stored for this entry, so its spelling is easiest explained by how it's pronounced rather than where it came from. The correct German form is allow, spelled A-L-L-O-W.

Definition

  1. 1
    erlauben
  2. 2
    tolerieren

Recorded use

Wiktionary example

These source excerpts show how allow appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.

  1. "It was allowed to keep its horse, since horses were so cheap to make."

Synonyms

abategive

Definitions, pronunciation, and etymology for this entry are drawn from Wiktionary via the kaikki.org structured extract (CC BY-SA); frequency ordering uses the FrequencyWords open word-frequency list (2018 German corpus, MIT). See the methodology for how each field is sourced and updated.

Frequently Asked Questions

How do you spell "allow"?
"allow" is spelled A-L-L-O-W. The IPA pronunciation is [əˈlaʊ].
What does "allow" mean?
As a verb, "allow" means: erlauben
How do you pronounce "allow"?
The IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) transcription for "allow" is [əˈlaʊ]. Click the speaker icon on the pronunciation badge above to hear it spoken aloud where audio is available.
What language does "allow" come from?
"allow" is a German word. You can look up definitions, pronunciations, and spelling data for this and other words across English, Spanish, Portuguese, French, and German on PlainSpell.
Is PlainSpell free to use?
Yes, PlainSpell is a completely free word reference. You can look up definitions, pronunciations, confusable pairs, homophones, and spelling corrections across 5 languages without any sign-up or subscription.

Similar German words by spelling shape

Same letter count and similar misspelling depth for "allow", not the corpus desk frequency band.

Same letter count

Frequency-ranked German headwords with 5 letters (nearest by frequency rank).

amano#98,078actio#98,048année#98,097bagno#98,146

Source: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org) Structured Wiktionary extract

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list