affair
Definition, pronunciation, etymology, and usage for the English word. Free spelling reference powered by Wiktionary.
Letters
6 characters
Language
English
word origin
Source
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Detailed reference entry for the English word "affair", 6-letters, with pronunciation in International Phonetic Alphabet notation, etymology traced through Germanic and Romance roots where applicable, common misspelling variants catalogued from Hunspell error dictionaries, and usage frequency ranked against the top 100,000 English words in the Wordfreq corpus. PlainSpell covers English, Spanish, Portuguese, French, and German spelling with confusable-pair detection that highlights visually and phonetically similar words. This entry for "affair" includes synonyms, antonyms, homophones, and cross-language translation pointers sourced from Wiktionary via the kaikki.org extract. Whether you are verifying the correct spelling of "affair" for academic writing, checking homophone confusion, or exploring etymological origins, this page provides a citation-backed, free reference that requires no sign-up.
affair is aEnglishnoun. It means: Something which is done or is to be done; business of any kind, commercial, professional, or public. Pronounced /əˈfɛə/. It ranks #4,284 in English word frequency. Often confused with affix and afraid.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | affair |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /əˈfɛə/ |
| Letters | 6 |
| Frequency rank | #4,284 |
| Misspellings tracked | 6 |
| Confusable pairs | 5 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Frequency rank visualization
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for affair is 6 letters long, classified as anoun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /əˈfɛə/. Corpus data places it at rank #4,284 in overall English word frequency, indicating it appears regularly in written and spoken text.Wiktionary records 9 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.
Our Hunspell-derived misspelling index lists 6 documented wrong-spelling variants for affair, with forms such as "afafir", "afair", and "affairr". Each variant represents a distinct typo pattern that appears often enough in corpora to be worth flagging, typically a doubled-consonant error, a silent-letter drop, or a vowel substitution.It also participates in 5 confusable-pair relationships, "affix", "afraid", "affirm", and more, where similar look or sound leads writers to substitute one word for another in context.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Middle English afere, affere, from Old French afaire, from a- + faire (“to do”), from Latin ad- + facere (“to do”). See fact, and compare ado. Root origin matters for spelling because borrowed morphemes (Greek, Latin, Old French, Old English) carry their source-language orthographic conventions into modern English, which is why historical etymology is often the cleanest predictor of whether a cluster like "-ough", "-eau", or "-tion" will appear. For readers arriving here from a spelling check, the authoritative guidance is: the correct English form is affair, spelled A-F-F-A-I-R, and any other sequence of those letters, regardless of how natural it feels, is a misspelling in standard orthography.
Definition
- 1Something which is done or is to be done; business of any kind, commercial, professional, or public.
- 2Any proceeding or action which it is wished to refer to or characterize vaguely.
- 3An action or engagement not of sufficient magnitude to be called a battle.
- 4A material object (vaguely designated).
- 5An adulterous relationship, chiefly of a married person. (from affaire de cœur, affair of the heart).
- 6An otherwise illicit romantic relationship, such as with someone who is not one's regular partner (boyfriend, girlfriend).
- 7A person with whom someone has an adulterous relationship.
- 8A party or social gathering, especially of a formal nature.
- 9The (male or female) genitals.
Etymology
From Middle English afere, affere, from Old French afaire, from a- + faire (“to do”), from Latin ad- + facere (“to do”). See fact, and compare ado.
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: afafir,afair,affairr,affari,affiar,fafair
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
Relative frequency of common misspelling types for affair
Misspelling Variants of "affair"
Frequency rank: #4,284 in English
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Nearby English words
Other entries that begin with the letter A in our English index: