Vail or vale?
vail is a verb meaning “To lower or “dip” a carried flag or banner in a salute by a forward reducing of…”; vale is a noun meaning “A valley”. Use vail as a verb and vale as a noun. They sound the same (/veɪl/). In written English (wordfreq, 2021 data) vale is about 3.6 times as common as vail.
What is the difference between vail and vale?
| vail | vale | |
|---|---|---|
| Part of speech | noun, verb | noun, interjection |
| Meaning | To lower or “dip” a carried flag or banner in a salute by a forward reducing of the angle of the pike/flagstaff with respect to the ground; in extreme… | A valley Farewell |
| Example | Then let them vale a bonet of their proud ſayle | Vale, Sarah Smith |
| Forms | vails, vailing, vailed | vales |
| Pronunciation | /veɪl/ | /veɪl/ [veɪɫ] /ˈvɑːleɪ/ |
| In writing | 1.1 times per million words | 4.2 times per million words |
Sources: vail and vale 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 vail and vale
vail
- 1
To lower or “dip” a carried flag or banner in a salute by a forward reducing of the angle of the pike/flagstaff with respect to the ground; in extreme instances, as when saluting a monarch, both the…
vale
- 1
A valley
- 2
Farewell
Vale, Sarah Smith
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, vail or vale?
vail appears 1.1 times per million words; vale 4.2 times per million words.
vail 1.1 times per million wordsvale 4.2 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 vail vs vale?
“vail vs vale” is searched about 50 times a month on Google and 10 on Bing in the United States. Google counts close variants of a query together (“vale vs vail”, “vail or vale”).
Sources: Google Ads keyword data through DataForSEO and Microsoft Advertising keyword data through DataForSEO, the average month from September 2025 to August 2026.