Adam
/ˈæd.əm/
"adam" is a 4-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“Adam” is a regularly-used English word, ranked #2,608 in English word frequency and used as a proper noun.
- #2,608
- frequency rank, English
- 4
- letters
- 5
- tracked misspellings
- 20
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - The first man and the progenitor of the human race.
Visual similarity to commonly confused words
How many letter changes separate each confused pair (Levenshtein distance, normalized).
Source: PlainSpell confusable corpus (Wiktionary, CC BY-SA).
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | Adam |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Proper noun |
| IPA | /ˈæd.əm/ |
| Letters | 4 |
| Frequency rank | #2,608 |
| Misspellings tracked | 5 |
| Confusable pairs | 20 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “Adam” sits in English frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for Adam is 4 letters long, classified as a proper noun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /ˈæd.əm/. Corpus data places it at rank #2,608 in overall English word frequency, indicating it appears regularly in written and spoken text. Wiktionary records 11 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.
Our generated misspelling index lists 5 likely wrong-spelling variants for Adam, with forms such as "aadm", "adamm", and "addam". Every one of these variants traces to a single-character edit -- an added or dropped letter, a swapped consonant, or a vowel swap -- the kind of slip a spell-checker is built to catch. It also participates in 20 confusable-pair relationships, "AM", "add", "arm", and more, a pairing that trips writers up because the two words share enough sound or shape to blur together.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Middle English Adam, from Old English Adam, from Latin Adam, Adamus, from Ancient Greek Ἀδάμ (Adám), Ἄδαμος (Ádamos), from Biblical Hebrew אָדָם (adam, “earth, man, soil, light brown”), from אדמה (adamah, “red earth, ground”). The correct English form is Adam, spelled A-D-A-M.
Definition
- 1The first man and the progenitor of the human race.
- 2A male given name from Hebrew.
- 3Original sin or human frailty.
- 4Jesus Christ, whose sacrifice, in Christian theology, makes possible the forgiveness of Adam's original sin.
- 5Designating a neoclassical style of furniture and architecture in the style of Robert and James Adam.
- 6First human and first prophet of Islam.
- 7An English surname originating as a patronymic.
- 8A Scottish surname originating as a patronymic.
- 9A French surname originating as a patronymic.
- 10A German surname originating as a patronymic.
- 11The drug ecstasy.
Etymology
From Middle English Adam, from Old English Adam, from Latin Adam, Adamus, from Ancient Greek Ἀδάμ (Adám), Ἄδαμος (Ádamos), from Biblical Hebrew אָדָם (adam, “earth, man, soil, light brown”), from אדמה (adamah, “red earth, ground”).
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: aadm,adamm,addam,adma,daam
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of Adam - measured in single-character edits (insert, delete, or substitute a letter). Larger bars are easier to catch; one-edit slips are the sneakiest.
Definitions, pronunciation, and etymology for this entry are drawn from Wiktionary via the kaikki.org structured extract (CC BY-SA); frequency ordering uses the FrequencyWords open word-frequency list (2018 English corpus, MIT). See the methodology for how each field is sourced and updated.
Frequently Asked Questions
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Using “Adam”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is A-D-A-M - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as /ˈæd.əm/ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Don't mix it up with “AM” - see the side-by-side comparison. Adam vs AM
- Browse more English words and confusable pairs in the same reference. English words
Data Source
Wiktionary (via kaikki.org), licensed under CC BY-SA & GFDL. Word ordering uses an open word-frequency list; misspelling variants are generated by edit-distance from the correct headword.