American

/əˈmɛɹɪkən/noun, adjective

American is spelled A-M-E-R-I-C-A-N: 8 letters and 4 syllables. It appears 309 times per million words in written English, the 306th most frequent word form (wordfreq, 2021 data). As a noun, American means “A citizen or national of the United States of America” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). The plural of American is Americans.

How many letters and syllables are in American?

Letters	8: A-M-E-R-I-C-A-N
Syllables	4 (from its American pronunciation)
In writing	309 times per million words; the 306th most frequent word form
Wrong spellings searched	none measured in search

Sources: letters and syllables from the English Wiktionary's hyphenation or pronunciation and the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary; written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).

How common is American?

American appears 309 times per million words in written English, the 306th most frequent word form in the list.

American0.0010.010.11101001,00010,000

rarerper million words of written Englishmore common

Source: written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).

How do you pronounce American?

British /əˈmɛɹɪkən/
US /əˈmɛɹɪkən/
US /əˈmɛɹəkən/

American has 4 syllables (counted from its American pronunciation in the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary).

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Recordings: En-uk-American.ogg, LL-Q7976_(mis)-BFDICream-American.wav, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).

Forms of American

Americans plural
Am.
Amer.
Americanian
Murican
more American comparative
most American superlative

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).

What does American mean?

The meanings the English Wiktionary records, quoted as written there (source below).

noun

1
A citizen or national of the United States of America.
Americans! your republican politics, not less than your republican religion, are flagrantly inconsistent. You boast of your love of liberty, your superior civilization, and your pure Christianity, while the whole political power of the nati
2
Any inhabitant of the Americas.
3
A citizen or inhabitant of British America.
4
archaicAn indigenous inhabitant of the Americas.
5
obsoleteAn inhabitant of French or Spanish New World colonies.
6
colloquialinformalThe dialect of English spoken in and around the contiguous United States of America.
7
Clipping of American cheese.
Q: What kinds of cheese do you have? A: We have American, Swiss, cheddar, provolone, or wiz.
8
Ellipsis of American cockroach.

adjective

1
Of, from, or pertaining to the United States of America, its people, or its culture.
He married an American woman in order to get an American passport.
2
Of, from, or pertaining to the Americas.
This is pure American powder from the foothills of Colombia.
3
Of, from, or pertaining to British North America.
4
archaicOf, from, or pertaining to the indigenous inhabitants of the Americas.
5
Able to be exercised on any date between its issue and expiry.

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).

American in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese

Language	Words
French	Américain (inhabitant of the Americas), États-Unien (person born in, or a citizen of, the U.S. – see…), américain, états-unien (of or pertaining to the U.S., its people or its…)
German	Amerikaner, Amerikanerin (inhabitant of the Americas), Amerikaner m Amerikanerin, US-Amerikaner m US-Amerikanerin, Ami (person born in, or a citizen of, the U.S. – see…), Achtelpetit (1-point type)
Portuguese	americano, americana (inhabitant of the Americas), norte-americano, estado-unidense, estadunidense (person born in, or a citizen of, the U.S. – see…), estado-unidens (of or pertaining to the U.S., its people or its…)
Spanish	americano, americana (inhabitant of the Americas), estadounidense, estadunidense, norteamericano (person born in, or a citizen of, the U.S. – see…), usamericano (of or pertaining to the U.S., its people or its…)

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Translations are Wiktionary's, by sense; a linked word has its own PlainSpell page.