accrue
/əˈkɹu/verb
accrue is spelled A-C-C-R-U-E. The wrong spelling people search most is acrue: about 330 Bing searches a month in the United States (September 2025 to August 2026), about 1 in 10 of all searches for the word. Accrue is a verb meaning “To increase, to rise”.
How many letters and syllables are in accrue?
| Letters | 6: A-C-C-R-U-E |
|---|---|
| Syllables | 2 (from its American pronunciation) |
| In writing | about once in every 1 million words; the 32,393rd most frequent word form |
| Wrong spellings searched | 1; the most searched, acrue, about 330 Bing searches a month (all of them) |
| Rhymes with |
Sources: letters and syllables from the English Wiktionary's hyphenation or pronunciation and the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary; written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media); Bing searches in the United States: the average month from September 2025 to August 2026 (Microsoft Advertising keyword data through DataForSEO, read September 30, 2026); rhymes and same-letter words are computed by PlainSpell from its own word list.
How do you spell accrue?
Accrue is spelled A-C-C-R-U-E. One wrong spelling is searched or written often enough to measure; together they are about 1 in 10 of the searches for accrue in either form.
Bing searches in the United States: the average month from September 2025 to August 2026 (Microsoft Advertising keyword data through DataForSEO, read September 30, 2026). Wrong spellings are taken from Wiktionary entries tagged "misspelling" and its obsolete or nonstandard forms, Wikipedia's Lists of common misspellings and the codespell dictionary, then measured. The proofreader's marks show the change that corrects each one.
How common is accrue?
Accrue appears about once in every 1 million words in written English, the 32,393rd most frequent word form in the list.
Source: written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).
How do you pronounce accrue?
- UK /əˈkɹuː/
- US /əˈkɹu/
Accrue has 2 syllables (counted from its American pronunciation in the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary).
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Recordings: En-us-accrue.ogg, En-au-accrue.ogg, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).
What rhymes with accrue?
The 12 most written words on PlainSpell end in the same sounds as accrue from its last stressed vowel (/u/):
Computed by PlainSpell from the pronunciations in the English Wiktionary (dump of September 2, 2026): a rhyme shares every sound from the last stressed vowel to the end; ordered by written frequency (wordfreq 3.1).
Forms of accrue
- accrues present, singular, he/she/it
- accruing participle, present
- accrued participle, past
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
What does accrue mean?
The meanings the English Wiktionary records, quoted as written there (source below).
verb
- 1
To increase, to rise
- 2
To reach or come to by way of increase; to arise or spring up because of growth or result, especially as the produce of money lent.
Environmental benefits that accrue to the area.
- 3
To be incurred as a result of the passage of time.
The monthly financial statements show all the actual but only some of the accrued expenses.
- 4
To accumulate.
He has accrued nine sick days.
- 5
To become an enforceable and permanent right.
noun
- 1
obsoleteSomething that accrues; advantage accruing
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
Accrue in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese
| Language | Words |
|---|---|
| French | accroître |
| German | anfallen, entstehen, zufließen, erwachsen, zugute kommen , anwachsen |
| Portuguese | acrescer, acumular |
| Spanish | acrecentarse, aumentar, acrecer, aumentarse, acrecerse , devengar |
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Translations are Wiktionary's, by sense; a linked word has its own PlainSpell page.
Where does accrue come from?
First attested in mid 15th century. From Middle English acrewen, borrowed from Old French acreüe, past participle of accreistre (“to increase”), from Latin accrēsco (“increase”), from ad (“in addition”) + crēscō (“to grow”). Compare accrete.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).