Ask or ax?
ask is a verb meaning “To request (information, or an answer to a question)”; ax is a noun meaning “US standard spelling of axe”. In written English (wordfreq, 2021 data) ask is about 100 times as common as ax.
What is the difference between ask and ax?
| ask | ax | |
|---|---|---|
| Part of speech | verb, noun | noun, verb |
| Meaning | To request (information, or an answer to a question) To request or enquire of (a person) informalAn act or instance of asking | USUS standard spelling of axe |
| Example | I asked her age | none recorded |
| Forms | asks, asking, asked | axes |
| Pronunciation | /ɑːsk/ /ask/ /ɑːks/ | /æks/ |
| In writing | 219 times per million words | 2.2 times per million words |
Sources: ask and ax in the English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0); written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).
Every current meaning of ask and ax
ask
- 1
To request (information, or an answer to a question)
I asked her age
- 2
informalAn act or instance of asking
- 3
ScotlandinformalAn eft; newt
- 4
Initialism of amplitude shift keying
- 5
To request or enquire of (a person)
I asked her (for) her age
- 6
informalSomething asked or asked for
I know this is a big ask, but …
- 7
informalA lizard
- 8
To request (an item or service) (see also ask for)
to ask for a second helping at dinner
ax
- 1
USUS standard spelling of axe
- 2
USUS standard spelling of axe
Source: the English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0); obsolete, archaic, dialect and rare senses left out.
Which is more common, ask or ax?
ask appears 219 times per million words; ax 2.2 times per million words.
ask 219 times per million wordsax 2.2 times per million words
Source: written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).
How many people search ask vs ax?
“ask vs ax” is searched about 10 times a month on Bing (Google reports it together with close variants, so it has no figure of its own) in the United States.
Sources: Google Ads keyword data through DataForSEO and Microsoft Advertising keyword data through DataForSEO, the average month from September 2025 to August 2026.