Chile or chili?

chile is a noun meaning “Alternative spelling of chili”; chili is a noun meaning “The pungent, spicy fresh or dried fruit of any of several cultivated varieties…”. Wiktionary gives them as spellings of the same word. They sound the same (/ˈt͡ʃɪli/). In written English (wordfreq, 2021 data) chile is about 2.1 times as common as chili.

chileorchili

What is the difference between chile and chili?

	chile	chili
Part of speech	noun	noun
Meaning	USAlternative spelling of chili Pronunciation spelling of child, representing Southern US and African-American Vernacular English	USThe pungent, spicy fresh or dried fruit of any of several cultivated varieties of capsicum peppers, used in cooking USPowdered chili pepper, used as a spice or flavouring in cooking USA dish made with chili peppers and other ingredients, such as beans and beef
Example	none recorded	none recorded
Forms	chiles (Alternative spelling of chili) chillun, chirren (Pronunciation spelling of child…)	chilis, chilies
Pronunciation	/ˈt͡ʃɪli/ /ˈt͡ʃaɪl/	/ˈt͡ʃɪli/ /ˈt͡ʃɪliː/
In writing	11 times per million words	5.4 times per million words

Sources: chile and chili 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 chile and chili

chile

1
noun USAlternative spelling of chili
2
noun Pronunciation spelling of child, representing Southern US and African-American Vernacular English

chili

1
noun USThe pungent, spicy fresh or dried fruit of any of several cultivated varieties of capsicum peppers, used in cooking
2
noun USA dish made with chili peppers and other ingredients, such as beans and beef
3
noun USPowdered chili pepper, used as a spice or flavouring in cooking
4
noun USCincinnati chili
5
noun USA spicy stew of chicken or paneer, capsicum and onion, eaten as an appetizer

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, chile or chili?

chile appears 11 times per million words; chili 5.4 times per million words.

0.0010.010.11101001,00010,000

rarerper million words of written Englishmore common

chile 11 times per million wordschili 5.4 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 chile vs chili?

“chile vs chili” is searched about 2,900 times a month on Google and 30 on Bing in the United States. Google counts close variants of a query together (“chili vs chile”, “chile or chili”).

Sources: Google Ads keyword data through DataForSEO and Microsoft Advertising keyword data through DataForSEO, the average month from September 2025 to August 2026.