antiphon
/ˈæntɪfən/
"antiphon" is a 8-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“antiphon” is an uncommon English word, ranked #90,144 in English word frequency and used as a noun.
- #90,144
- frequency rank, English
- 8
- letters
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - A devotional chant; a piece of music sung responsively.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | antiphon |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /ˈæntɪfən/ |
| Letters | 8 |
| Frequency rank | #90,144 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “antiphon” sits in English frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for antiphon is 8 letters long, classified as a noun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /ˈæntɪfən/. Corpus data places it at rank #90,144 in overall English word frequency, marking it as uncommon enough that many writers pause before typing it. Wiktionary records 2 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.
No generated misspelling entries exist for antiphon in our index, suggesting the orthography follows predictable English patterns. It is not paired with a close-neighbour confusable in our dataset, since nothing in our dataset looks or sounds close enough to cause mix-ups.
Etymologically, the entry records: From French antiphone or Medieval Latin antiphōna, from Ancient Greek ἀντίφωνα (antíphōna, “responses, musical accords”), neuter plural substantive of ἀντίφωνος (antíphōnos, “concordant”) from ἀντί (antí, “in return”) + φωνή (phōnḗ, “sound”). Doublet of ant… The correct English form is antiphon, spelled A-N-T-I-P-H-O-N.
Definition
- 1A devotional chant; a piece of music sung responsively.
- 2A response or reply.
Etymology
From French antiphone or Medieval Latin antiphōna, from Ancient Greek ἀντίφωνα (antíphōna, “responses, musical accords”), neuter plural substantive of ἀντίφωνος (antíphōnos, “concordant”) from ἀντί (antí, “in return”) + φωνή (phōnḗ, “sound”). Doublet of anthem.
This word in other languages
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
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Using “antiphon”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is A-N-T-I-P-H-O-N - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as /ˈæntɪfən/ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- 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.