Fairy tale or fairytale?
fairy tale is a noun meaning “A folktale or literary story featuring fairies or similar fantasy characters”; fairytale is an adjective meaning “Alternative spelling of fairy-tale”. fairy tale is written as two words and fairytale as one word; they are used differently.
What is the difference between fairy tale and fairytale?
| fairy tale | fairytale | |
|---|---|---|
| Part of speech | noun, adjective | adjective, noun |
| Meaning | A folktale or literary story featuring fairies or similar fantasy characters The literary genre of these stories Of the nature of a fairy tale; as if from a fairy tale | Alternative spelling of fairy-tale Alternative spelling of fairy tale |
| Example | I used to love reading fairy tales when I was a child | none recorded |
| Forms | fairy-tales | none |
| Pronunciation | /ˈfɛɹi ˌteɪl/ /ˈfeəɹi ˌteɪl/ | not recorded |
| In writing | not counted (the list counts single words) | 1.6 times per million words |
Sources: fairy tale and fairytale 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 fairy tale and fairytale
fairy tale
- 1
A folktale or literary story featuring fairies or similar fantasy characters
I used to love reading fairy tales when I was a child
- 2
Of the nature of a fairy tale; as if from a fairy tale
a fairy-tale romance
- 3
datedDated form of fairy tale
- 4
The literary genre of these stories
- 5
A fabricated or misleading account meant to deceive, such as an exaggerated excuse
He's telling us another fairy tale about how great the software will be
- 6
A delightful and ideal situation of a kind attained by very few
I've been living in a fairy tale since I met Joe
fairytale
- 1
Alternative spelling of fairy-tale
- 2
Alternative spelling of fairy tale
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, fairy tale or fairytale?
fairy tale is a phrase, which the list of single words does not count; fairytale 1.6 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 fairy tale vs fairytale?
“fairy tale vs fairytale” is searched about 70 times a month on Google and 10 on Bing in the United States. Google counts close variants of a query together (“fairytale vs fairy tale”, “fairy tale or fairytale”).
Sources: Google Ads keyword data through DataForSEO and Microsoft Advertising keyword data through DataForSEO, the average month from September 2025 to August 2026.