ai
/ˈɑ.i/
"ai" is a 2-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“ai” sits in 20 confusable pairs (corpus #4,818) as a noun. The look-alike neighbours are the real trap.
- #4,818
- frequency rank, English
- 3,931
- “A” headwords
- 20
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - A type of three-toed sloth, Bradypus tridactylus, endemic to forests of southern Venezuela, the Guianas, and northern Brazil.
Corpus desk
Index EN-ai · ai · English
ai · rank #4,818 · 0 variants · 20 confusables
- FREQ-COMMON #4,818
- LEN-SHORT 2 letters
- VOW-2 2 vowels
- CONFUS-HIGH 20 pairs
- VAR-0 0 variants
- BOOK-MID 3,931
- PHOTO-FINISH Afghanistan
Nearest frequency peer: Afghanistan (-1 rank slots)
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.
Frequency neighbours of confusable “ai”
Peers at similar corpus weight, separate from look-alike pairs below
- Aaron
Aaron
95,186 corpus weight
- actively
actively
95,185 corpus weight
- Afghanistan
Afghanistan
95,184 corpus weight
- ai
ai
95,183 corpus weight
- arrangements
arrangements
95,181 corpus weight
- asset
asset
95,180 corpus weight
What this shows Bars place “ai” against nearest ranked English headwords, not a reprint of the confusable-pair desk.
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 | ai |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /ˈɑ.i/ |
| Letters | 2 |
| Frequency rank | #4,818 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 20 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Corpus rank beside confusables of “ai”
Easy to mix with look-alikes
The spelling risk for ai is neighbouring look-alikes ("as", "at", …), not just typos; it is anoun pronounced /ˈɑ.i/. Frequency #4,818 among 3,931 “A” headwords. Gloss: "A type of three-toed sloth, Bradypus tridactylus, endemic to forests of southern Venezuela, the Guianas, and northern Brazil.".
ai has no tracked misspelling variants, suggesting the orthography follows predictable English patterns. It also participates in 20 confusable-pair relationships, "as", "at", "an", and more, where similar look or sound leads writers to substitute one word for another in context.
Etymologically, the entry records: Originated 1685–95, from Brazilian Portuguese aí, from Old Tupi a'y. The correct English form is ai, spelled A-I.
Definition
- 1A type of three-toed sloth, Bradypus tridactylus, endemic to forests of southern Venezuela, the Guianas, and northern Brazil.
Etymology
Originated 1685–95, from Brazilian Portuguese aí, from Old Tupi a'y.
Synonyms
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.