anomalous
/əˈnɑmələs/adjective
anomalous is spelled A-N-O-M-A-L-O-U-S. The wrong spelling people search most is anomolous: about 240 Bing searches a month in the United States (September 2025 to August 2026), about 1 in 11 of all searches for the word. Anomalous is an adjective meaning “Deviating from the normal; marked by incongruity or contradiction; aberrant or abnormal”.
How many letters and syllables are in anomalous?
| Letters | 9: A-N-O-M-A-L-O-U-S |
|---|---|
| Syllables | 4 (from its American pronunciation) |
| In writing | about once in every 1 million words; the 31,168th most frequent word form |
| Wrong spellings searched | 1; the most searched, anomolous, about 240 Bing searches a month (all of them) |
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); Bing searches in the United States: the average month from September 2025 to August 2026 (Microsoft Advertising keyword data through DataForSEO, read September 30, 2026).
How do you spell anomalous?
Anomalous is spelled A-N-O-M-A-L-O-U-S. One wrong spelling is searched or written often enough to measure; together they are about 1 in 11 of the searches for anomalous in either form.
Bing searches in the United States: the average month from September 2025 to August 2026 (Microsoft Advertising keyword data through DataForSEO, read September 30, 2026). Wrong spellings are taken from Wiktionary entries tagged "misspelling" and its obsolete or nonstandard forms, Wikipedia's Lists of common misspellings and the codespell dictionary, then measured. The proofreader's marks show the change that corrects each one.
How common is anomalous?
Anomalous appears about once in every 1 million words in written English, the 31,168th most frequent word form in the list.
Source: written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).
How do you pronounce anomalous?
- UK /əˈnɒmələs/
- US /əˈnɑmələs/
- Australia /əˈnɔmələs/
Anomalous 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-us-anomalous.ogg, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).
Forms of anomalous
- more anomalous comparative
- most anomalous superlative
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
What does anomalous mean?
The meanings the English Wiktionary records, quoted as written there (source below).
adjective
- 1
Deviating from the normal; marked by incongruity or contradiction; aberrant or abnormal.
statistically anomalous
- 2
Of uncertain or unknown categorization; strange.
- 3
Having anomalies.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
Anomalous in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese
In the sense deviating from the normal:
| Language | Words |
|---|---|
| French | anormal, anomal |
| German | unregelmäßig, irregulär, anomal |
| Portuguese | anômalo, anómalo |
| Spanish | anómalo |
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.
Where does anomalous come from?
From Late Latin anōmalos, from Ancient Greek ἀνώμᾰλος (anṓmălos).
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).