acidulous
/əˈsɪdjʊləs/
"acidulous" is a 9-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“acidulous” is uncommon English (outside the top frequency list), classed as an adjective. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- Unranked
- below top-frequency English
- 9
- letters
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - Slightly sour; subacid; sourish.
Corpus desk
Index EN-acidulous · acidulous · English
acidulous · unranked · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-UNRANKED Unranked
- LEN-LONG 9 letters
- VOW-5 5 vowels
- CONFUS-0 No pairs
- VAR-0 0 variants
- BOOK-THIN "A" thin
- PHOTO-UNK Peer pending
Read with this headword: Spelling guide for this pattern
Desk codes from Wiktionary headword shape, FrequencyWords rank tier, confusable-pair count, generated misspelling depth, letter-cohort book size, and photo-finish peer. Not a difficulty grade.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | acidulous |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Adjective |
| IPA | /əˈsɪdjʊləs/ |
| Letters | 9 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Long-tail rank of “acidulous” in English
Rare enough to double-check
acidulous is uncommon English outside the top frequency list, classed as anadjective, transcribed /əˈsɪdjʊləs/. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. 3 senses are on record.
acidulous doesn't appear in our generated misspelling index, suggesting the orthography follows predictable English patterns. It is not paired with a close-neighbour confusable in our dataset, since its spelling is unusual enough that it doesn't cluster with a lookalike.
Etymologically, the entry records: Learned borrowing from Latin acidulus (“sourish, acidulous”), diminutive of acidus (“sour, acid”). See acid. The correct English form is acidulous, spelled A-C-I-D-U-L-O-U-S.
Definition
- 1Slightly sour; subacid; sourish.
- 2Sharp; caustic.
- 3Containing carbonic acid.
Recorded use
Wiktionary examplesThese source excerpts show how acidulous appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
the hard, acidulous, metallic tincture of the spring
He talked with acidulous tolerance of the exalted personages who had sent Ashenden to X.
Etymology
Learned borrowing from Latin acidulus (“sourish, acidulous”), diminutive of acidus (“sour, acid”). See acid.
This word in other languages
Definitions, pronunciation, and etymology for this entry are drawn from Wiktionary via the kaikki.org structured extract (CC BY-SA). See the methodology for how each field is sourced and updated.