apology
Definition, pronunciation, etymology, and usage for the English word. Free spelling reference powered by Wiktionary.
Letters
7 characters
Language
English
word origin
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Detailed reference entry for the English word "apology", 7-letters, with pronunciation in International Phonetic Alphabet notation, etymology traced through Germanic and Romance roots where applicable, common misspelling variants catalogued from Hunspell error dictionaries, and usage frequency ranked against the top 100,000 English words in the Wordfreq corpus. PlainSpell covers English, Spanish, Portuguese, French, and German spelling with confusable-pair detection that highlights visually and phonetically similar words. This entry for "apology" includes synonyms, antonyms, homophones, and cross-language translation pointers sourced from Wiktionary via the kaikki.org extract. Whether you are verifying the correct spelling of "apology" for academic writing, checking homophone confusion, or exploring etymological origins, this page provides a citation-backed, free reference that requires no sign-up.
apology is aEnglishnoun. It means: An expression of remorse or regret for having said or done something that harmed another: an instance of apologizing (saying that one is sorry). Pronounced /əˈpɒl.ə.d͡ʒi/. It ranks #6,541 in English word frequency. Often confused with analogy.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | apology |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /əˈpɒl.ə.d͡ʒi/ |
| Letters | 7 |
| Frequency rank | #6,541 |
| Misspellings tracked | 10 |
| Confusable pairs | 1 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Frequency rank visualization
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for apology is 7 letters long, classified as anoun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /əˈpɒl.ə.d͡ʒi/. Corpus data places it at rank #6,541 in overall English word frequency, indicating it appears regularly in written and spoken text.Wiktionary records 3 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.
Our Hunspell-derived misspelling index lists 10 documented wrong-spelling variants for apology, with forms such as "aoplogy", "aploogy", and "apolgoy". Each variant represents a distinct typo pattern that appears often enough in corpora to be worth flagging, typically a doubled-consonant error, a silent-letter drop, or a vowel substitution.It also participates in 1 confusable-pair relationship, "analogy", where similar look or sound leads writers to substitute one word for another in context.
Etymologically, the entry records: From French apologie, from Late Latin apologia, from Ancient Greek ἀπολογία (apología, “a speech in defence”), from ἀπολογοῦμαι (apologoûmai, “I speak in my defense”), from ἀπόλογος (apólogos, “an account, story”), from ἀπό (apó, “from, off”) (see apo-) + λ… Root origin matters for spelling because borrowed morphemes (Greek, Latin, Old French, Old English) carry their source-language orthographic conventions into modern English, which is why historical etymology is often the cleanest predictor of whether a cluster like "-ough", "-eau", or "-tion" will appear. For readers arriving here from a spelling check, the authoritative guidance is: the correct English form is apology, spelled A-P-O-L-O-G-Y, and any other sequence of those letters, regardless of how natural it feels, is a misspelling in standard orthography.
Definition
- 1An expression of remorse or regret for having said or done something that harmed another: an instance of apologizing (saying that one is sorry).
- 2A formal justification, defence.
- 3Anything provided as a substitute; a makeshift.
Etymology
From French apologie, from Late Latin apologia, from Ancient Greek ἀπολογία (apología, “a speech in defence”), from ἀπολογοῦμαι (apologoûmai, “I speak in my defense”), from ἀπόλογος (apólogos, “an account, story”), from ἀπό (apó, “from, off”) (see apo-) + λόγος (lógos, “speech”). Doublet of apologia. By surface analysis, apo- + -logy.
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: aoplogy,aploogy,apolgoy,apollogy,apologgy,apologyy,apoloyg,apoolgy,appology,paology
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
Relative frequency of common misspelling types for apology
Misspelling Variants of "apology"
Frequency rank: #6,541 in English
Frequently Asked Questions
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Nearby English words
Other entries that begin with the letter A in our English index: