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ravel

rav·el/ˈɹævəl/verb, noun

ravel is a verb meaning “To entwine or tangle (something) confusedly; to entangle” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). It is spelled R-A-V-E-L and has 2 syllables (rav·el), and it appears about once in every 2 million words in written English (wordfreq, 2021 data, counting Ravel, the name).

What does ravel mean?

verb

  1. 1

    To entwine or tangle (something) confusedly; to entangle.

  2. 2

    Often followed by up: to form (something) out of discrete elements, like weaving fabric from threads; to knit.

  3. 3

    To unwind (a reel of thread, a skein of yarn, etc.); to pull apart (cloth, a seam, etc.); to fray, to unpick, to unravel; also, to pull out (a string of yarn, a thread, etc.) from a piece of fabric, or a skein or reel.

  4. 4

    To confuse or perplex (someone or something).

  5. 5

    archaicOften followed by out: to undo the intricacies of (a problem, etc.); to clarify, to disentangle.

  6. 6

    obsoleteTo destroy or ruin (something), like unravelling fabric.

  7. 7

    In the APL programming language: to reshape (a variable) into a vector.

  8. 8

    Often followed by out: of a reel of thread or skein of yarn; or a thread on a reel or a string of yarn in a skein, etc.: to become untwisted or unwound.

noun

  1. 1

    ScotlandA tangled mess; an entanglement, a snarl, a tangle.

  2. 2

    ScotlandA confusing, intricate, or perplexing situation; a complication.

  3. 3

    A thread which has unravelled from fabric, etc.; also, a situation of fabric, etc., coming apart; an unravelling.

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).

How do you pronounce ravel?

  • US /ˈɹævəl/
  • US [ˈɹævl̩]

Ravel has 2 syllables, split rav·el in writing.

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Recordings: LL-Q1860_(eng)-Vealhurl-ravel.wav, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).

Forms of ravel

  • ravels present, singular, he/she/it, plural
  • raveling US, participle, present
  • ravelling UK, participle, present
  • raveled US, participle, past
  • ravelled UK, participle, past

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).

How common is ravel?

Ravel appears about once in every 2 million words in written English, the 41,154th most frequent word form in the list. The list counts every capitalisation together, so this includes Ravel, the name.

Source: written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).

Where does ravel come from?

The verb is borrowed from Dutch ravelen, rafelen (“to tangle, become entangled; to fray; to unweave”) [and other forms]; further etymology uncertain. It has been suggested that the verb is originally derived from the noun, but the Oxford English Dictionary regards this as “very uncertain”, and instead regards the noun as having derived from the verb (compare Dutch rafel, raffel (“frayed thread”)). Ravel is a contranym having both the senses of tangling (verb senses 1.1, 1.2, 1.4.1, and 2.3; noun sense 1) and untangling (verb senses 1.3, 1.4.2, 1.4.3, 2.1, and 2.2; noun sense 2).

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).