airway
/ˈɛə.weɪ/
"airway" is a 6-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“airway” is a moderately-common English word, ranked #22,568 in English word frequency and used as a noun.
- #22,568
- frequency rank, English
- 6
- letters
- 8
- tracked misspellings
- 8
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - The trachea.
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 | airway |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /ˈɛə.weɪ/ |
| Letters | 6 |
| Frequency rank | #22,568 |
| Misspellings tracked | 8 |
| Confusable pairs | 8 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “airway” sits in English frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for airway is 6 letters long, classified as a noun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /ˈɛə.weɪ/. Corpus data places it at rank #22,568 in overall English word frequency, marking it as uncommon enough that many writers pause before typing it. Wiktionary records 3 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.
Our generated misspelling index lists 8 likely wrong-spelling variants for airway, with forms such as "airawy", "airrway", and "airwayy". 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 8 confusable-pair relationships, "away", "airy", "array", and more, since the words sound or look close enough that writers reach for the wrong one mid-sentence.
Etymologically, the entry records: From air + way. The correct English form is airway, spelled A-I-R-W-A-Y.
Definition
- 1The trachea.
- 2A flight path used by aeroplanes.
- 3A roadway used for ventilation.
Etymology
From air + way.
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: airawy,airrway,airwayy,airwway,airwya,aiwray,ariway,iarway
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of airway - expressed in single-character edits (insert, delete, or swap one letter). Bigger bars stand out at a glance; a one-edit slip is the hardest to catch.
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
How do you spell "airway"?
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Using “airway”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is A-I-R-W-A-Y - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as /ˈɛə.weɪ/ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Don't mix it up with “away” - see the side-by-side comparison. airway vs away
- 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.